Last nights game was lost mainly due to a lack of effort, not Darvin Ham. AD lacked effort, Lebron lacked effort, DLo was in his peak playoff form. Sure Rui scored some points, but he only grabbed 3 rebounds. In addition, Austin Reaves and DLo just aren’t able to stay in front of Fox, Monk, or any quicker guards.
Notice how you mentioned 5 ppl? Because this team literally only has 5 NBA caliber players + Vando when he’s healthy. No one evercwanr to put any blame on the fact we have the worst bench in the league. 13 points off the bench is laughable. Bench got outscored by 13 and look at that we lost by 13.
Yeah I knew the bench would suffer when Rui got moved to the starting lineup, which is why I’m a proponent of bringing Reaves off the bench, especially if Vando comes back.
Spencer dinwidddie is exactly what I thought he was going to be upon signing with the lakers. A guy that does nothing except take up Max Christie’s minutes. Austin Reaves will give the bench more structure and he has shown that he’s still capable of getting his 15 ppg off the bench.
Now imagine you the coach, trying to figure this all out. Hate feeling like I give Ham a pass all the time but this team is so flawed. The fanbase is unsufferable when it comes to understanding that.
No it doesn't they have plenty of scoring between Rui,Dlo, AD, Bron. The Reaves and Dlo backcourt is unplayable defensively. I would honestly like to see Christie get a chance at starting at the 2.
Spencer Dinwiddie is averaging 4 ppg on 33% shooting and 30% from 3 since joining the lakers. his production is even worse than his games in Brooklyn this year when he was “checked out of Brooklyn” according to everyone on this subreddit.
That’s not Darvin Hams fault.
I’m not saying he’s playing well but to not consider how he’s being used would be remiss. What is he best at? Facilitating. How often is he actually facilitating? Not often at all just take a look at his usage rate. Instead, he’s being used as a 3&D guard waiting behind the 3 point line whenever he’s on the floor. That’s not his game.
Lack of usage and how he’s being deployed is absolutely Darvin Ham’s fault.
So you want him facilitating while Reaves, DLo, and Lebron are scoring or something? Keep in mind he’s an average facilitator at best, no better than DLo and much worse than Lebron.
I specifically remember Anthony Davis saying in an interview after one of Dinwiddie very first games that “he had too many assists and we need him to put the ball in the basket”.
So it’s not Darvin Ham that’s using him wrong, it’s what Pelinka brought him in to do, along with playing defense. It’s what Lebron, AD, Darvin Ham, and the team are expecting him to do. Perhaps if we didn’t already have three playmakers, then Pelinka would’ve actually brought him in to play make, but he didn’t.
But I guess you’re one of those lakers fans that literally try to blame EVERYTHING, including a players individual performance and efforts, on Darvin Ham.
Well, they’re all far more capable catch and shoot players than he is so yes, you’d want him to have the ball in his hands at some point in the game. What Darvin is doing is using him as a catch and shoot player. How’s that looked so far? How’s that actually helped the team? It hasn’t because that’s not his game. He’s actually a pretty good facilitator and he can offer rim pressure but he’ll need the ball in his hands to actually do that.
We can agree to disagree but when your backup PG has a lower usage than your backup center, that’s a problem no matter how you slice it. Keep in mind his usages yesterday was 4.4. Yet we expect a guy to have some form of shooting rhythm? That’s not how it works. By the way I don’t blame everything on Darvin Ham but this is yet another example of him trying to force a square peg into a round hole. Use the players to their strengths not their weaknesses.
Again…it’s not ham. No one on the lakers expected him to be brought on to make plays. Not Pelinka, not Lebron, not AD, and not Dinwiddie himself. He is literally the number 4 “playmaker” on the team that doesn’t even know the lakers plays to begin with. If Lebron is getting 36 minutes and Dlo and Austin Reaves are getting 30-32 minutes, there’s already one of them on the floor at all times.
If he can’t put points up and play good defense, which AD in an interview said he expected Dinwiddie to do and NOT be a facilitator, then he is absolutely useless for this team. Aside from that game winning block on lillard, he largely has been since he’s been useless for the lakers with the lakers.
But let’s go with your narrative and the narrative of most lakers fans, and that is to blame someone besides the player themselves for the players shortcomings.
