The LeBron Thread 2021 Off-Season Edition

[Greatness]

Mid season form for Bron

[homecourtloss]

Rondo is -29 in 16 minutes of play

He's in fine 2020 regular season form.

Rondo.

LeBron looks good out there. He actually had some really good stretches with Russ and Davis and Jordan even with AD playing like a replacement level player again.

[nzahir]

Rondo is -24 in 14 minutes of play

He's in fine 2020 regular season form.

He should really not be playing when we are relatively healthy

Ellington has been a huge disappointment. Not sure how he can even get real minutes, especially vs starters.

I am not sure what our starting 5 should be

Russ, Baze, Lebron, AD are 4

Monk has been so poor on defense as well, but at least he has the tools

Leaning towards Monk or even *gulp* Melo (but then we have no bench wings w/o Ariza)

Russ, Monk, Bazemore, Lebron, AD
Nunn, THT, Ariza (Sekou/Reeves for now), Melo, Dwight

Should really sign Ennis or RHJ right now. Going to have to play too many small guards, defense will collapse

[MisterHibachi]

Reeves feels like a real player.

There's always the possibility of it being preseason nonsense but I agree, he's looked good. He's got a fairly quick release, has shown great court awareness, hustles, and looks like a smart passer.

Lebron looking really good in this game, very spry. Incredible he's almost 37 and in his 19th season. The new FT routine looks much better too.

You know the FT routine is gonna change at some point lol

[thebigbird]

Really worried that AD got his ring and is now happy just living the LA lifestyle with his fat contract. He looks just as out of it as he did last year.

[Greyhound]

Anthony Davis has not contested a single shot at the basket in this game. I am absolutely disgusted with this guy.

He just stands there while guards are attacking the basket. His signature move of (early) last season has apparently carried over.

[Greyhound]

Really worried that AD got his ring and is now happy just living the LA lifestyle with his fat contract. He looks just as out of it as he did last year.

Yup.

I wonder if he has some sort of substance-abuse problem (or something)?

Something is completely off with this guy and it’s been over a season now.

[trickshot]

That Reaves kid is going to bump some huge names out of the rotation in important stretches. Just having one guy who plays within the team on both ends is huge impact wise.

got torched on defense towards the end though but that's a common theme with their entire bench.

[falcolombardi]

wow, dimt watch much of the game but is davis really that bad?

[Greyhound]

With DeAndre Jordan in the starting lineup, the Lakers are literally the biggest team in the NBA. Somebody send a memo to that moron on NBA TV trying to fake it as an analyst.

Not Mitchell, the other guy.

The guy literally asked the question, how are the Lakers going to deal with all the big teams across the league?

LOL.

That’s the least of their worries. They are trying to figure out if they can consistently make shots.

[trickshot]

AD wasn't too bad, that extra muscle might have thrown him off but he was also never a workhorse, not even in that season he was 2nd to Giannis in DPOY. Also have to admit Reaves got brutally exploited towards the end. Actually also getting obvious how big a loss caruso might have been. No good team defenders on that bench.

Biggest issue still is they needs to fix their 2nd units. They are always 2 subs from getting blown out. I'd keep an eye on net rating of the 2-3 man units of any 2-3 of Rondo-westbrook-carmelo. They actually look decent to really really good on offense only to give up blown rotations and cuts on every possession. When the larger sample sizes impact metrics come in I have a feeling it will be solid fool's gold. It only passes the eye test on offense anyway. I'm guessing the original plan was to have Ariza out there to balance it.

[falcolombardi]

westbrook biggest strenght is raising offensive floor of a team, i imagine the best way to to use him is to have him lead bench units with 3 and D players (not that many in lakers) and playing with lebron + davis at 5 the rest of the time for spacing reasons

playing him with offensive creators who dont defend much and need the ball in their hands (mostly rondo) like Carmelo and rondo is a waste of what may be his more valuable role to lakers

[trickshot]

Having Reaves as the third sub with Rondo and Melo as the 1st and 2nd subs is wild and awful. Every geme they’ve played this preseason is exactly the same—a little drought, blown rotations, lead becomes 10+. They’ve only been competitive with James playing and putting in some effort. Having Ariza, THT, Monk, and Nunn would help things, but this looks like a disaster in the making,

AD again looks like non impact trash.

Fr that big name 2nd unit is net garbage.

[falcolombardi]

Having Reaves as the third sub with Rondo and Melo as the 1st and 2nd subs is wild and awful. Every geme they’ve played this preseason is exactly the same—a little drought, blown rotations, lead becomes 10+. They’ve only been competitive with James playing and putting in some effort. Having Ariza, THT, Monk, and Nunn would help things, but this looks like a disaster in the making,

AD again looks like non impact trash.

Fr that big name 2nd unit is net garbage.

