The Lakers have 2 issues.: 1. Lebron ACTUALLY thinks the Lakers "aren't far from title contention." 2. "So does the rest of the team" This is the same team that BARELY made the play-in and lost in the first round. With SEVERAL notable differences. 1. They lost Prince, but drafted Knecht. (I don't see a rookie coming off the bench contributing more than Prince statistically.) 2. AD and Lebron were both mostly healthy last season. (AD played in a career-best 76 games. Lebron played in 71 games; the most since leaving Cleveland). With AD's injury history and Lebron being nearly 40 year older, the chances of lightning striking twice are almost none. So I expect this team to struggle just to make the Play-In again this year. And that's IF both AD and Lebron can stay healthy all year. If EITHER miss significant time to injury, this team will miss the playoffs altogether.
@@mattosso7676 technically Davis only played in 38 games last year... Considering he vanishes half the game Seriously, when is the last time you saw another player that at some point in the game you went? Oh hey, what happened to him? And he's a freaking big guy Hell I go watch them play in person and oftentimes I forget that Anthony Davis is even on the freaking floor
@@justthisguy1948 Almost every game they move is they lose when Anthony Davis sits on the bench and they give up a string of second Chance points Nothing and I mean absolutely nothing comes close to that It is literally the easiest fix in all of pro-sports and yet refuse to do it
Well I have been saying that for the past 10 days.. that roster won 47 games with below average coaching, numerous lineup changes by that Coach, it's two top defenders missing 70+ games yet just 4 games behind the 4th seeded Clippers... those 4 losses The Spurs, Nets at home, the Heat at home without Butler, The Rockets on the road when both AD & LBJ rested. FUN fact the Kings in 2023 won the Pacific with 48 wins. Fans and the media always demand changes for the sake of changes if the team doesn't win a title which is ridiculous...That's how the Lakers ended up with R.W on the roster. The Fans, media even Magic himself screamed for changes.. they wanted Kuz, KCP, Dennis gone, even were indifferent about Alex, because they witnessed him get smoked for 6 games by Booker while barely scoring himself. when the changes occurred and things turned sour, they have spent the last 3 years complaining about not having those same players they wanted Banished from Lakerdom.. go figure.
The starting line up of D-Lo, Reeves, Vando, LeBron and AD was enroute to a 55 win season. This is why the off season last year was so lauded. It didnt take rocket science but instead we got Darvin Ham.
@@antibrotha Trading the farm for whats been available in a weak free agent market just makes you worse. Then again, I don't expect the average fan to comprehend that, they are just impatient and generally have little understanding of context.
@@50yearoldskater 😂 everybody turned y’all down including coaches lol Yall are finished atleast Yall have the bronny storyline to keep Yall entertained during Yall 45 win season
@@antibrothain fairness, it always someone at fault/a reason. Why didn’t dallas win the finals? Why didn’t the Knicks go to the finals, etc. no denying Haw wasn’t a good coach? Can’t say I watched a game where he outsmarted another coach
@@LockedOnLakers Vando is just an average player, and has to FIRST be able to get back on the court before we can even count him as a factor on this team.
@@mattosso7676 He might be average on a lot of teams but on a team like this who doesn't even have a 7th grade understanding of how to rebound a ball he is vital Only Vando and Max. Christie actually know how to rebound or even give the effort to do so. And since rebounding is far and away this team's biggest weakness that actually makes them two of the most important players on the team
5-6 seed is not out of the question. Avoid the play in and anything can happen in the playoffs. Teams still don’t wanna see a healthy Lakers squad in the playoffs
We can almost look at Vando, Vincent, and Woods as Free agent signings this year. They were not able to contribute to the end of the season last year. Who knows how things would have turned out if health didnt become a problem
I believe if we have everyone healthy for most of the year and AD and Lebron can stay healthy similar to last season we can hope for 5th seed at best. Behind OKC, Dallas, Minnesota and Denver in that order. Seeds 5-10 will be a dog fight next season once again.
The coaching is actually going to make a difference . Ham was just so bad. He didn’t know what he was doing . I think Reddick will get the Lakers right . As far as Line ups, strategy , and adjustments .
