Game Debrief: What Went Right And What Went Wrong?

I saw the fire news, and I saw the game, but didn't connect the two. JJ's family got evacuated though, and LeBron's house is right next to the evacuation area. Maybe other players too. Everybody gets a pass. T&P for all affected, for real. Links in player threads.

 

i was worried we'd come out flat. didn't expect several mavs to shoot better than they do all the time. i know jj and the online lakers guys all said the defense was the worst ever (and it wasn't good--flat like the offense), but the personal 9-0 runs from thompson and hardy were just back breakers that haven't happened all year, whether they were wide open or not. add in grimes and washington both hitting 3+ threes, and it's tough to win even if you're engaged, which we were not.

felt like max and dfs were the only guys who showed up for us. well, hayes did, too, imo, but for some reason the refs decided he wasn't allowed to play. think he got whistled for three fouls in a two-minute span that i'm pretty sure weren't fouls--like, any of them. felt bad for him and us because it seemed like he was trying to bring the right energy was getting taken out of the game.

still can't believe the mavs got grimes in the thj salary dump. holy s***. detroit's gotta be wanting a do-over there.

 

Whatever the issue is with the over all lazy attitude towards any specific game, at falls on the leaders of this team: LeBron and AD.
Not sure if it’s the fire situation back home(which is totally acceptable), but this is not the first, or second, or even third game this season that should have been a win. No excuses.
I would surely blow it up this summer based on this reason alone.
Our FO doesn’t have the balls to do it, but it should be done for basketball reasons.
This malaise has been a common thread going back for years after we won the Bubble Chip.
Don’t even mention the IST Cup “Championship” because we all know that’s just a thinly veiled attempt at drumming up more interest in the early season games.

 

It’s called NO LEADERSHIP! When a bum loser JJ has control of your team and only got the job because of connection you are going to stink up
The joint ! Stupid is as stupid does . Wow who didn’t see this one coming. As long as LeBron is here it will be same s*** different coach .

NO! FO doesn’t have the balls to do it because LeBron has the FO by the balls and won’t let go

 

I was really pissed
It's the only thing that drives me crazy. Losing games just because you don't care and you half-a** it. I'm too competitive, I can't conceive when it happens.

Unfortunately, it's a pattern with Bron/AD. And infects the other players.
We don't have blowout wins, at all. It's crazy.

In such a crazy West, with Bron being 40 and AD benefitting for any additional rest he can get, I just can't understand why this happens so often.

Next game is at home with Charlotte. There's 1000 reasons to win that game by 30 after the poor showing yesterday. Anything less than that is not acceptable

 

Chucky going off

 

On the bright side, yesterday we had a stint in the Q2 with Gabe, Max, DFS, Rui and AD and we were smothering Dallas. They couldn't score.
This is so helpful to have at times just to cool off the other team or suck out their confidence. I want to see it more.

Potentially we can even put Vando in for Rui and just be a nightmare defensively. Offense would suffer, but we would play off AD and have some opps in transition too. Max went for 7 points in that stretch, btw

 

The bigger issue to me: AD is still really damn good. However, some glimpses's he's starting to decline, IMO. They're subtle, but the signs are trending in that direction. We probably have 2-3 more years of this year's version "MAX".

Another reason I can't blame Rob if he isn't trading the picks...

 

Any team can be awful and miss shots on any given night, this was way more worse than that.

JJ became ham where he was getting out coached and couldn't adjust.

Effort which is the bare minimum wasn't on show, getting blown by, going under screens collapsing in the paint and leaving them wide open 3s.

No one on that Dallas team deserved doubling so how do they get wide open?

AR and DK need to do a lot better on defense, JJ should have sat them for defenders when Dallas started their ran. We were scoring but couldn't stop anyone and when they missed we gave them offensive rebounds.

How can you give the same player the same shot three times in a row, then give his teammate a similar shot on the other side of the perimeter

As for AD the less said the better, once Bron retires he will run out of LA, because you can't count on him for s***. Your team needs you and he sat for half of the 3rd quarter. And when he came in he just turned the ball over multiple times

He doesn't wanna play as a big and I have said it before when you really need him to stand and deliver he quits.

They will make it about it was a bad night, it wasn't. Jason Kidd took everything that's bad about this team to blow as out.

The same terrible habits are there every night we play. It's the reason why we don't blow teams out.

Keep the picks, they will milk the LeBron train for all the money they can get as owners. God help us when he's gone cos these owners aren't going to spend

 

There is no garuntee that those picks, are going to turn out to become good players, or produce a star in a trade either.

 

True. But trading them IS a guarantee that those picks won't become good players or produce a star via trade.

