Aloha,

Both Tom and Jamie had great posts breaking down the series. Here are a few things I will be watching.

1.AD’s back. He was visibly laboring against the Pels. For the Lakers to have a chance AD has to be as close to 100% as possible this time of year. He needs to score and rebound to negate what the Joker will do.

2. DLO. Like everyone else I think DLO is key. Now he doesn’t have to be great, just decent. If he were decent last year we may have won.

3. The bench. This is a possible advantage that isn’t getting a lot of attention. Last year Bruce Brown and Jeff Green were huge for the Nuggets. While a couple of young guys have stepped up, they still are not as impactful. Gabe, Prince and Spencer are all experienced vets that should give us the advantage. Gabe in particular could be huge. I’ve been impressed with his defense since he’s returned. The last game he found his shot, if that continues he could play important role, especially defending Murray.

4. The starters defense. Both DLO and Austin have slow feet. They will never become lock down defenders but they are becoming better in a team scheme. DLO in particular has been better on that side of the ball with steals, deflections and the occasional sneaky blind side block. I think AD has to guard the Joker much of the time straight up. The Joker shines when you send doubles. The last time we played the Nuggets we did a good job on Murray but we left Porter Jr open and he went 10 for 10 five of which were 3’s. Ball game. Let the Joker score 35, just don’t let other guys beat us.

5. Rui. Rui has grown a lot over the last few months on both sides of the ball. Defensively he has become one of the best defenders on the team. He’s also been good on the boards which I thought was the weakest part of his game. And can we please the guy a few more shots? He’s our best shooter. Rarely have I seen a guy that shoots as well as Rui get under 10 shots a game. And from 3 he’s shooting 42%.

6. The first 2 games. It’s simple. Win one and I think we can win the series. Lose both and we lose the series.

Aloha,

Wow, LeBron had an amazing game. While a lot of the attention is going towards his offensive game, his defense was impressive as well.

The Lakers are a bad matchup for the Pels. Zion doesn’t have much of a perimeter game. He makes his living in the paint, overwhelming his opponents with his strength and athleticism inside. Now we all know that LeBron’s defense has fallen off, particularly on the perimeter. But with Zion you don’t have to worry about the perimeter. Lebron just waited for him. LeBron is one of the few players in the league that can match Zions strength inside. And when you have AD behind him, we effectively bottle Zion up and disrupted the Pels entire offense. And a shout out to Rui as well. At times he was on Zion and he also held his own. But then Rui is also extremely strong with a 7’ 2” wing span.

After the Grizzlies debacle I was really worried about our focus, but it was laser sharp, with everyone contributing. If we continue to play defense with this much energy we have a real chance at a run.

Aloha,

Last night was a tough break. Still, somehow we still have a chance. We have one advantage, we only have 3 games left. The 3 teams ahead of us have 4. When you look at the schedules of those teams all 3 have at least 3 tough games left. The Suns have 4. If we win out we pass any of them if they go 2 and 2. The Pels and Kings have injuries. I don’t think it’s a stretch to think that at least one of those teams go 2-2.

Aloha,

We won the biggest game of the year yesterday. Today’s game is now the biggest game of the year. Every remaining game will be the biggest. The TWolves on a back to back is probably our biggest remaining challenge.

I think the thing that has been fueling our recent winning ways is defense. It’s been pretty good recently. Yesterday was a good example. Mobley and Struss didn’t hurt us which is a result of good D from LeBron and Rui. And the backcourt D was good as well. Mitchell only scored 10 points. Garland had 26 but on 25 shots which for me is acceptable. Of course having the best defender in the game patrolling the paint goes a long way on that side of the ball. AD’s 6 blocks doesn’t even come close to explaining how dominant he was inside.

Our Transition D has been excellent and the effort that Dlo and Austin have been giving has really helped. Actually Dlo has played harder on defense all year. He has slow feet so he will never be great. But he has made up for it with quick hands and quality defensive reads. Rui has also came a long way defensively over the last couple of months. With our ability to score. having even an average defense can lead to a deep playoff run. It would be great to get Vando back but it would take some time for him to get back to where he was.