Isn't it possible Lakers Roster is good enough & all they need is a Good Analytical Number Crunching Coach who can Maximize Talent & Minimize unnecessary Mistakes
No. They aren't good enough. Talent wins. Talent ALWAYS wins. There are just too many teams in the West that have better depth and more overall talent than the Lakers. This is a Play-in team at best. At worst, AD or Lebron miss significant time and they miss the playoffs entirely.
Ham was playing defense on Jamal Murray and Jokic??? Please look at the backcourts that are on the elite contenders, they are special on offense and most are more importantly special on defense. Ham cost us nothing, was he great? No, but give him Jru and DWhite and he wins a lot more games including playoffs than with Reeves and DLo.
@@Oberonz1 If Ham had the Celtics back court, he would of found a way to screw that up too! At the most crucial times of the game you would probably see Jhru Holiday And D white on the bench if Ham was coaching. Get outta here with that
Max averaged less than an assist per game last year. Fourteen minutes a game. That's a pretty decent sample. That's why he didn't play. He should be better this year.
I feel like an analogy for Reddick over assistant coaches with “experience” is do you rather the long time “interns” for the job ( assistants coaches in the league) OR do you rather the psychotically prepared person for the job ( Reddick) I’m taking my chances with Reddick rn 😂
I completely understand the nuance of swapping players like D-lo. I really enjoyed the twitter conversation trying to explain what you lose by trading him. And when we talk about availability I understand some apprehension to assume Lebron and AD would be available for as many games this season. My counter for Lebron is that minus some freak injuries in the past few years (some triggered by other players), Lebron has built his career around being available. AD is more questionable to me. This is why I think getting a quality (backup or really starting caliber) center is critical for this season. Not only does a quality big give AD the opportunity to play a forward position, it also provides protection in the case AD is out. This is why someone like Walker Kessler would be intriguing IF Utah is really willing to move him for just one of our 1st rounders (maybe with little/no protections). Such a move would require limited resources to make the deal given his low salary. Any other move is much more sophisticated. If you swap out d-lo or rui for a better defender you probably have to have others step up their offense and creation for others - the replacement players is unlikely to be as good offensively PLUS be a notable improvement on defense. All this said ... I think we should also consider the mental aspect of a roster change. I would assume most players on this team assume we cannot win with what we have. Sometimes, change for the sake of change has value. Even if you're not necessarily adding more talent - I just hope we are not losing too much shooting for the sake of defense (we have already seen what poor 3 point shooting looks like).
For the title. Yes he's right. But it would be preferred to make it easier haha. Doesn't make sense to keep hoping that regular season D lo will show up in the playoffs. He basically never has
Vincent's only good play was in the playoff run with the Heat. For his career he is a slightly below average player. Not a big assist guy and 33% from 3 and 39% overall.
Yeah, one time I saw Brian K on another podcasters show, and somehow figured that Andy shaved his beard. I'm like, Andy looks pretty different with the beard shaved off. Don't ask.
I hate these topics. We get our hopes up for nothing. Lebron and AD tie up most of the money, if we can't move DLO we will have to pay him. If im gonna be honest, say we make no moves and such. I think this reason will be the worst of the Last 3 seasons
I would agree that the Lakers were not necessarily "better" than some of the teams you listed in the west. But this year and maybe going forward the match ups seem to be playing a larger role. Dallas was not a challenge for Boston. But Denver, LA, Minestota could have been. Dallas was not the "best team" in the west the seeding broke extremely right for them.
@@akaspon1 They will cherry pick what they want bro. There is no logic. I could list 10 big moments when DLo delivered last season, including against the Nuggets
Lakers was just injured last season that’s all and people don’t give them the same benefit of others like they only lost to the defending champions and beat every other team,make two small moves and we 👍 💜💛💪🏾
If I actually believed any of it I would say you guys have had the worst freaking concert luck in history! Come on spare us the made up stories and just do the stupid ad
@@LN-Lifer The LL Cool J story in that read (and the one I often mention about the Police) one hundred percent true. Seriously, why would I even make that up? It’s not exciting or weird enough to be fake. AK
