Unlike previous seasons, expectations around the Los Angeles Lakers aren’t at the championship level the franchise is accustomed to. In fact, many only see the Lakers as a fringe playoff team likely to be in the Play-In Tournament and not much more.
Of course, there are some reasons for hope in regards to the Lakers and that begins with the duo of LeBron James and Anthony Davis, who have proven they can lead a team to a championship. New head coach Darvin Ham also looks to inject some new energy in the team and owner Jeanie Buss is counting on these things this year.
In an interview with Kirsten Chuba of The Hollywood Reporter, Buss says that she is optimistic like everyone is this time of year, but admits they can’t control everything especially when it comes to injuries:
“This is the time of year everyone’s optimistic. We made a big change in hiring a new coach, Darvin Ham, who brings that work ethic that Laker fans really expect. I’m optimistic, but certainly injuries are what you can’t control, so we try to control everything that we can and set ourselves up for the best possible success. But everything else has to kind of go our way as well.”
Davis has missed 88 games over the last two seasons while James has missed 63. Regardless of anything else that happens, Davis and James can’t afford to miss more than 10-15 games or this year will go the way that last year did.
There is also hope that Ham will be able to get more out of Russell Westbrook than Frank Vogel was able to and Ham himself certainly believes he has the capability to do so. Not to mention the additions of players such as Patrick Beverley, Juan Toscano-Anderson and Damian Jones that can help improve the Lakers’ defense.
As Buss said, now is the time to be optimistic and despite the concerns, there are still reasons to believe the Lakers can turn things around and get closer to championship form this season.
Lakers in ‘ongoing talks’ with Jazz on potential Bojan Bogdanovic trade
There still remains the possibility that the Lakers still make another big move before the start of the season and the Utaj Jazz continue to be the team mentioned as a possible trade partner.
A recent report mentioned that the Lakers and Jazz have had ongoing talks on a possible trade for Bojan Bogdanovic, which would almost certainly include Westbrook. While he isn’t the greatest defender, Bogdanovic would bring a major shooting boost as a career 39.2% 3-point shooter.
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