The 6th seed is still a possibility but one loss likely ends that. Both the Pels and the Kings are hurt and we possibly could pass both with one loss. But I would prefer not to have to find out.

Let’s win this, biggest game of the year.

Aloha,

The Lakers hada huge night and didn’t even play. The Kings lost to the Celtics but the Celtics almost blew it. They pulled their starters out at the 6 minute mark and the Kings went on a 21 to 2 run and lost by one. If the Celtics lost this game I would hate them even more than I already do. We are now tied with the Kings but because of the tie breaker we need to win one more game than the Kings. With all their injuries and some tough games left we are right there.

The Pels also lost to the Spurs. They are ahead of us by only one game. We currently hold the tie break with one game remaining with them. They also have injuries and some tough games remaining. If we beat them in the last game again we only need to win one more than them.

The Warriors also lost to Dallas without Luka. We now are a full two games ahead of them.
Their schedule is easier than ours, so our last game with them will be huge.

The last game that mattered was the Suns TWolves game. Unfortunately that one isn’t going as well. The Twolves are down 13 at the beginning of the 4th. We hold the tie break with the Suns, so we would need to win two more games then the Suns, which probably would require us winning out. The Suns schedule is tough but they are playing well.

Of course the 6th would be ideal. I think we would have a better chance for a deep run if we could finish 6th. LeBron would get 6 days of rest, as would Austin. He admitted he’s dealing with fatigue. After the long playoff run, the summer with team USA and playing every game this year. Yes he could use
The time off. Finally it give Vando 6 more days to ramp up which would be huge.

Oh, we did clinch a play in today as well. But that was pretty much a given. Still the 7th or 8th is still very achievable but we need to keep winning.

Aloha,

The road trip is over and 5-1 is a very good result. While it wasn’t always pretty, a 6 game roady with 2 back to backs does not lend itself to perfection.

LeBron and AD have both ramped up their games and are playing at a high level. When those two play like this we always have a chance.

Darvin’s handling of Rui still baffles me. He scored 19 on 9 for 12 shooting with 7 boards in 27 minutes. 7 less than any other starter. He was a plus 21and played some good defense. He was generally off the floor when the Wiz made their runs. I just don’t get it.

If we are going to make any noise in the playoffs we will need more production from the 2nd unit. I think Darvin will need to mix up the rotations some and stop having say 4 reserves with one star.

Vando is working out and could be available for the last couple of games. While that’s good news, I think it could be a while before he could give us quality minutes.

At one point we were 25 and 25 in the 9th seed. Now we are 44 and 33 in the 9th seed. Pretty frustrating.

I still think it’s possible to get out of the 9th spot. If we can win our last 5 we might have a shot at the 6th. And the scenarios are not a stretch. The Pels would need to go 4 and 2 and the Kings 4 and 3. Both have key injured players with some tough games coming up. The Kings have a very tough back to back against the Celtics and Knicks. Hoping the Celtics don’t start resting their stars yet. As for the Suns they also would need to go 4 and 2. They also have a tough schedule. They got a little lucky when they played the Nuggets without Murray. It only takes one of the 3 to slip to get out of the 9th. That is if we keep winning.

Aloha,

Well the playoffs are not even here yet and the click bait crew is already posting trade scenarios for the Lakers. Everyone seems to think we need a third star. And most of the names mentioned are offensive players, even though after a slow start our offense is rolling.

Since February 1st we are 18 and 8 with 10 wins coming against playoff teams. That roughly equates to a 68 win season over 82 games. And even. More note worthy was the fact that Vando and Vincent each played in just one game. Both of them were being counted on as important role players for this team.

