This Lakers roster is extrememly unimpressive

[FlatearthZorro]

The Lakers are 4-1 without Kuzma and Rondo.

Rondo wont start, I expect him to be a 20-max 25 mins a game guy. Kuzma is a bottom 3 defender at PF and if they continue playing him there I wonder how effective he's gonna be.

[evilpimp972]

Rondo’s going to be a very important part of this team. His ability to direct traffic, handle the ball and facilitate will prove invaluable for this team whose only play-maker right now is Lebron.

When Kuzma hits his stride he’ll fit nicely as a consistent third option behind AD/Lebron. They should only need about 15-16PPG from him at most, and he’s more than capable of producing that efficiently(or at league average efficiency anyway, which will also suffice).

Outside of those two, who haven’t really played yet, there’s Dwight and McGee — two serviceable bigs that can protect the rim, rebound and rim-run — and Danny Green who’s been phenomenal on both ends thus far.

That’s five guys surrounding AD and Lebron who can contribute in multiple areas. Then there’s some shooters whose shots haven’t been falling yet — Cook, Bradley, KCP, Daniels. How much more of a supporting cast do you need ? When healthy, this team has all the pieces to get it done.

His ability to warm up the bench will be important.
Rondo is not a solution, stop with that!

[nickhx2]

a roster full of pLAymaKerS and big men will go far

[Doug_12]

25th in 3PM per game
23th in 3P%

24th in DREB%
22nd in OREB%
20th in Reb Diff

2018-19 DRPM:
Green: +2.07 (1/99 among SGs)
Rondo: -1.38 (50/68 among PGs)
Cook: -3.49 (65/68 among PGs)
Daniels: -1.23 (64/74 among SFs)
Caruso: +0.77 (11/99 among SGs)
Bradley: -1.22 (59/85 among SGs)
Caldwell-Pope: -2.17 (76/85 among SGs)
Kuzma: -0.77 (64/78 among PFs)


So, so far the outside shooting and rebounding have looked every part of bottom third of the league level as I said. And while there isn’t a good measure of individual defense for 5 games worth, we can look at last year’s DRPM data to see roughly how good the perimeter defenders on the team are. Note: Kuzma is listed with the PFs but he’ll most likely be defending SFs this year. As you can see above, Green is a fantastic defender. Caruso is good. And the other 6 guys are awful and in some instances right near the very bottom. The team DRTG is great now but over a larger sample size, the porous perimeter defense will probably start to take a toll, especially when Rondo comes back and starts getting minutes.

The Lakers have indeed performed well so far when you look at record, point differential, and DRTG, but again, 4 of the 5 games have essentially been at home. Memphis and Charlotte will be bottom 5 teams in the league, so those aren’t too impressive of teams to beat up on. Utah at home without Bogdanović and during the midst of an uncharacteristically awful Conley start to the season is an okay win. Dallas on the road is a good win. The Clippers without George and in a stadium of mostly Lakers fans was a bad loss. 3 games against Denver, 2 games against Philly, 2 games against Milwaukee, 2 games against Toronto, 3 games against San Antonio, 3 games against Houston, 3 games against LAC, 3 games against Utah, 3 games against Portland...all still on the horizon. And what happens when Davis inevitably goes down? Also, LeBron has been going balls to the wall so far and I don’t see that lasting a full regular season when he’s trying to preserve himself for the postseason.

I’m sticking to my prediction that the Lakers will win ~48 games and fail to earn HCA in the playoffs. And LeBron and Davis will have to play at GOAT levels for the team to advance to the WCF. I don’t see any way they make a Finals appearance though.

Aren’t Slava’s stats clearly more important than the ones your have provided here since the Lakers are 4-1 with the league best point differential?

You’re fighting the good fight here but every single team has statistical areas where they’re not going to be elite and aren’t wins and outscoring your opponents by a great margin more important than rebounding % and number of made 3’s? This seems like a huge reach on your part. A better direction to go here would have been just to say that you would like to see a bigger sample size of games. .

LA has performed well so far. I’m just looking at their weaknesses and projecting how those will affect the Lakers’ success over the course of the whole season. Perimeter defense and rebounding are major issues. I think the 3 point shooting will bounce back a bit. And there’s a clear lack of a secondary ballhandler. I just don’t think they have very valuable players outside of LeBron, Davis, Green, and Dwight. Those 4, along with Caruso, form a fantastic lineup imo. But after that the roster is filled with a whole lot of negatives.

I think that's a bit of exaggeration: If you say that Caruso belongs to the starting lineup, then Kuzma, Bradley and KCP are the 6-8th best players on that team. How many teams have better players in that range? Out of those three 2 were starting last year and the other one would have started if he's playing here. Last year's team was crap, but still managed to get 37 wins...