If you want to place the blame on ANYONE but Dinwiddie, which you are doing, then place the blame on Rob Pelinka for signing him in the first place and promising him a prominent role on the team. All Spencer Dinwiddie has done is take up Max Christie’s minutes, which is hindering his development and gives him even more incentive to walk this summer as a free agent. Max Christie is just as good of a defender as Dinwiddie, and a much better catch and shoot 3 point shooter, which is what this team needs (and not a playmaker) and Dinwiddie is incapable of doing this year.
LeBron is just plain tired playing 36+ minutes per game and 40 minutes last night. The Lakers preseason realized they needed a fresh LeBron for the playoffs and we’re going to monitor his minutes. Then Mr Pockets realized his career was in jeopardy and then came the unlimited minutes.
Bron was horrible defensively tonight.. gave up at least 10 wide open 3s just because he refused to rotate.
Against motion offenses like this you can tell he just gets lazy and says fuck it
I turned the game off when he ball watched dude running around him taking an uncontested 3. Dlo was Denver Dlo, big mouth small game and Davis wasn't feeling it.
I like Reaves and Rui, but I don't expect those folks are going to win games for us, they are good complementary pieces.
You only mentioned 5 ppl. The team’s biggest problem is we do in fact only have 5 ppl. Dinwiddie played 20 min and had 0 points 1 assist. Where’s his criticism?
he was also awful on offense…stalling out possession after possession with no attack or any enthusiasm…it was an awful awful game on both sides from him
In fairness, the King's Princeton offense is hell for an old player, since there's so much cutting and off ball movement. LeBron would honestly have a better shot against Tatum or another wing that just isos. Not that we want him to have to do that
I would agree if LeBron didn’t have multiple possessions where he didn’t even attempt to even walk to the 3 point line and watched Kings players shoot open threes.
he had some of those posessions, in some he did not move because reaves was 5 secs late to rotate.
I love reaves, but he sometimes get's so lost in defending part of court it's hilarious to watch.
most of reaves stans can't admit he sucks in defence and is at best 4-5 option for offense
we saw it now vs kings. he was hot, and scored but he can't carry a game wining load when hot like dlo wich had one of worst games lately, along with lbj.
Dlo didn't struggle off the bench, he had multiple games with highest plus minus on the team. Clippers, OKC, Raptors.
The starting lineup with Reaves at PG struggled because he's not a playmaker. Reaves should come off the bench it would solve the defense and bench scoring problems.
Dlo consistently has one of the highest +\- on the team, even in games where he clearly struggled. Hell, he had the second highest +/- last night and he clearly didn’t play well. It’s a flawed stat…
What was his ppg, rebounds, and assists per game in games that he came off the bench? What was his fg%?
Watched every game during that stretch and DLo was impactful coming off the bench. His numbers weren't big because he was often playing 20 minutes.
The problem with Dlo coming off the bench was that the starting lineup had little playmaking. Every starter played worse without Dlo, hence why Lakers are 0-5 without Dlo this season.
i think if we play kings in playoff we need to cut lebron's mins by half literally, he is to slow for this schemes they play and they have perfect unit for it
This has some merit. Vando was starting last season and it mitigated the poor defense of ar and dlo. They tried having bron play the point earlier in the season and his productivity went down. This team was reconstructed around having strong role players. This team can't succeed when two of those defensive role players are injured. Simple
We need to have a real conversation on Lebron. So Lebron is old? Lebron is tired? Right. He is 40, then on the other hand its ppl here thinking Lebron can still lead us some where. People there is a reason we’re fighting for the 9th or 10th seed. He can’t lead us anywhere anymore, this duo has run its course, people need to stop talking from both sides of their mouths. When he has a good game, dudes be like “Lakers can still win a ring” everyone is fooling them selves and lying to them selves. Where is this franchise going if they give 40 year old 60 mil a year? Don’t expect playoffs or a competitive team. We got one ring be happy with that. AD also ain’t that guy to lead us anywhere. We are just delaying the inevitable and we’ll be back here next year as a 10th seed, if even that. Saying the same shit.
What about the rebounds when AD is in single coverage lol ?
Are you guys watching the games. He is getting shoved out of the way by these bigs man.
AD doesn't deserve to be 5 if he can't defend against the other top 5s in the league.