The problem with trades for stars is they cost a lot. While you may strengthen one position you can weaken your team by losing quality role players. I am still under the impression that this team is much better than their record. The amount of injuries along with some truly baffling rotations have contributed to where we are now.

I’m am still a fan of depth over a third star. Look at the Nuggets. They are 6 and 11 when a star sits because they have no depth. The Suns are fighting for their playoff lives because of one star being out a lot. On the other hand the Lakers are 6 and 4 when LeBron sits. They have had problems when AD has missed games but that’s primarily because we don’t have quality depth behind him.

Some say we need better perimeter defense but our two best perimeter defenders have hardly played. Vando being out has also hurt our rebounding.

When you look at recent champions they all have a few years of continuity. Our core only came together at the trade deadline last year and got us to the conference finals. Austin, Rui and Vando haven’t even reached their prime years yet. I’m watching both Austin and Rui grow. Rui in particular has really elevated his game since becoming a starter. While Austin was fatigued from a summer with Team USA early on, he has rebounded nicely. I would hate to give up either at this point.

I think ultimately our off season will depend on how we look in the post season. It’s not easy to win a ring after only being together a year. I would love to run this group back and give them another year to grow as a team and as individual players. I would like to try and improve around the edges. With LeBron and AD’s injury histories I don’t believe 3 stars and no depth is the right path forward.

Aloha,

Back in the day Phil would circle games he thought would be schedule losses. I’m sure he would have circled this one. 3rd game in 4 nights on the road against a quality team certainly had all the ingredients of a schedule loss. All the missed shots was a dead give away.

Watching this game reminded me yet again of how disruptive injuries have been to this season. I thought we handled Haliburton well in the two Pacers game but he’s not what one would consider a quick guard and our guards for the most part stayed with him. It was TJ in both games that killed us. And he is definitely a quick guard. He’s the kind of guard we brought Gabe into guard. He is an excellent on ball defender and can hang with that type of small quick guard.

The other player that hurt us was Siakam. He is the kind of player we could have put Vando on. When I read that the Lakers need to trade for better perimeter defense, I just wish we had the opportunity to know for sure. While both Vando and Gabe could be back soon, the question is will they be ramped up and ready to really contribute.

I had hoped for a 5-1 road trip and that’s still in play. It’s a shame we lost with both the Suns and Kings losing. But they both have schedule challenges ahead so if we can keep winning, it’s not out of the question that we can pass both of them

Aloha,

I was a little nervous about this game. After an emotionally and physically draining double overtime win against the Bucks. this was a classic trap game without AD. Fortunately we got the win, it wasn’t pretty but I didn’t care.

LeBron was in complete control of this game with yet another triple double. Thats why I didn’t panic when the Grizzlies went on that ridiculous run to end the third. Still I really wish LeBron would stop trying to make those cross court passes that have like a 5% chance of being completed. I don’t mind a turnover due to a great defensive play but a lot of LeBrons turnovers are self inflicted.

With AD out we needed someone to step into the 2nd star role and Rui did just that. 32 and 10, 7-8 from 3 and 2 blocks will get it done. Rui is the most underrated player on the team. The first part of the year he was in and out of the line up, followed by Darvin constant tinkering with the rotations. Rui is shooting 42% from 3 for the year and since being inserted into the starting lineup at the beginning of February he has averaged 16 per. He is 6’ 8” 230 pounds with a 7 foot wing span. He is a matchup problem for most wings and I get a bit frustrated that he is not featured more but it’s safe to say that there are few 5th options in the league as good as him. Considering his defense has really picked up as well, he really deserves a little more love than he gets.

Austin’s shot was not falling last night but he made up for it with 11 assists and over all gritty play.

DLO continues his scorching 3 point shooting with a 5-9 night but the rest of his game was quite lack luster. But considering that he had been sick and then played 50 minutes against the Bucks the night before, I’ll give him a pass.

