Is it time to hit the panic button in LALA land???? The Lakers currently sit at 1-4 and last in their division.
Wow sports pundits across the nation expected the lakers to struggle but this team looks really bad. They Committed 18 turnovers while only forcing 12, only managed to score 86 points despite all of the their starters played upwards of 35 minutes including Kobe Bryant, who was forced to play 37 while nursing his various ailments. To be honest I think the starters would have played for longer had the game been closer down the stretch. Mike Brown is rapidly earning my vote as the worst offensive coach in the NBA. He might single handedly derail their entire season despite having the most talented roster of any coach.
This team will make the playoffs barring injuries or a basketball-apocalypse of some kind (not sure what that'll look like quite yet but I will get back to you). But some very serious and fundamental questions about this teams identity remain.
1. Given what we've seen so far it seems unlikely that Steve Nash can stay healthy for extended periods of time without the best medical staff in the NBA (Phoenix Suns medical staff is unreal. There will be pieces written in the future about how they extended Steve Nash's career for 5 seasons. If there aren't, then there fucking should be), who will the lakers offense run through? Kobe Bryant? It seems to be a very risky move given he's gone through bouts of severe ball-hoggery throughout his career (most recently in the 2010 finals when he nearly handed the Celtics the championship).
2. If Mike Brown is going to insist on running his BS (Bullshit not Bill Simmons) "Hybrid Princeton Offense" where does Steve Nash fit in? He's arguably the best pick and roll player of all time and is currently playing with two perennial all-star bigs on a night in night out basis. RUN THE PICK AND ROLL MIKE BROWN! His offense is heavily reliant on a good passing big (Pau Gasol) operating on the high post and distributing. While this plays to Pau, and maybe Dwight's advantage (think high-low wide open alley oops), its hard to believe that a spread out pick and roll offense wouldn't be more effective. You could rest Pau in the middle of the first quarter by bringing on Jordan Hill a little earlier, spread the floor, and have Nash and Howard run the pick and roll 10 times. Then, after the defense makes some adjustments and you're starters get tired, bring Pau on in the second quarter and run your shitty little offense through him so you're not wasting the precious minutes that old Stevey Nash can be on the court.
Its terrifying to think that you can set up Kobe and Dwight on the weak side of a pick and roll and have Kobe in the corner to spot up. Boggles the mind why they wouldn't have Nash and Pau run the screen essentially as decoys to pass for the teams better players or take open pull-ups.
ReplyDeleteThat said, the Lakers (except maybe Antawn Jamison and Devin Ebanks) are reminiscent of the Lakers of the Smush Parker era: unidimensional players who are generally unathletic and don't have the personalities to be aggressive when Kobe is on the floor. If they had even a Boobie Gibson or a Glen Davis who aren't afraid to take big shots coming off the bench or, more importantly, some athletic backup PGs/ wings who can actually hold down their man, they might actually stand a chance in the West. Also Steve Blake is garbage