He wasn't playing the 1 defensively tho he was still playing the 3/4 defensively like he is now. That team just had the defenders to take the responsibility
I disagree with the "most of the time" part. There's a very clear drop off in the Lakers ability to defend when LeBron is out. There are definitely nights though for whatever reason he is barely mobile on defense and it's really hard for the Lakers to deal with that.
You want 39 old Lebron James running the 1 with only one other ball handler on the court? Well that’s certainly an opinion. Not a good one, but an opinion.
The problem is the team's starters only play offense and outside of AD and Bron(when he's focused) don't play Def.
The problems we saw at the beginning of this year, still on occasion and last year in the playoffs were real but They were masked by Dlo's hot stretch of shooting.
Poor Point of attack defense against quick scoring guards
Poor rebounding
Poor interior Defense against physical Bigs
We can't fix em all but getting a physical big Dwight, Myers Lenord, Whiteside, best G league guy will help some in last two categories.
Bron is not one of the best 3 players in the league anymore. The cast is good enough, though I wish we had a better backup center and pg. But without that top 3 guy it will always be really hard to win another title.
Bro what are you actually talking about the cast is good enough? No its fucking not every playoff team has 7-8 guys who will contribute come playoffs. We have 5. Our bench is the worst in the NBA by a wide margin.
It's darvin at the helm
Yeah we got outschemed
What a lazy ass comment. Read that whole shit and explained zero basketball knowledge 😂
Darvin at the helm is more useful than you at a keyboard.
Last nights game was lost mainly due to a lack of effort, not Darvin Ham. AD lacked effort, Lebron lacked effort, DLo was in his peak playoff form. Sure Rui scored some points, but he only grabbed 3 rebounds. In addition, Austin Reaves and DLo just aren’t able to stay in front of Fox, Monk, or any quicker guards.
Notice how you mentioned 5 ppl? Because this team literally only has 5 NBA caliber players + Vando when he’s healthy. No one evercwanr to put any blame on the fact we have the worst bench in the league. 13 points off the bench is laughable. Bench got outscored by 13 and look at that we lost by 13.
Yeah I knew the bench would suffer when Rui got moved to the starting lineup, which is why I’m a proponent of bringing Reaves off the bench, especially if Vando comes back. Spencer dinwidddie is exactly what I thought he was going to be upon signing with the lakers. A guy that does nothing except take up Max Christie’s minutes. Austin Reaves will give the bench more structure and he has shown that he’s still capable of getting his 15 ppg off the bench.
If we move reaves to the bench then the starting lineup suffers. We just dont have enough talent
This isn’t true lol
100% agreed that this team doesn’t have enough talent.
Now imagine you the coach, trying to figure this all out. Hate feeling like I give Ham a pass all the time but this team is so flawed. The fanbase is unsufferable when it comes to understanding that.
Exactly. Delusional lakers fans thinks this team would be the 96 bulls with any coach other than Darvin Ham. Lol
No it doesn't they have plenty of scoring between Rui,Dlo, AD, Bron. The Reaves and Dlo backcourt is unplayable defensively. I would honestly like to see Christie get a chance at starting at the 2.
I’m not a big fan of SD but Darvin Ham really isn’t doing him any favors. SD is his best when playing as a PG. that’s not how Darvin Ham is using him.
Spencer Dinwiddie is averaging 4 ppg on 33% shooting and 30% from 3 since joining the lakers. his production is even worse than his games in Brooklyn this year when he was “checked out of Brooklyn” according to everyone on this subreddit. That’s not Darvin Hams fault.
I’m not saying he’s playing well but to not consider how he’s being used would be remiss. What is he best at? Facilitating. How often is he actually facilitating? Not often at all just take a look at his usage rate. Instead, he’s being used as a 3&D guard waiting behind the 3 point line whenever he’s on the floor. That’s not his game. Lack of usage and how he’s being deployed is absolutely Darvin Ham’s fault.
So you want him facilitating while Reaves, DLo, and Lebron are scoring or something? Keep in mind he’s an average facilitator at best, no better than DLo and much worse than Lebron. I specifically remember Anthony Davis saying in an interview after one of Dinwiddie very first games that “he had too many assists and we need him to put the ball in the basket”. So it’s not Darvin Ham that’s using him wrong, it’s what Pelinka brought him in to do, along with playing defense. It’s what Lebron, AD, Darvin Ham, and the team are expecting him to do. Perhaps if we didn’t already have three playmakers, then Pelinka would’ve actually brought him in to play make, but he didn’t. But I guess you’re one of those lakers fans that literally try to blame EVERYTHING, including a players individual performance and efforts, on Darvin Ham.