Last but not least was a Jackson Hayes. I was really worried when AD was scratched because triple J is a quality big but Jackson had 14 and 7 and pretty much matched Triple J’s production. Jackson really has been improving as the year has went on. He doesn’t have a lot in his back pocket which is a problem against beefier centers but he always brings the energy.

So I was hoping for a 5 and 1 road trip but since we got past the Bucks, a 6-0 trip is still in play. A lot will depend on AD’s health. We can probably get by the rest of the way without him, except for the Pacers. That would be tough game without him. Still, I’m feeling really good about this team as the playoffs approach. We have been winning a lot and many of those wins have come against quality teams. We just need to keep it up.

Aloha,

After witnessing one of the worst first quarters of the year I asked myself why am I watching this? Then the Lakers would do a little something then fall back again and I continued to ask that question well into the 4th quarter. Then a funny thing happened. We won.

This was one of the most impressive wins of the year. Holding the Bucks to 13 points in the 4th was one of our best defensive efforts of the year. Just a few thoughts.

Austin is a gamer. To be a gamer one must not be afraid of the moment and Austin never is an afraid of the moment. His triple double was perhaps his best game as a Laker, on both sides of the ball. His two clutch 3’s were huge game saving shots. Austin always seems to rise to the occasion when LeBron is out.

Never sit Dlo because he isn’t shooting well. Darvin would do that earlier in the year. Elite shooters can explode at any time. Dlo hit 5 3’s in the 2nd half and hit big free throws and dished 12 assists.

Speaking of free throws, the game never should have went to OT. Dlo got hammered on that layup with 6 seconds left in regulation.

AD is a warrior and the soft label should be retired forever. Not his best shooting night but he played through pain and dominated the game in the second half. Amazing performance.

Lost in all of this was Rui’s great game. 16 points and 14 boards along with some solid defense. Defense is the area of his game that gets little attention but he is developing into a very good defender.

Spencer needs the ball in his hands. He hasn’t been nearly as effective off the ball. Darvin needs to play him when DLO sits as much as possible. Although he was great defensively again.

I think the reason the team rises to the occasion when LeBron sits is because the players are free to be themselves. They have a tendency to LeBron watch. We won without LeBron last year down the stretch and we have won this year. AD is the guy we can’t win without.

The Grizzlies will be tough. They are playing a lot of young guys and will run. After this exhausting game the Lakers will need to dig deep to win. I’m hoping that AD’s knee is sound because we will need him. Losing to the Griz would diminish the Bucks win. The 7/8 seed is still within reach but we can’t let up against anyone.

Aloha,

All Lakers fans eyes have been fixed on what the Suns, Kings and Mavs do down the stretch. I would add the Clippers to that list. After the Lakers beat the 76ers and Pacers, the Clippers lost to both at home. They have lost 6 of the last 9 and have fallen to 5th, a mere 2 games out of 7th. They also have quite a few tough games coming up. And they are healthy. We hold the tie breaker against them so it could be huge if they slip to 7th or 8th. One wonders what management will do if they fail badly in the playoffs. Their stars have been available most of the time. PG and Harden are both free agents. It will be interesting to see if they pay them.

Aloha,

A win is a win is a win but man, that was ugly. Two things happened that we haven’t seen for a while. Our offense had been humming along nicely until last night. 21 turnovers led by LeBron with 8, guys missing shots they normally make and a lot of missed free throws made it appear like we were trying to lose.

Fortunately the other thing we haven’t seen for awhile showed up. Defense. We held the 76ers under a 100 points. The Lakers hadn’t done that since December. Maxie had 27 points but on 26 shots. I’ll take that every day of the week. Spencer and Cam were great on the perimeter and there wasn’t a 76er that had a good shooting night.

The 76ers are without Embid but they have been a tough out for everyone without him. They would not have won as many games with him if they didn’t have a lot of talent on that team. So I’m happy that no matter how hard we tried to lose, we didn’t fold and took over in the 4th.