It's not quantum physics regarding the picks. Reading the past decade of this league and the way the CBA is built, a minimum of 3 FRPs are required for a superstar. Due to the Stepien Rule, after we trade ours, we will only have 3 again by the summer of 2030. Until then, we will owe our picks every odd year which makes a full rebuild really hard. We are also in a unique position where our best player is 40 and will leave through retirement, meaning we just lose him for nothing. Finally, no superstar hits Free Agency nowadays. The last one was probably Durant in 2019.

So in the end, after we trade these 2 picks we will be 5 years with:
- an aging and eventually retired AD and AR as the best players
- no picks to trade
- no consecutive picks to draft a young core
- no available stars in FA

So yeah, our next decision with these picks is quite important. It will define our next 5 to 7 years.

 

If the picks were used for Kessler …. what the hell happened to him, Dalton Knecht and Max Christie plus AR …. that we should be so “lucky” to draft one at a time sucking again for years in the process? OR for a pipe scenario one superstar coming here in trade for all the picks and those good players like happened with AD … and NO second “superstar” here to help out with the gutted roster?

 

Got beat by 2 of Mavs bench guys

 

I guess nobody currently is deserving of our precious picks, and the hypothetical draft pick or superstar 5 years from now will absolutely be a better player.

 

I don’t get this blow it up and let’s start the rebuild with tanking at all. It sucked last time and would suck worse this time with the tougher lotto odds in place. We have some really fine pieces here already nowhere near their prime especially with DK and now Max cost controlled past when AR is not. For anyone saying Kessler, AD, AR, Max and DK aren’t “good enough” pieces for the rebuild post LeBron …. compared to what …. tanking for years trying to get new players “better” than these guys already here?? or this mythical super star wanting to come by himself to a gutted team by a forced trade?

 

I don't want the picks to use them. I want them because it's the only way for us to get a superstar post-Bron, which is via trade.
I want to have the assets to go after Ant, Booker, Fox, Luka or whichever superstar becomes available. They're not available in FA,only by trade. And to trade, you need the picks.
We see Ant frustration in Minny. Fox is already being talked about. Booker has the franchise already on fire and it will be worse after KD is retired and they are still paying Beal. Luka is not winning in Dallas, maybe he gets tired there. Or Tatum after Boston's window closed. Etc...

This league is made of superstars. You need at least one to win it all. That's my goal. The previous champions are Tatum, Jokic, Curry, Giannis, Lebron, Kawhi, etc. There's always a top 10 player leading the team. I want it faster than 10 years from now.

I'm fine using both for Dejounte for example. He's not a superstar but is good enough to keep us up top for years to come and ultimately a player who can be used in such trade and reduce the number of picks required. All while helping us immediately.

I don't want to blow it up, I don't know where you picked that up

 

True all that but we still need a young competent Zubac type big man like Kessler 23 years old for defense and rebounding which he is good at. There's still legacy BIG men and prime career BIG men and a whole new cadre of young newly entered BIG men in the league. I'm talking about a starting capable center. You'd throw 2 picks at Dejounte "for example" but not the perfect defending/rebounding big man we need who's only 23 years old? I think with our offensive talents and one way defensive guys for point of attack D PLUS 2 way more-than-3-and-D Max Christie .... that Kessler would make a far greater impact than Murray. Dejounte does nothing to help rim protection and our rebounding against the "ogres" in the league as abeer puts it. So in 5 years when Murray is way past his prime at 33 and you claim he could be thrown into a trade with value .... what's a prime 28 year old fully developed, maybe even shooting 3s by then (who knows?) .... Kessler worth?

 

Makes sense. I think the counterargument, though, is that you need to make sure you're the kind of team a superstar wants to force his way to. Regardless of whether its 1, 2, 3, 4 seasons from now, we're not going to have the most assets to trade for a superstar anyway. The next guy is going to have to force his way here by saying this is the only team we'll re-sign with. So would you rather (A) trade one or both picks for a good young player like Kessler that could make your team more attractive to the next superstar while diminishing the assets you have to trade for that guy, or (B) keep the picks and be less attractive to the next superstar but have more to trade for him. I think I lean (A) because like I said, other teams will be able to outbid us when this all happens regardless of whether we trade 2029 and 2031. It will all come down to one of these guys saying I only want to play for the Lakers and I'm willing to wait and sign there in free agency to make it happen.

Side note - hard disagree on Murray. He's been hurt a good chunk of the year and has sucked when he's played. Hasn't defended the way we'd need him to since he left San Antonio. Hawks got better replacing him with Dyson Daniels. I don't think he's a winning player.

 

Game night finally! Let's go kick the Spurs butts tonight!!!