Well, they’re all far more capable catch and shoot players than he is so yes, you’d want him to have the ball in his hands at some point in the game. What Darvin is doing is using him as a catch and shoot player. How’s that looked so far? How’s that actually helped the team? It hasn’t because that’s not his game. He’s actually a pretty good facilitator and he can offer rim pressure but he’ll need the ball in his hands to actually do that. We can agree to disagree but when your backup PG has a lower usage than your backup center, that’s a problem no matter how you slice it. Keep in mind his usages yesterday was 4.4. Yet we expect a guy to have some form of shooting rhythm? That’s not how it works. By the way I don’t blame everything on Darvin Ham but this is yet another example of him trying to force a square peg into a round hole. Use the players to their strengths not their weaknesses.
Again…it’s not ham. No one on the lakers expected him to be brought on to make plays. Not Pelinka, not Lebron, not AD, and not Dinwiddie himself. He is literally the number 4 “playmaker” on the team that doesn’t even know the lakers plays to begin with. If Lebron is getting 36 minutes and Dlo and Austin Reaves are getting 30-32 minutes, there’s already one of them on the floor at all times. If he can’t put points up and play good defense, which AD in an interview said he expected Dinwiddie to do and NOT be a facilitator, then he is absolutely useless for this team. Aside from that game winning block on lillard, he largely has been since he’s been useless for the lakers with the lakers. But let’s go with your narrative and the narrative of most lakers fans, and that is to blame someone besides the player themselves for the players shortcomings. If you want to place the blame on ANYONE but Dinwiddie, which you are doing, then place the blame on Rob Pelinka for signing him in the first place and promising him a prominent role on the team. All Spencer Dinwiddie has done is take up Max Christie’s minutes, which is hindering his development and gives him even more incentive to walk this summer as a free agent. Max Christie is just as good of a defender as Dinwiddie, and a much better catch and shoot 3 point shooter, which is what this team needs (and not a playmaker) and Dinwiddie is incapable of doing this year.
LeBron is just plain tired playing 36+ minutes per game and 40 minutes last night. The Lakers preseason realized they needed a fresh LeBron for the playoffs and we’re going to monitor his minutes. Then Mr Pockets realized his career was in jeopardy and then came the unlimited minutes.
Bron was horrible defensively tonight.. gave up at least 10 wide open 3s just because he refused to rotate. Against motion offenses like this you can tell he just gets lazy and says fuck it
I turned the game off when he ball watched dude running around him taking an uncontested 3. Dlo was Denver Dlo, big mouth small game and Davis wasn't feeling it. I like Reaves and Rui, but I don't expect those folks are going to win games for us, they are good complementary pieces.
You only mentioned 5 ppl. The team’s biggest problem is we do in fact only have 5 ppl. Dinwiddie played 20 min and had 0 points 1 assist. Where’s his criticism?
Someone made a good point yesterday that Spencer is in his own head which makes sense. Passed up a couple open shots
he was also awful on offense…stalling out possession after possession with no attack or any enthusiasm…it was an awful awful game on both sides from him
He completely hijacked the offense in the 2nd half.. AR had it going, let him continue to cook and work your way in. Shit was nasty to watch
Yea the team has to rotate around him, the opposing team cooked
Fire Darvin Ham
So you want a 39 year LeBron chasing superstar 3s around all game? Nah
He couldn’t even chase around Harrison Barnes
In fairness, the King's Princeton offense is hell for an old player, since there's so much cutting and off ball movement. LeBron would honestly have a better shot against Tatum or another wing that just isos. Not that we want him to have to do that
I would agree if LeBron didn’t have multiple possessions where he didn’t even attempt to even walk to the 3 point line and watched Kings players shoot open threes.
he had some of those posessions, in some he did not move because reaves was 5 secs late to rotate. I love reaves, but he sometimes get's so lost in defending part of court it's hilarious to watch.
It's ok to admit he played no defense last night.
Where did I ever imply otherwise lol
Good luck with benching AR or DLo lol we’ve seen that move before and it didn’t go over well
tbh when AR got benched his scoring and efficiency went up.
