The Los Angeles Lakers are a mixed bag as they enter the All-Star break of head coach JJ Redick’s second season at the helm. They have the No. 11 offense, No. 23 defense and No. 16 net rating in the NBA. Their point differential is exactly 0.0, one of two teams in the NBA with a winning record without a positive point differential.
Despite all that, they are 33-21 and fifth in the Western Conference. They are only 1.5 games back of the No. 3 seed Denver Nuggets. They have also done this despite missing each of their top three players for significant time. Luka Doncic — the NBA’s leader in points per game — has missed 12 games. LeBron James has missed 18 games and Austin Reaves has missed 26. They have only played in 10 games together.
It’s extremely difficult to assess exactly where the Lakers are, but what was easy for Redick to assess is that the break is coming at a good time for L.A.
“I think it’s well-timed for everybody in the league (laughs),” Redick said. “Yeah, I mean, look, everybody in this league is going through it in some way. Even the top teams, Shai (Gilgeous-Alexander) is out, Jalen (Williams) is out again, Detroit has guys suspended…
“But we talked about it as a group, this is probably the hardest schedule that I’ve been a part of in 17 years in the league prior to All-Star break. It’s not gonna get any easier. We don’t have two days between games, the last time we practiced was Dec. 27 and we don’t have two days between games from that point until I think it’s late March. So it’s almost a three-month stretch. We’ll be able to get some work done next week on Wednesday and Thursday and it will be good for everybody for the mental and physical reset.”
One positive sign is that the Lakers defense has been better over the last few weeks. They rank 11th in the league since Jan. 29, and Redick spoke about that improvement.
“Yeah, I am,” Redick said when asked if he is pleased with the direction they are headed in defensively. “I think the zone has been really good for us and the guys have done a good job of communicating when we do go to man out of it. There’s still some things that we can get a lot better at and we’ll continue to chip away at it.”
Regardless of any statistics, Redick is generally happy with where the Lakers stand given the context of their season.
“Yeah, I mentioned the other day that I did it as a player, and I probably do it more as a coach, the micro day-to-day stuff that you fret over and you think about all day long. That’s one part of this job. The other part is the macro stuff and the big picture stuff.
“Look, if you would have you told me in September that we’d be, are we five in the West or six? So, we’re top five in the West; we’ve had those guys together for 10 games, and AR [Austin Reaves] has missed some time. In an extended stretch, Luka [Dončić] has missed some time. Bron [LeBron James], missed the start of the year. Certainly doesn’t mean the day-to-day internal pressure you put on yourself, and I know the guys put on themselves because they care. It doesn’t mean that’s going to go away, but you’ve got to feel good about the last 14 games outside of the San Antonio game the other night.”
It remains to be seen if the Lakers can be a legitimate championship contender this season — or even a team that can get out of the first round — but there are definitely reasons to be optimistic. And Redick certainly is leaning into that optimism as they enter the break.
Bronny James: Lakers believe they are contenders if healthy
Bronny James spoke about where the Lakers feel they stand as they enter the break, and their confidence is high that they can make noise if healthy.
“I know that our team believes that we can be contenders and make a deep playoff run,” Bronny said. “We all believe that. Once we get healthy and stuff like that, it’s just gonna come down to playing hard and playing smart and winning games.”
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