Ex-Coach Luke Walton Discussion

Nance was defensively better this year...there are stats to back it up.

He was muuuuch better last year too.

Luke ain't f***ing around. If you have the athletic talent to play defense and ain't playing it, your athletic behind will be sitting next to him on the bench.

Have you noticed Kuz's minutes from January to March? You bust your a** on D and you earn playing time. We know Kuz can score, but coming out of Utah, scouts were heralding his D...he needs to get back to that.

 

Fair enough. In Luke We Trust.

So glad we don't have to deal with Bryon "Drill Sergeant" Scott anymore. Can you imagine him with this team? We'd be in the bottom 5 once again

 

What? Where?

You're taking off with 15 games left after tomorrow just because it cements we're out of the playoffs? Why? Don't you enjoy watching our team regardless? Are you that hard core the ring is the only thing? Where's the pure joy in watching any and all of our meaningful players when they are on their games and we are in the games?

 

I liked that Luke praised Julius for understanding how they want to play, and his role within it. He really has done a great job overall of collapsing the defense and being a willing play maker. He still has out of control moments, but overall, the game is slowing down for him, his confidence is growing for good reason, and he's playing great.

He's cemented his place on this squad, and will be a Laker for a LONNNGG time.

 

Late to the discussion but I remember wanting Randle traded for the better part of November/December.

But man that pic of Luke and Randle smiling, that sort of thing makes Luke a keeper.

 

I've been begging to give Julius more minutes from the getgo, so I'm naturally going to disagree with @Weezy and @vasashi17

Our record with Randle as reserve: 11-22
Our record with Randle starting:19-14

Remember, the latter numbers are with injuries to 2 of our best players in Lonzo/Ingram, Kuzma hitting the rookie wall, and losing Clarkson/Nance via trade. Through all that adversity, Randle was the constant that led us to victories.

If anything, Randle isn't getting enough credit for his stellar play, and I'm not going to forgive Luke for f***ing with Randle after all the work he put in the offseason. There were games that he played 8, 12, 14 minutes and we were losing winnable games. It was obvious that Nance wasn't cutting it. I don't think we would have played as well as we are right now, but that stupid experiment cost us 3-5 games. Enough to bury our playoff hopes.

 

I love getting into it with Jules fans... Y'all a fiesty a** bunch.

Seriously tho, my intent is not to hate on the dude. He's actually grown on me alot and I sincerely hope its not a case of contractitis and he remains a Laker for a really long time. But if he gets moved or walks away in free agency, we better get assets back for him... And what better asset than Anthony Davis (as a hypothetical)? Those against that type of move are probably Jules fans, but it's hard to justify not moving for AD, especially if we successfully bring in LaBron and George which would equate to rings, which is good for Lakers fans. Better than being stuck at #16 while Ainge trades for AD and they compete for #18.

You bring up Jules winning in the face of adversity, but a guy like AD lost Boogie, dealt with trades and has still kept that team afloat leading them to a 4th seed in the West when they had every excuse to free fall.

You bring up 8, 12 and 14...I see win, win and you probably meant his 15 minute game, but that was a loss to Houston. Ironically, out of that bunch, it was the game he got the most minutes that led to a L. But I know what your intent is... More minutes for Jules equates to more team wins. Well in the games that Jules has played 30 or more minutes, we're 12-7...not bad.

Look at the competition tho... In the 7 losses, all were against playoff teams (Portland, Houston, GS 2x, NO, Minny) and one bad loss vs the Mavs. Meanwhile our 12 wins were against tanking and lottery teams, sprinkled in with fringe 8th seeds in Miami and Denver and the latest coming against the Cavs, who I would say aren't very good and injury depleted.

So with Jules as our leader, are we a legit title contender? If all we add is George this summer are we a title contender?...even when dude has the reigning MVP, and OKC still ain't a legit threat.

Btw, there was no correlation to Jules's minutes and team success early in the season, so hate on Luke all you want, cause that's exactly what it would be...unwarranted hate.

 

Luke's a young coach and made stupid decisions in regards to lineups earlier in the season. Not just with Randle's minutes, but starting Anus, overplaying Brewer, etc. I think the majority of fans agree with that so the criticism is not unwarranted. He's learned along the way and I give him credit for that, but I'm not going to brush off his mistakes like it didn't happen. Again, it may have cost us the playoffs.

 

Young coaches make mistakes like young players.... the good ones learn from them.. called growing as a team. Luke seems to have really put it together but yes, along the way he will make a few more as all coaches do.

 

@tada Luke is a massive reason for the turn around, but of course the players will get that credit. But when it comes to costing us a bid to the playoffs, that all of it falling on Luke is a farce.