IMO we have James, Davis, Green, Kuzma, Howard, Bradley, KCP as our core. Then we have a set of players with different skillsets to be thrown in depending on what is needed. For example if we look at the weaknesses you mentioned: If we are lacking perimeter defense then we can put Caruso in the rotation. If it turns out that shooting is the problem, then we can throw in Daniels or Cook to help on that. If ballhandling is the problem (and we would like James to rest) then we can form a lineup around Rondo. Our roster is not without holes, but whatever is our biggest weakness we can find an answer to it. Last year we didn't have that option. Moreover other teams (apart from the Clippers) also have weaknesses, and some contenders have less options to mitigate those than us. (For example: Celtics in interior D, 76s in shooting, Rockets in perimeter D)

[cycl0nus]

lakers are old and tired and these reg. season games mean nothing. shouldve kept ball, randle clarkson, hart and bi because their youth will take us to the promise land. btw, shouldve kept luke because he relates well to the youngsters, sheesh!!!!!

[MisterHibachi]

Further, Utah and Dallas, both playoff teams, were challenges as well. Why are they being overlooked because the Lakers beat them?

This happened to the East 8 years straight. Always hyped up then written off as trash as soon as LeBron beat them. Same thing now happening to Western teams. People just don't want to give credit where it's due.

[mademan]

Once they get Iggy, who will eventually be bought out, they'll have a decent bench. I still think they need to trade Kuzma for a ball handler who can do something in the PnR, but i still put them up there with any team in the league.

But ya, Kawhi delaying his decision killed their depth. If they coulda got Wright/Lamb/Morris and kept Caruso/Kuzma, minimums still for guys like Mcgee/Daniels...they'd be a lot better. But Magic or no Magic, this is still a terribly managed team who gave de facto NTC to guys like KCP. Just awful

They dont need another bad 3 point shooter.

With Lebron handling the ball, you can do with 1. A closing lineup of

Bradley
Green
Iggy
Lebron
AD

Is nasty defensively and has enough shooting to make the high PnR very difficult to guard.

[Amare_1_Knicks]

Rondo’s going to be a very important part of this team. His ability to direct traffic, handle the ball and facilitate will prove invaluable for this team whose only play-maker right now is Lebron.

When Kuzma hits his stride he’ll fit nicely as a consistent third option behind AD/Lebron. They should only need about 15-16PPG from him at most, and he’s more than capable of producing that efficiently(or at league average efficiency anyway, which will also suffice).

Outside of those two, who haven’t really played yet, there’s Dwight and McGee — two serviceable bigs that can protect the rim, rebound and rim-run — and Danny Green who’s been phenomenal on both ends thus far.

That’s five guys surrounding AD and Lebron who can contribute in multiple areas. Then there’s some shooters whose shots haven’t been falling yet — Cook, Bradley, KCP, Daniels. How much more of a supporting cast do you need ? When healthy, this team has all the pieces to get it done.

His ability to warm up the bench will be important.
Rondo is not a solution, stop with that!

Him being a solution would imply that there’s a problem, which I don’t think there is. The Lakers are 4-1, and have looked as good as their record.

Whether you like him or not, Rondo’s obviously not going to be warming the bench. He’ll play north of 23MPG and his impact, particularly when Lebron is sitting, will be evident.

[Carlos_Danger]

Oooooo, 4-1 on a creampuff schedule so far, soooo impressive.

Creampuffs are tasty and good, and so is LA's schedule so far - 3 playoff teams - Mavs, Jazz, Clippers - in the first 5 games.

They looked good in all 3 of those games, and went 2-1. Also won their 2 games they should win.

With a totally turned-over roster and new coaching staff.

The Lakers are good. Shocking that a team with LeBron, AD, and a handful of really good role players would be, I know.

[Osirus89]

The problem for the lakers is not when Lebron and Anthony Davis are both healthy. The problem will always be when those two inevitably miss time, which they will. Then the situation will be distinctly "not fine". The Clippers are in trouble every time Kawhi sits and the Lakers are far worse than the Clippers are without the top two guys.

One injury to Davis or Lebron and those losses will pile up.

[LightTheBeam]

So Dwight hasn't been impressive on defense? Green hasn't been impressive shooting 50% from 3, and playing great D?

What? Dwight is one of our best defenders... dwight >>>>> McGee.

If he can get away with holds like last night, I agree.

[lamscott]

What are we discussing at this point. Of course the Lakers have holes, they skunked their hopes on Kawhi and built a team as good as I could because of the circumstances. Also.... who cares?!!! We are 4–1 and have 2 transcendent stars.