Now the question becomes, can we play the kind of offense we had been playing along with the defense that we saw last night. That will be key. We went 9 and 2 down the stretch last year, with LeBron missing some of those games. Our schedule has us set up for a similar run if we can get it together. With 12 games left we really need to go 10-2 to have a chance to move up. Some of the teams above us have tougher schedules then the Lakers. Moving up in the standings will be tough but not impossible but there is zero room for error.

Aloha ,

I don’t have much to say about last night. We lost the game in the 3rd quarter when we couldn’t hit a shot. But one thing stuck out to me. Rui had 17 in the first half on 8-10 shooting. He scored 29 in the last Kings game. It’s obvious they had a matchup issue with Rui. So why did Rui get his first shot of the 2nd half at the 6 minute mark of the 4th quarter? Ham has done this before. I don’t understand a coach going away from a hot hand. Makes no sense to me. We didn’t score a basket for 7 minutes in the 3rd. Our big 3 scorers couldn’t shoot. Why not look to run things for Rui? I can’t figure it out.

Aloha,

Wow one of the most exciting games we have had for awhile. DLO not only picked up the slack for LeBron but he was the best player on the floor all night. He basically out Lillard,Lillard. That tailbone injury DLO suffered may have saved the season. He sat and watched the team play and when he came back he decided to be himself and he stopped deferring as much. With no LeBron he took control of the team and not only scored but had 9 assists. If passes that leads to free throws. Counted as assists he would have had several more. Hopefully he will remain assertive the rest of the season.

Spencer has yet to supply a lot of offensive. I think he has deferred too much on that end. But he has been playing some great defense since coming to the Lakers.
Lillard had 28 points but it was a bad 28. Nothing came easy and Spencer blocked him twice including that incredible game winner. Hopefully he will become more aggressive on the offensive end as our 2nd unit needs more offensive firepower.

I thought AD had a real gutsy performance. He was rolling until he took that blow to his shoulder. Still he played with one arm most of the 4th quarter. While he was no longer scoring, he still managed to be a force on defense down the stretch. With DLO scoring 21 in the 4th he really didn’t need to score. I’m hoping that the shoulder is just a nerve thing, like a bad stinger and he will be ready to go against the TWolves. We are 5-4 without LeBron but there is no way we can be that effective without AD. Our entire defense depends on him.

We are 11-5 since February 1st, with a lot of those wins coming against quality teams. When looking at the schedule 11-5 would have been viewed as a nice result. Unfortunately we had dug a deep hole and we really needed to go 13-3. But games like last night give me some measure of optimism. If we can avoid anymore major injuries and get some of our best defenders and rebounders back, we still could be a tough out in the playoffs. We have to do it again, against the TWolves.

Aloha,

Another loss to the Nuggets in the last few minutes. What else is new. Sometimes Darvin baffles me. AD has had great success attacking Joker in the past. You have to makes the Joker play defense but somehow it didn’t sink in for Darvin and he didn’t make an adjustment.

Then there was Rui. 23 points in first 3 quarters. They didn’t have anyone that could guard him. One would think a coach would ride that. Rui got one shot in the 4th quarter. I have no idea why.

While Rui did his best he is just not tall enough to guard the Joker. I could maybe understand not having AD on him all game but he should have been on the Joker for those last 7 minutes.

We were up 2 with 7:30 left when Darvin took DLO out and brought Cam in to defend Murray. Up to that point Murray scored 3 in The 4th. He score 3 more baskets down the stretch. When DLO is in he stretches the floor. Whether he is hitting shots or not you have respect him. After DLO went out the Nuggets began to drop an extra man and clogged the paint. AD and LeBron both were stripped in the traffic. DLO wasn’t reinserted back in until the 1:30 left and 7 points behind. We had stopped scoring, it would have been nice having our best shooter in the game.

It would have been nice to get this one. The loss makes the OKC game even bigger. Perhaps we can summon a little defense or maybe our 2nd unit will actually score a few points for a change. What ever we better find a way to win this one.