Lets look at the close games (2 possessions or less ie 6 point deficit or less) we've lost this season. There have been 9 games in total. Of course Luke has an imprint in those losses, but certain fans are stating that had our rotations been tighter and that certain players got more minutes (ie Jules), that we would have won those games and been a legit contender for the 8th seed.

I've already shown that Jules as a starter (and/or playing 30+ minute games) doesn't mean he leads us to team wins against quality playoff bound teams. But looking at the 9 games we lost by 2 possessions or less, Jules had started in 2 of those losses and had played 30 or more minutes in 5 of those losses (and playing at or above his career avg. of 28 minutes per in 6 of those losses). He's only played less than 20 mins in 1 of those losses. Also consider who we lost to: Lost to the Dubs by 2 and 4, lost to the Blazers by 3 (2x) and 5, lost to the cLips by 5, lost to the "process" by 6 and lost to Houston by 6. The one close loss that we probably should have got was against a non-playoff Knicks team, to which we lost by 4 points.

So you think that 1 loss vs the Knicks really would have made up the difference to making the playoffs (we're currently 6 losses out from the 8th seed)? Lets say we chalk up a W against the Knicks and fringe playoff teams like the cLips and Philly, then we're still sitting at 3 losses out of the playoffs and needing a whole lot of help from teams that are ahead of us in the standings.

Now take into consideration that this is a newly constructed team needing time to develop chemistry with one another and finding their true roles, all while taking on the 3rd toughest schedule in the league and that gauntlet of a December schedule. Heck, once Jules was placed in the starting lineup, we still lost 5 in a row. On the season we have lost by double digits (aka got routed) 17 times and out of those losses, Jules has started in 8 of them. Our 2 largest deficits ironically came at the hands of OKC (losses of 24 and 37 points) and Jules started in both those games.

In terms of Ennis, we're seriously thin at the the PG position before the IT trade and with Caruso having a limited amount of call-ups due to being a 2way player, Ennis had to get those minutes when Zo went down. Luke obviously adjusted and turned BI into the point when he saw it wasn't working. When it comes to Brew, there is a reason he wanted a buyout in a contract year....his minutes were inconsistent and at a career low....so how is that overplaying Brew exactly?

We just don't have the horses, no matter how highly you think of our players, especially Jules. We needed a closer for these type of games and we might have one now in IT, but I wouldn't say the majority of the 9 close games we had this season is all on Luke. We lost some one possession games to legit playoff teams that have veteran pedigree, while at one point in the season, we were the youngest team in the entire league. We're just not that type of team yet. But it certainly is a good learning experience.

And I will concede that I was particularly hard on Jules, cause he really hadn't proven himself to this point. I didn't believe in fans thinking the FO/Luke mistreated him and still don't...I believe it actually helped him develop into the player he is now. However, I did believe at one point that I would do anything to dump Deng, including Jules as trade fodder, and boy was I wrong on that front. There's no way you heap Jules in with a Deng dump. I still would deal Jules for a guy like AD, but it has to be a legit star. Otherwise, Jules has made a huge impression on me and I'm happy to eat crow if he chooses to remain in a Laker uni. We simply can't lose an asset like him for nothing.

That being said, I still don't think he's a max guy and I hope he/Mintz/George do us a solid, cause I'm not about giving anybody the max...I would rather we bring in LaBron, George, retain Jules and still have wiggle to give Brook the room exception, all while rounding out the roster. More money to the top 3, means less money in strengthening our supporting cast.

So yeah...Luke didn't cost us a playoff berth. Our inexperience, lack of talent and early strength of schedule did....yet we still have the slimmest of chances to shock the world.

Having that short leash on Jules is Luke being hard on a player that he knows can be special one day. Its all about the long game and building the culture, as opposed to just playing our talented rookies extended minutes in order to make the playoffs only to get humiliated cause we ain't playing/developing the right way. Luke ain't a dope... he is dope!

 

Didn't Luke do the same with Draymond? Luke knows what he's doing.

 

i spoke to this in another thread, but i'm still behind luke as coach. one way of thinking is that we'd have been this good all along, but another is that we'd have never been this good had he done what the armchair coaches clambered for.

imo, the biggest coaching mistake of the season was trying to turn ingram into a 20ppg scorer, and i don't think that was luke's idea...

 

f*** you, you stupid a** hippie. You and your hard-on for the midget. Just get fired already.

 

Why would you bring a cold IT off the bench for the last shot after his craptastic game tonight? Bruh....

Do better.

 

Because he is Puke.

 

That was a bad call on Luke. You could see it on all the players faces... They knew they lost