This was always my biggest fear with Lebron coming here. Once he’s gone, he leaves your franchise in shambles in his rear view mirror leaving out of town.
Meh. He has done a crappy job this season. He built a very good roster (the championship year) and built a contingency plan post-Kawhi. The following season we were top 3 in the western conference until LBJ got hurt against Atlanta. He's also squandered some potential assets, traded for WB, and squandered assets. . He needs to get it together and quickly.
Yeah if we don’t make the Finals (very much the long shot) the FO needs to be held accountable for their job this year. So far it looks bad. We’ve all been over this thing a lot but the complete roster turnover looks like it totally backfired. Compare to GS who kept theirs together through major injury and are back on top with plenty of chemistry and roster continuity/familiarity. And probably not the smartest idea for us to simultaneously go small and big at the same time in the ultimate mixed message confusing/contradictory lineup concept ie: signing all small offensive only guards, 2 old wings and two giant non shooting bigs. It is one of the oddest roster concepts ever. And this is ignoring the Westbrook trade completely. Again, that is what it is - orchestrated by our two best players and implemented as they wished. So I’m taking that one out of it. The follow up moves are just contradictory which is what really alarms me about the FO and the story that Rambis wanted DJ to start or at least be playing a lot as well as Dwight. WTF is going on upstairs? To be fair to Rob he did pull a rabbit out of the hat with Monk. Great signing there for vet min. I won’t give him credit for Melo, the other killer vet min signing because we all know he’s here because of Lebron.
To be fair here, I think Rob was pushed to do the Westbrook trade by one of if not both of Lebron and AD. The fact is Rob had been working hard on the Buddy Hield deal The big 3 of LBJ, AD and Westbrook have played 16 games this year for a total of 9-7 vs 10 playoff teams (top 8, not play-in garbage) and 6 lotto teams It's a fairly small sample size and it was sporadic, guys going in and out the only stable player being Russ. LBJ and AD missing 38 games combined (21 for AD, 17 for Lebron) 53 games into the season they have missed 32% and 39.6% of the season. We don't know if a Buddy Hield deal would have done much for our glaring defensive weaknesses or shortages at the 3-4 personnel-wise. Hield is no defensive stopper by any means. Although he slacks off all the time, at least we know that Westbrook can turn on the D when he wants to, and when he does is actually quite good. For all the attention we gave 3pt shooting in the off-season, we are averaging 34.9% right now and we averaged 35.4% last season. The biggest offenders being Westbrook, THT, AD, Stanley J, Ariza, and Reeves averaging a total combined of 28.9% but taking about 16 of our 3pt attempts a game. 1/2 of our 3pt shooters just plain suck. It seems some simple offensive management and putting the red light on some of these guys could help quite a bit. I believe Ariza and Reeves could pull out of their slumps but the others have never proven they can hit the 3. We still have about 6 guys who shoot good to great percentages. Most fall into the 3 & me rather than 3& D category. A solid large 3 & D guy is our biggest need. On an odd note, our best 3pt shooter is Dwight wight Shaka:
i wasn't in favor of a hield deal, but also remember that if we deal for hield, we probably keep one of trez/kcp (or use trez in a different trade) and keep the eagle. i think rob got railroaded there, tbh. again, didn't like the hield deal, either, but a gm has to be able to operate in good faith.
Hield is the equivalent of Monk. So I don’t see him really making a noticeable difference. They could of kept Caruso over THT, but didn’t and I don’t think the Hield trade changes that. So the question is, does one of Trez or KCP offer us more than Westbrook. To me the answer is a simple no.
could have had two monks, and kept both AC and THT. and THT might have looked better stepping into westbrook's general role than he has as...whatever we're trying to do with him. trez has been more valuable than westbrook by most metrics, tbh. kcp i'll grant you. though he knew his role here and played it. at the time, i viewed russ/hield as 50/50, maybe slightly favored russ, tbh. not now, though. i can admit when i was wrong.
KCP alone is way more valuable than Russ based of the fact that he plays above average D and Westbrick plays none at all. Also, I’ve never seen him hit the side of the board while shooting. Furthermore, he doesn’t make boneheaded plays every single game.
Simply put: Rob, LBJ, and AD all need to take responsibility for the Russ transaction. Now, it's up to the three of them to convince this dude to come off the bench if he wants to continue to be a Laker. Whether that happens this season or this summer, I don't care. But that discussion needs to take place if you can't find a suitor for him. And I don't think they'll find one.
1. nobody in the world questioned green for schroder. 2. we didn't dump mcgee for gasol. also, gasol was better than mcgee last year. 3. investing in harrell was smart. he's appropriately paid and productive. benching him then trading him was dumb. 4. drummond was dumb all around. boo. i agree. 5. we didn't choose THT over caruso. if we did, is that management or ownership? because i'm guessing if rob had a blank check, AC would be here. the westbrook trade was bad. some of the back end signings have been head-scratchers. but let's not get hyperbolic.
If James and Davis had been on the floor instead of street clothes so much over the last two seasons. Rob would be hailed as a genius in either season.
yeah, there's definitely some unfair grave tapdancing in the press, but that's life as the lakers gm.
There is a demand for these kinds of articles by our fans who are distraught at the season and by our haters who are revelling in it. It comes with the territory, but all the articles and Twitter analysis is just noise. The truth is we have two top 10 players who have missed extensive time the last two seasons. If they hadn’t we’d be coming for everyone.
He is going to have to really scramble now. Not sure if there are moves to make to save this season and potentially next at this juncture or not. We are in a terrible position right now to negotiate so we might need to punt so as to have something left to work with this summer.
Don't know about next season, but I think we can all agree this one is lost. We're pretty bad right now and with no reasonable moves to make. Short of replacing Russ with Chris Paul, we're going nowhere this season, LOL.
Next season will be improved I think IF we: Cut/trade Westbrook Get players who can play the 3/4 and 4/5. LBJ/AD are available and playing at their best (the latter applies more to AD) Since we have no cap space aside from our tax payer MLE and very limited trade assets, I would scour the G-League/overseas for young talent looking for a second chance to get back to the league ala Stanley Johnson types and/or look for hidden gems in rookies that have gone undrafted like Reaves. Please no more old *** veterans or "shooters" or "playmakers". I just want players who will be available, hungry, work hard and play a defined and limited role around LBJ and AD.
