During a meeting between the Lakers and Klutch Sports, Lakers’ head coach Darvin Ham proclaimed he planned to ‘run the Lakers’ offense through Anthony Davis’ this coming season, a move approved by LeBron James.
This would be a major change for any LeBron team much less a Lakers team that’s relied upon the ball being in James’ hands since he signed as a free agent four years ago. Whether Ham can accomplish this is uncertain. What Ham’s proclamation and James’ approval signal is a recognition that it’s time for Anthony Davis to take the baton as the face of the franchise and for the Lakers to begin limiting the workload on 37-year old LeBron James.
The Lakers’ major offensive challenge has been creating spacing to prevent teams from packing the paint and forcing LeBron James and Anthony Davis to settle for outside jumpers rather than attacking the paint and the basket. Darvin Ham’s pitch to the Lakers’ front office was that the 4-out offense he ran on the Bucks with Antetokounmpo, Lopez, and Holiday could create the spacing needed by the Lakers’ big three of James, Davis, and Westbrook.
Let’s look at why Darvin Ham’s 4-out offense should give LeBron and AD more spacing than last year’s 5-out sets, where James and Davis play in the new offense, and what it means to run the offense through Anthony Davis.
Why Do 4-Out Sets Provide Better Spacing Than 5-Out Sets?
The above is the Milwaukee Bucks practice court with five blue rectangles head coach Mike Budenholzer had drawn on the court to show his players where they should be in the 4-out offense to create the best spacing.
Before changing to a 4-out offense two years ago, Budenholzer had been running 5-out sets but had been frustrated how, even with all five players spaced outside the 3-point line, defenders were still close enough to help. Switching to 4-out sets where first player down the court fills the dunker slot and the next two the corners pins three defenders to the baseline to give the remaining two offensive players the maximum possible spacing.
Budenholzer’s goal in evolving from a 5-out offense to a 4-out offense was to increase the space between defenders so that it become more difficult for defenders to help or stop scoring wings from attacking the paint and rim. Obviously, Pelinka and the Lakers’ front office are betting the spacing from Darvin Ham‘s’4-out offense can do for LeBron James and Anthony Davis what it did for the Bucks’ Giannis Antetokounmpo and Khris Middleton.
In today’s NBA, the prevailing theory is 5-out sets maximize spacing. While 5-out sets spread defenses and force every player to defend the 3-point line, 4-out sets give elite perimeter players more space to attack defenses.
Where Do LeBron James and Anthony Davis Play in 4-Out Offense?
Unlike Frank Vogel offense, Darvin Ham’s 4-out offense is a positionless system. Players take spots on the court based on the order they arrive in the front court rather than the position in the lineup they play.
In Darvin Ham’s 4-out offense, the first player down the court takes the dunker spot, in this case Brook Lopez. The second and third players down the court — Bobby Portis and Grayson Allen — go to left and right corners. Assuming no early offense, the fourth and fifth players down the court — Giannis Antetokounmpo and Khris Middleton — become the wings with potential help defenders too far away to keep them from penetrating.
The Lakers will be actively looking for early offense opportunities, either a pass to AD or another defender who leaked out after challenging a 3-point shot or to the second and third players who filled the left and right corner. While the Lakers new offense is positionless, LeBron James and Anthony Davis will often wind up being the two wings at the top of the key with the other three players and their defenders lined up along the baseline.
While there will be matchups where the Lakers’ superstars post up, James and Davis will usually be positioned on the wings above the break with the greatest possible space between help defenders on the left and right.
What Does Running the Offense Through Anthony Davis Really Mean?
Running the offense through Anthony Davis really means featuring him as the Lakers’ primary offensive weapon, the superstar whom the team relies upon to lead in scoring and get them a bucket when desperately needed.
The last three years, LeBron James remained as the Lakers’ leading scorer, averaging 25.3, 25.0, and 30.3 points per game versus 26.1, 21.8, and 23.2 points per game averaged by Anthony Davis during the same three years. When it came to total shot attempts, LeBron James averaged 19.4, 18.3, and 21.8 shot attempts per game the last three years versus 17.7, 17.0, and 17.4 shot attempts per game for Anthony Davis over the same three years.
If the Lakers want to compete for an NBA championship, they’re going to need both LeBron James and Anthony Davis to stay healthy all season and perform at the same heightened level they played to win in the bubble. Realistically, if the Lakers run their offense through AD, he should be expected to lead the team with 20 shot attempts and 30 points per game with LeBron backing him up with 15 shot attempts and 25 points per game.
The Los Angeles Lakers are at a critical crossroads and desperately need to find out whether Anthony Davis can take the baton from LeBron James and become the lead superstar through whom they can run their offense.
