LeBron James 2021-22 Regular Season Thread - Part ?

[Mos_Heat]

It doesn't make sense. He used to be a great finisher and recently it's like he's not an NBA player

Hes actually never been a great finisher. Overrated for highlight dunks.

His Mvp season he was 57% at the rim and in 2016 it was 58%. Hes at 59% this season so far. 19-21 seem to be his only seasons above 60%

He doesnt have the skill or craft of a Kyrie, Tony or the body control of a Rose, Ja... Hes always had problems against traffic with his wreckless style. He has some explosive dunks like the Rudy one but that hides all the misses

That's high for a guard, I'd call that great. He's been as good as Kyrie the last 4 seasons and suddenly just stopped.

That's not high, that's average

[zimpy27]

Hes actually never been a great finisher. Overrated for highlight dunks.

His Mvp season he was 57% at the rim and in 2016 it was 58%. Hes at 59% this season so far. 19-21 seem to be his only seasons above 60%

He doesnt have the skill or craft of a Kyrie, Tony or the body control of a Rose, Ja... Hes always had problems against traffic with his wreckless style. He has some explosive dunks like the Rudy one but that hides all the misses

That's high for a guard, I'd call that great. He's been as good as Kyrie the last 4 seasons and suddenly just stopped.

That's not high, that's average

64% is average for guards within 3 feet? Maybe at low volume but that's as good as other great guard finishers.

[Mos_Heat]

That's high for a guard, I'd call that great. He's been as good as Kyrie the last 4 seasons and suddenly just stopped.

That's not high, that's average

64% is average for guards within 3 feet? Maybe at low volume but that's as good as other great guard finishers.

Oh, you're talking about 19-21 Westbrook. Yeah, that's great for a guard

[zimpy27]

That's not high, that's average

64% is average for guards within 3 feet? Maybe at low volume but that's as good as other great guard finishers.

Oh, you're talking about 19-21 Westbrook. Yeah, that's great for a guard

Yeah the last 4 years have been great until this one. It's odd.

[Mos_Heat]

Seems like there's a hope Westbrook won't be on a team next season or maybe even this season

Read on Twitter

[Freighttrain]

Seems like there's a hope Westbrook won't be on a team next season or maybe even this season

Read on Twitter

The way it's being stated makes it sound as if it was a pregame play to not play Westbrook in the end. It's encouraging that upper management and Vogel seem to align on that matter. However, If this reaches Westbrook's camp, which it surely will, I'm guessing he'll just shoot 30 shots from now on since he knows they're actively trying to bench/trade him anyway. So I'm not sure why they released this info to the media as it might backfire unless they're actually making work of trading him before the deadline.

[Greyhound]

Seems like there's a hope Westbrook won't be on a team next season or maybe even this season

Read on Twitter

The fact that the coaching staff has to be given permission on who to play (perhaps even start), how much to play them, and when to play them is the most alarming revelation here.

Many of us have suspected this, but to have it confirmed just seems disappointing.

Management builds the team, they should not be dictating on court matters. This is just embarrassing that Vogel (and his staff) would allow such nonsense.

[MisterHibachi]

This Russ stuff has been trending this way the past couple of games. He's played 25, 27, and 26 minutes in the past 3 games. But he doesn't seem the type of player to respond positively to this kind of coaching feedback. He's basically uncoachable. Wouldn't be surprised if they just straight up lose him mentally rest of the way.

This franchise makes no sense. Best win of the season against Utah, and there are immediate leaks that Vogel's job is in danger. One of the worst losses of the year (although there's been so many bad losses, hard to rank them), and there are immediate reports that he's not going anywhere. Wth this is so backwards.

That said, I won't be sad to see Vogel go if that's what they decide. Stanley has the best game of his Lakers career against Utah but then only plays 16 minutes in favor of Melo coming off a back injury. Vogel actively hurts the team with these rotations.

[Guessed]

Melo is HORRIBLE. Just kills any semblance of being a defensive team.

What is he doing in the game at this point when we need stops? He can't even knock down open 3s so there's really nothing he provides.

The last few scores in this key stretch have all been on his defensive lapses.

Hey, now: Melo is a guaranteed bucket!

...for both teams.

Watching the last two quarters was excruciating but the fourth quarter was the worst. There was a stretch where several defensive possessions featured multiple Melo and Monk PnR defense masterclasses, Melo's indifference to valid 3 point threats, THT literally spinning in circles under the basket as an external representation of how the defensive schemes must seem to him, poor Reaves desperately trying to plug all the holes, nay: craters!, in the defense only to be run over by his own teammates; I was actually left wishing for regular season Rondo to make a return.

