AROUND the NBA:

[omahen]

This show has been growing on me. I’ve always liked Mannix, and Rachel Nichols has impressed me more than I thought she could recently.

This entire clip is them discussing the recent Lakers woes. A rather lengthy and interesting Luka Dončić discussion starts around 5.25, and lasts for a long, long time. Almost the entire rest of the video. They are basically catching up to the stuff we already know, but I found some of the info Rachel says she got directly from Redick and Jason Kidd pretty interesting. As a Mavs fan, I thought it was a worthwhile watch.

https://youtu.be/MRbq-t2bIUg?si=tJjroGrnvY8Qp7b2

I don't think they are catching up, they know exactly what they are talking about. I think Rachel has a very mature look on the situation. Luka is who he is and you can't expect him to change (a lot). You live with it and build around him, because he has proved he can take a team very far, perhaps all the way. Also, while Luka is of course not a great defender, Lakers problems are much bigger than him. Defense doesn't get any better with him out and it was just as bad against Phoenix where he didn't play. I think you can actually find many more videos of LeBron complaining to refs and not getting back on defense this year, since this was highlighted so much.

I think Rachel very correctly pointed out that the piece that doesn't fit for Lakers is LeBron. As I said many times already, this is basically a gap season waiting for LeBron to either retire or leave in the summer. He is like AD on Mavs when he wants to play the PF - he put "half" of roster out of position. LeBron has same effect on Lakers. Luka-LeBron and Rui are all PF on defense and they are a terrible combination on defense (add Reaves to the mix). Starting unit is beyond bad with their net-rating below - 20 now. No defense, no one goes for offensive rebounds in this unit, not enough shooting. Yet the coaches probably have their hands tight. Ayton and Luka are a lock. You can't bench LeBron because he is king. Rui and Reaves are both in their contract years and you probably want to keep them for years after LeBron, so you also need to play them. Hachimura barely sees the ball after LeBron came back from injury (vast majority of shots is taken by the "big three"). LeBron is still a good player, but he is not a max player anymore and he just doesn't fit on a roster with Luka and Reaves. 

Replace LeBron with Smart and this unit has a +20 net rating, even though they still lack a lot of athleticism. With Reaves out, Lakers will have a lot of troubles. LeBron can't lead offense anymore. He rarely creates any separation against anyone and his offense is usually a fadeaway tough shot. He does hit a decent percentage of them, but offense is completely static with these kind of plays.