The last six years have been absolute crap. Hoping for the kids to get better was fun but Laker fans aren’t use to watching lotto teams get better. I’m just happy we are back to winning games.

Any Laker fans that are beating their chest are bandwagon idiots.


Sent from my iPhone using RealGM Forums

[Pharmcat]

Why is Iggy being penciled in? Lakers fans should have learned lesson on not counting eggs before they hatch this summer

[therealbig3]

Why is Iggy being penciled in? Lakers fans should have learned lesson on not counting eggs before they hatch this summer

Even without Iggy, they have two of the best players in the game who fit each other like a glove and a solid group of shooters around them. They have two dominant defensive big men and an engaged LeBron (which means he's an elite wing defender who can defend anyone at the 2-4 positions) and they're currently a top 3 defense. They're able to play at an elite level on both sides of the ball.

They're pretty much set. Obviously there are other good teams out there so they're not invincible, but the main thing that's going to limit their potential is themselves, in terms of play calling and rotations (like having Anthony Davis spam ISOs instead of putting him in the PnR with LeBron, or force feeding Rondo and McGee minutes).

Your original point doesn't really stand.

[JellosJigglin]

Rondo’s going to be a very important part of this team. His ability to direct traffic, handle the ball and facilitate will prove invaluable for this team whose only play-maker right now is Lebron.

When Kuzma hits his stride he’ll fit nicely as a consistent third option behind AD/Lebron. They should only need about 15-16PPG from him at most, and he’s more than capable of producing that efficiently(or at league average efficiency anyway, which will also suffice).

Outside of those two, who haven’t really played yet, there’s Dwight and McGee — two serviceable bigs that can protect the rim, rebound and rim-run — and Danny Green who’s been phenomenal on both ends thus far.

That’s five guys surrounding AD and Lebron who can contribute in multiple areas. Then there’s some shooters whose shots haven’t been falling yet — Cook, Bradley, KCP, Daniels. How much more of a supporting cast do you need ? When healthy, this team has all the pieces to get it done.

His ability to warm up the bench will be important.
Rondo is not a solution, stop with that!

Rondo can play. Last season he was put in when ball movement became static. He's the type that can enter the game cold and rack up 6 assists in a quarter and then sit for the rest of the game. Preseason he looked good with AD in the pick n roll. Don't count him out yet.

[evilpimp972]

Rondo’s going to be a very important part of this team. His ability to direct traffic, handle the ball and facilitate will prove invaluable for this team whose only play-maker right now is Lebron.

When Kuzma hits his stride he’ll fit nicely as a consistent third option behind AD/Lebron. They should only need about 15-16PPG from him at most, and he’s more than capable of producing that efficiently(or at league average efficiency anyway, which will also suffice).

Outside of those two, who haven’t really played yet, there’s Dwight and McGee — two serviceable bigs that can protect the rim, rebound and rim-run — and Danny Green who’s been phenomenal on both ends thus far.

That’s five guys surrounding AD and Lebron who can contribute in multiple areas. Then there’s some shooters whose shots haven’t been falling yet — Cook, Bradley, KCP, Daniels. How much more of a supporting cast do you need ? When healthy, this team has all the pieces to get it done.

His ability to warm up the bench will be important.
Rondo is not a solution, stop with that!

Rondo can play. Last season he was put in when ball movement became static. He's the type that can enter the game cold and rack up 6 assists in a quarter and then sit for the rest of the game. Preseason he looked good with AD in the pick n roll. Don't count him out yet.

Nah sorry he hasnt been a positive impact player since his Boston days.
6 assists by pounding the ball and destroying any spacing no thanks, plus he doesnt play defense. In the pre season he had one good game then looked like he was a bad fit.

[BlazersBroncos]

Its funny to think it, but to me this season comes down to Dwight Howard. If he can keep buying in and being the low usage near elite defender / rebounder that he has the skills to be, they can be dangerous. He is the only guy on that roster outside the big-2 that is an above average role player. So much in the playoffs will depend on his play.

[GoGreen]

Still early to make any judgments, but this league is all about superstars, and the LAL have 2 of the top. That being said, I am skeptical of their depth.

[DaPessimist]

If this is the Lakers offense all season, both LeBron and Davis will be gassed by the time the playoffs start.

This type of ISO offense works fine in the playoffs, but in the regular season you need to find easier ways to get buckets.

[markjay]

Its funny to think it, but to me this season comes down to Dwight Howard. If he can keep buying in and being the low usage near elite defender / rebounder that he has the skills to be, they can be dangerous. He is the only guy on that roster outside the big-2 that is an above average role player. So much in the playoffs will depend on his play.

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