With the Los Angeles Lakers short so many of their rotation players, guys have had to step up in order to keep the team afloat.
One player who has really picked up their play in the past month is Markieff Morris. With LeBron James and Anthony Davis out, head coach Frank Vogel inserted Morris into the starting lineup and he has looked more like himself on both ends of the floor.
Morris explained that knowing he will be playing more minutes has helped him find his rhythm offensively. “For sure,” Morris said. “I wouldn’t even say like a starter role, it’s just a consistent role. Just knowing how it’s gonna go every game, picking my spots.
“It’s the same thing, I’ve been a starter for nine years, I started last year in Detroit before I got here. So it’s just normal. Once you get your feet under you, you get that consistency and that’s what the league is about.
In the loss to the New York Knicks, Morris scored 17 points on 7-of-11 shooting, including 3-of-6 from distance. He has often times bailed out the Lakers on offense with his shotmaking, while defensively he seems to be moving better laterally.
Although Morris will head back to the bench when the stars come back, these games have helped him get his legs back under him and as a result, is playing his best basketball since the 2020-21 season began. Head coach Frank Vogel called the veteran the ‘unsung hero’ for L.A. during this recent stretch and he has earned it with how well he has been playing.
Morris frustrated with loss to Knicks
Despite Morris’s good game, the Lakers were unable to get over the hump against a stifling Knicks defense. Morris explained that he was frustrated with the loss, but also admitted that the rest of the roster was just as upset.
“We just don’t like to lose, man,” Morris said. “We had to go to try to win two here, we just got a lot of guys that just don’t like to lose and I’m one of them. We’re trying hard. We hate when we lose when we can control the controllables, and this was definitely one of those games. Losing to a team that made four 3-pointers all game, we usually blow teams like that out. So that was just more so what affected us I think.”
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