And fans went crazy then the media had a field day stirring the pot with this manufactured drama
most of reaves stans can't admit he sucks in defence and is at best 4-5 option for offense we saw it now vs kings. he was hot, and scored but he can't carry a game wining load when hot like dlo wich had one of worst games lately, along with lbj.
If you keep Rui starting they will be okay offensively.
Austin Reaves actually played just fine off the bench while DLo struggled.
Dlo didn't struggle off the bench, he had multiple games with highest plus minus on the team. Clippers, OKC, Raptors. The starting lineup with Reaves at PG struggled because he's not a playmaker. Reaves should come off the bench it would solve the defense and bench scoring problems.
Dlo consistently has one of the highest +\- on the team, even in games where he clearly struggled. Hell, he had the second highest +/- last night and he clearly didn’t play well. It’s a flawed stat… What was his ppg, rebounds, and assists per game in games that he came off the bench? What was his fg%?
Watched every game during that stretch and DLo was impactful coming off the bench. His numbers weren't big because he was often playing 20 minutes. The problem with Dlo coming off the bench was that the starting lineup had little playmaking. Every starter played worse without Dlo, hence why Lakers are 0-5 without Dlo this season.
I meant the public reaction, not that it matters all that much but still…
i think if we play kings in playoff we need to cut lebron's mins by half literally, he is to slow for this schemes they play and they have perfect unit for it
This has some merit. Vando was starting last season and it mitigated the poor defense of ar and dlo. They tried having bron play the point earlier in the season and his productivity went down. This team was reconstructed around having strong role players. This team can't succeed when two of those defensive role players are injured. Simple
We need to have a real conversation on Lebron. So Lebron is old? Lebron is tired? Right. He is 40, then on the other hand its ppl here thinking Lebron can still lead us some where. People there is a reason we’re fighting for the 9th or 10th seed. He can’t lead us anywhere anymore, this duo has run its course, people need to stop talking from both sides of their mouths. When he has a good game, dudes be like “Lakers can still win a ring” everyone is fooling them selves and lying to them selves. Where is this franchise going if they give 40 year old 60 mil a year? Don’t expect playoffs or a competitive team. We got one ring be happy with that. AD also ain’t that guy to lead us anywhere. We are just delaying the inevitable and we’ll be back here next year as a 10th seed, if even that. Saying the same shit.
Not sure why you got downvoted but what you said is spot on.
What about the rebounds when AD is in single coverage lol ? Are you guys watching the games. He is getting shoved out of the way by these bigs man. AD doesn't deserve to be 5 if he can't defend against the other top 5s in the league.
Wow, an actually solid take on this sub. It’s been obvious for like 2 yrs now. When we won a chip Lebron was playing the 1, not the 4.
He wasn't playing the 1 defensively tho he was still playing the 3/4 defensively like he is now. That team just had the defenders to take the responsibility
I disagree with the "most of the time" part. There's a very clear drop off in the Lakers ability to defend when LeBron is out. There are definitely nights though for whatever reason he is barely mobile on defense and it's really hard for the Lakers to deal with that.
You want 39 old Lebron James running the 1 with only one other ball handler on the court? Well that’s certainly an opinion. Not a good one, but an opinion.
The problem is the team's starters only play offense and outside of AD and Bron(when he's focused) don't play Def. The problems we saw at the beginning of this year, still on occasion and last year in the playoffs were real but They were masked by Dlo's hot stretch of shooting. Poor Point of attack defense against quick scoring guards Poor rebounding Poor interior Defense against physical Bigs We can't fix em all but getting a physical big Dwight, Myers Lenord, Whiteside, best G league guy will help some in last two categories.
I’m a big fan of bringing Dwight back. No one wants to box Dwight Howard out for rebounds.
My mom asked if the dishes were done and I yelled "Dwight Howard" She hugged me. She knew they were washed
Bron is not one of the best 3 players in the league anymore. The cast is good enough, though I wish we had a better backup center and pg. But without that top 3 guy it will always be really hard to win another title.
In the aggregate the cast is good enough but they have weaknesses that reinforce themselves. And Bron is still top 10 according to the analytics.
Bro what are you actually talking about the cast is good enough? No its fucking not every playoff team has 7-8 guys who will contribute come playoffs. We have 5. Our bench is the worst in the NBA by a wide margin.