That play where Reaves threw it past Melo at half court only to have Melo completely disengage from the ball, waiting for it to go out of bounds, instead it gets picked up by the Pacers and then Melo finally shows interest only for him to FOUL FOR THE THREE POINT PLAY?!?

[At least in the third (I think?) he was actually hitting shots; but I couldn't get an internal monologue from Game of Zones out of my head every time he made a play (...but it was merely a pump FAKE! *points finger*...)]

I was ranting for the entire last quarter to my poor children; thankfully they found it amusing.

Flabbergasted.

[TroubleS0me]

@ least Westbrook had 1 TO
hes keeping his TOs down (2.9 TO per game for the last 10 games)
but damn his shot seletion is just terrible
bad shot seletion = TO regardless

[Slava]

Seems like there's a hope Westbrook won't be on a team next season or maybe even this season

Read on Twitter

The fact that the coaching staff has to be given permission on who to play (perhaps even start), how much to play them, and when to play them is the most alarming revelation here.

Many of us have suspected this, but to have it confirmed just seems disappointing.

Management builds the team, they should not be dictating on court matters. This is just embarrassing that Vogel (and his staff) would allow such nonsense.

From that article, it sounds more like they are empowering Vogel and the coaches to do as they see fit:

Over the past week and a half, Lakers management has told the coaching staff to coach Westbrook as the coaches see fit, even if that means pulling him from a game, as Vogel did for the final 3 minutes, 52 seconds of the fourth quarter against Indiana, sources told ESPN.

One source close to the situation described the message from management to the staff as, "You got to do what you got to do."

[PistolPeteJR]

Exactly. This is a great sign for the Lakers, honestly. Vogel has been given the reigns to do what he seems to have wanted to do for a while at least. Hopefully LeBron and AD don’t get in the way of this. To be honest, I don’t expect them to.

[PistolPeteJR]

@ least Westbrook had 1 TO
hes keeping his TOs down (2.9 TO per game for the last 10 games)
but damn his shot seletion is just terrible
bad shot seletion = TO regardless

Only 1 last night because he didn’t play to close lol

[MisterHibachi]

As frustrating as Russ has been to watch, I think it's just bad process and point fingers when the team so publicly blames one guy for not playing well on a night everyone disappointed. You can bench him, but don't make the behind the scenes deliberations so public.

[TroubleS0me]

Watch on YouTube

[MisterHibachi]

Read on Twitter

Never heard of this guy before and this trade makes no sense for the Cavs, but he's saying what I wanna hear, so I'm gonna treat this as a credible rumor.

[thebigbird]

Dude has 930 followers and looks like he’s just making stuff up. Kevin Love would be great for this team, though. A stretch big is exactly what they need.

[Greatness]

Why would the Cavs mess with what they have going with such a stupid trade? Lets be realistic guys

[PistolPeteJR]

Why would the Cavs mess with what they have going with such a stupid trade? Lets be realistic guys

The only piece here that makes this somewhat credible is they were looking for guard depth to replace Sexton. If they get Russ in a trade from LAL, I'm inclined to think Russ wouldn't have nearly as much of a problem coming off the bench for them in a Sexton-type role than if the Lakers tried to wheel him in that role because it's a new page in Cleveland for him and he'd have to prove himself after hypothetically being thrown out of LAL.

That said, the Cavs shouldn't do this LOL.

[Greyhound]

Seems like there's a hope Westbrook won't be on a team next season or maybe even this season

Read on Twitter

The fact that the coaching staff has to be given permission on who to play (perhaps even start), how much to play them, and when to play them is the most alarming revelation here.

Many of us have suspected this, but to have it confirmed just seems disappointing.

Management builds the team, they should not be dictating on court matters. This is just embarrassing that Vogel (and his staff) would allow such nonsense.

From that article, it sounds more like they are empowering Vogel and the coaches to do as they see fit:

Over the past week and a half, Lakers management has told the coaching staff to coach Westbrook as the coaches see fit, even if that means pulling him from a game, as Vogel did for the final 3 minutes, 52 seconds of the fourth quarter against Indiana, sources told ESPN.

One source close to the situation described the message from management to the staff as, "You got to do what you got to do."

That’s part of my point.

A coaching staff should not have to be empowered on playing time matters.

Gregg Popovich could have benched Tim Duncan if he wanted to. Then after the loss, go home and drink a piña colada with no worries.