Carmelo and rondo are really the worse posible fit around westbrook as they need the ball a lot, domt provide defense or even that much spacing

the best possible second unit should be westbrook + shooters and defense but both those thinghs are too scarce to keep on the second unit

if lakers had a shooting big they could play him in second units

[dcstanley]

Having Reaves as the third sub with Rondo and Melo as the 1st and 2nd subs is wild and awful. Every geme they’ve played this preseason is exactly the same—a little drought, blown rotations, lead becomes 10+. They’ve only been competitive with James playing and putting in some effort. Having Ariza, THT, Monk, and Nunn would help things, but this looks like a disaster in the making,

AD again looks like non impact trash.

Fr that big name 2nd unit is net garbage.

Carmelo and rondo are really the worse posible fit around westbrook as they need the ball a lot, domt provide defense or even that much spacing

the best possible second unit should be westbrook + shooters and defense but both those thinghs are too scarce to keep on the second unit

if lakers had a shooting big they could play him in second units

I think Rondo is just filling in for Nunn. I have to imagine Rondo is a deep bench guy when the team is healthy.

[MoneyMo]

Having Reaves as the third sub with Rondo and Melo as the 1st and 2nd subs is wild and awful. Every geme they’ve played this preseason is exactly the same—a little drought, blown rotations, lead becomes 10+. They’ve only been competitive with James playing and putting in some effort. Having Ariza, THT, Monk, and Nunn would help things, but this looks like a disaster in the making,

AD again looks like non impact trash.

AD's offense is Trash if he's out there with Howard or Jordan. Their man keeps doubling him and he's horrible dealing with doubles. He is just tossing up contested jumpers. They need to simply his game more and use him in Pick and roll, pick and pop, alleyoops, and dump offs cause his iso game is rough right now.

[nzahir]

Having Reaves as the third sub with Rondo and Melo as the 1st and 2nd subs is wild and awful. Every geme they’ve played this preseason is exactly the same—a little drought, blown rotations, lead becomes 10+. They’ve only been competitive with James playing and putting in some effort. Having Ariza, THT, Monk, and Nunn would help things, but this looks like a disaster in the making,

AD again looks like non impact trash.

AD's offense is Trash if he's out there with Howard or Jordan. Their man keeps doubling him and he's horrible dealing with doubles. He is just tossing up contested jumpers. They need to simply his game more and use him in Pick and roll, pick and pop, alleyoops, and dump offs cause his iso game is rough right now.

It is insane how an nba "star" can't understand simple double teams

Whoever thought this guy was on Lebron's level is a lunatic

I really wish we had everyone healthy

Luckily Nunn and Monk should be back soon, but we are so small besides our bigs

I also remembered Danuel House Jr may be available

Salary filler, 2 wiz 2nds and our own 2nd if need be?

Would be a body who can shoot the 3 at avg to above avg, depending if that 17-18 year was a possibility or an outlier, and can play about avg defense

[Run DLC]

LeBron looked great. His shooting touch/jumper look good and hopefully he can maintain it consistently throughout the regular/post season. AD needs to find his rhythm. He’s getting some good looks and touches, he just has to find his rhythm. Russ needs to play more as a cutter/slasher without the ball in order to be efficient and play within the flow of the offense. If he tries to force his way overdoing things, the offense will get ugly really fast.The Lakers will eventually figure out their best rotation and effective style of play. Overall, LeBron still reign supreme, he’s the most efficient quarterback on the team besides Rondo.

[thebigbird]

Really worried that AD got his ring and is now happy just living the LA lifestyle with his fat contract. He looks just as out of it as he did last year.

Yup.

I wonder if he has some sort of substance-abuse problem (or something)?

Something is completely off with this guy and it’s been over a season now.

I don’t think it’s anything like that, I’m just not sure he has the hunger that the greats have to keep coming back year after year with the same fire. Tom Brady in the NFL is 44 years old and he still has just as much fire to win as he did in his 20s. LeBron’s in his 19th season and he still has that fire. He’s still the driving force behind this team. AD should be embarrassed honestly that 19th season LeBron is still the best player on his team. AD is 28 years old. This is supposed to be his time to shine. But he doesn’t look ready to seize it.

[Greyhound]

AD wasn't too bad, that extra muscle might have thrown him off but he was also never a workhorse, not even in that season he was 2nd to Giannis in DPOY. Also have to admit Reaves got brutally exploited towards the end. Actually also getting obvious how big a loss caruso might have been. No good team defenders on that bench.

Biggest issue still is they needs to fix their 2nd units. They are always 2 subs from getting blown out. I'd keep an eye on net rating of the 2-3 man units of any 2-3 of Rondo-westbrook-carmelo. They actually look decent to really really good on offense only to give up blown rotations and cuts on every possession. When the larger sample sizes impact metrics come in I have a feeling it will be solid fool's gold. It only passes the eye test on offense anyway. I'm guessing the original plan was to have Ariza out there to balance it.

AD was atrocious in terms of conditioning. His interior defense was less then mediocre.

That was too bad to me.

That is not what one should expect from an MVP level player in his physical prime.

AD should be carrying that team in terms of scoring and controlling the paint defensively. Unfortunately, he has not done anything resembling that since the bubble.