Lakers will have a modern NBA offense for the very first time! Think about that. Other than a brief flirtation with an over-the-hill Marc Gasol, the Lakers have never had a modern center. This is going to change everything for LeBron and AD.
It will be interesting seeing how the Lakers adapt to Ham’s 4-out offense. Of course, we still need to see whom the Lakers are able to trade Russ and THT for as that could change who plays the 5.
At any rate, there’s no question that LeBron and AD will be the team’s two forwards. Who is the three and who is the four won’t really matter as Ham’s offense is actually positionless. Where guys end up to start the possession is based on who gets into the front court first. 1-Dunker, 2&3-Corners, 4&5-Wings.
Most of the time, Giannis and Khris were the wings for the Bucks and LeBron and AD will be for the Lakers. With the improved spacing that Ham’s 4-out offense will provide, LeBron and AD will be positioned beyond the arc on the wings with just a single defender between them and the paint and the longest possible distance to the hep defenders on either side.
Going to be hard to stay in front of LeBron or AD in Ham’s offense, which then opens up everything from drive-and-kick to 3-point shooters or drive-and-dish to whomever is in the dunker position.
Anthony is 29-years old.
LeBron is 37-years old.
Who should play the three?
Who should play the four?
I think it’s obvious.
I think it’s what coach says.
Wing stopper is MIP role on D
Wing scorer is the MIP role on O
AD should and will play wing.
JMO.
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Good write up and analysis of the potential look the offense might be. A far more interesting topic than trades in a vacuum. In some ways though we need for the roster to take on a look of finality before diving wholesale into this discussion. Although the two main culprits, AD and LBJ, will certainly feast first and second, but after that it’s fairly wide open. Even if Russ is still a Laker. Training camp and preseason should be fun.
Thanks for reading and commenting, Jamie. It was a fun article to research and makes me eager to see how the offense works. I’m in 7th heaven. Ham is a defense first coach who plays a modern offense. That’s the perfect combo for me. Now go out and get players he needs to play his style of basketball. Defense first. Modern offense.
I’m looking forward to seeing how the spacing Ham’s offense creates changes and makes LeBron and AD harder to guard. While the offense is positionless, it works best when all five players are interchangeable on offense in that they can shoot and on defense in that they can defend at all three levels.
Swap out Russ and THT for three or four legitimate rotation players who can shoot and/or defend and suddenly this team looks a whole lot different. Keep Russ and it’s pretty much a younger, bigger, and poorer shooting version of last year’s team.
Regardless if there’s a trade or not I’m curious to see how we play in transition and semi-transition. Last year everyone from the coach to the ball boy said “we want to be a team that gets out on the break for easy baskets.” which we actually kind of did, 14.8 pot in transition. Problem was we let other teams get out break or score in the paint worse than every other team except Houston. The reasons for that were vast, from bad shots, half-hearted defense, and a general lack of effort. Also old everywhere. LeBron and Russ have a tendency to recover wind and stamina by walking the ball up the court when they could push the pace a little more. Don’t see that changing, and other than AD we don’t much in the way of a solid defense. So I’m actually more curious to see what coach Ham does to stymie easy baskets with whomever is on the roster. If that doesn’t change it won’t really matter whom we run the offense through. Teams ran it down our throats all game, pretty much every game last season. Not sure we have addressed that yet. Also not sure we can given the tools we have to work with this season.
The problem is with the Lakers right now is they’ve done mostly a good job this offseason. I like that they hired Ham and got younger, longer, and more athletic. Unfortunately, whether they can successfully pull off a good rebuild will depend on what they get from Russ.
I know you like to take the current roster and extrapolate what’s going to happen based on what we have now but I think that’s fruitless because the Lakers have multiple options to trade Russ and are not going to keep him under any circumstances imo. So I prefer looking at the likely options, which are we trade for Kyrie and Joe or Seth or Myles and Buddy.
I also don’t think anything we did offensively or defensively last season has any bearing on this season. It’s a new coach and systems and will be mostly new players and systems. I also think last year’s team’s character was lacking, mostly due to Russ, and they frankly just gave up and quit.
Anyway, you’re right that if what we have now is what we go into the season with, we’re going to suck and will be lucky to make the playoffs even if we are healthy. But trade Russ to the Pacers or Nets and suddenly the Lakers have at least a puncher’s chance to be good again.
What’s concerning to me is that we might end up with Kyrie when I think Myles Turner and Buddy Hield would be the smarter and better fitting trade to pursue. Kyrie is going to take touches away from LeBron and AD and I would not trust him with a long term contract.