The Los Angeles Lakers have made it to the quarter-season mark with a 12-9 record. While clearly not one of the top teams in the league, things could also be far worse especially with a new head coach in JJ Redick still figuring out how to optimize this roster around the superstar duo of Anthony Davis and LeBron James.
So far, the results have been inconsistent with the Lakers looking like a team that can beat anyone on any given night some games, and then turning around and looking like one of the worst teams in the NBA the next. At one point, the Lakers’ defense was completely holding them back, but as of late the defense has been solid while the offense has dropped off significantly, as evidenced by a season-low 80 points in their loss to the Minnesota Timberwolves.
Following that loss, LeBron was asked to assess the Lakers at this point of the season and he maintained that the goal for this team remains simply to keep improving on both sides of the floor, via Spectrum SportsNet:
“It’s been good at times, obviously. It’s been poor at times. But I think that was to be expected with a new system, new coaching staff, new players and trying to work in some things. I wouldn’t say ‘I’ll take it.’ You never want to say that and just confine to that. But it is what it is, our record is our record but we just want to continue to get better on both ends of the floor because the West is tough, we know that.”
James is right in that the West is very tough and there is little room for error. The Lakers currently sit eighth in the conference, but the second-seed and 11th-seed are separated by just four losses. A couple of wins or losses can shift a team’s spot in the standings dramatically.
But as LeBron said, the Lakers’ focus simply must be on themselves and continuing to improve. Defense was an issue early on, but the team has improved there only for their offense to now being struggling greatly. Believing in the process and putting in the work is all this team can do as they have shown they can beat good teams. They simply have to get back to what was working and not let this rough patch drag them down.
LeBron James believes ‘everything’ is going wrong with Lakers offense
Both the Lakers and LeBron James himself are having their worst offensive stretch of the season and the superstar couldn’t boil it down to just one thing plaguing them.
While LeBron did mention spacing specifically, he said that ‘everything’ is wrong with the Lakers offense right now, but remains confident that they will identify what needs to be done and fix the issues.
In regards to his own struggles, as he has failed to reach 20 points in three of the last four games while missing all 19 of his 3-point attempts over that stretch, LeBron admitted he’s felt out of rhythm, but will ‘work’ his way out of this shooting slump.
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