D'Angelo Russell Discussion: Adopting A Professional Attitude

His agent needs to make him understand he's playing for his next contract.
Even if he gets traded, he could get hurt and not just suddenly improve his play afterwards.

Maybe get TIm Thomas or even Trevor Ariza on the line and let him know what you need to do in a contract year vs non-contract year

 

He's not the same player without the ball in his hands, but he's not a good enough player on this team to be THE guy with the ball in his hands on the first unit.

He may not like the bench, but it may be what is best for the squad. let DLO be DLO with the 2nd team. I think he'll find success there running that unit.

 

this is all accurate and contains no wild speculation, which is nice.

can jj sell dlo on a bench role? here's where you earn your coaching dollars, imo. jj's already shown some xs and os chops--can he manage the egos? same with christie--how do you make him not lose all confidence when you (justifiably) bench him for reddish?

 

Much better off the bench: still some real weird TOs and has seemed to have lost his ability to find the bigs off the PnR consistently.

Overall though if JJ can convince him to try to go for 6th man of the year a big win for the Lakers

 

be nice to still see him not be a black hold on offense though. I'd like to see his assists still be there helping the guys on the 2nd unit get some easy buckets. Not just gunning.

 

6th man gunner has value on a bench that can't score though. Much more so than as a Milk Carton starter. It not only slots others in much more advantageous roles, but makes it easier to move on from him if we find a taker by the deadline.

15 points and tied a season high with 3 made 3s...I'll take it.

 

He's a good fit as a classic sixth man - bring the offense type. Particularly with this team which had no offensive punch off the bench, I'm hoping this continues to work well.
D.Lo's agent has to be telling him good sixth man get good contracts

 

Perfect. At least high flying dangers be damned Ja Morant is out too. Pretty amazing how long and great of a career AI had playing that way. Maybe he was smarter about picking his spots? (no idea)

 

i'm a huge AI fan, but he didn't get off the floor quite like morant. i think he was more skilled in the midrange and--despite his earned reputation--a bit less reckless about his paint finishes.

but yeah, iverson was tough. topped 40mpg several years. wow.

 

DLO hit a few key 3's in this game...but def need more than him off the bench. If it wasn't for Knecht going off...ppl would be calling for his head once again

I know DLO will eventually turn it around but man it's BAD out there for him

 

his first few minutes were a clown show, then he snapped out of it a bit. if he really was ill, that would make some sense.

 

I've been watching Russell since college. He's always had this "too cool for school" mentality at different points to start or during a game. However, this demotion should have gotten his attention, but given the fact that he still has to be benched for certain things he's doing on the court, I don't know if that will ever correct itself here while he's in a Lakers uniform.

I'm rooting for him, though.

 

he was this way in bkn, gs, and minny, too. he's just this way. if he didn't have the lapses, he wouldn't have moved around as much.

 

I still need him to do more on offense every time he plays.
I wish that he could be a League average defender, but I don’t ever see that happening.
I will wish him well after he’s traded this season.

 

Some downright bad terrible decisions out there last night. Sometimes you look at him and just think what the hell are you thinking?

Exhibit A



New pod quote from him:

 

lebron was mad on that botched break, but tbh, he gave up the ball before the defender committed. this is just basketball 101 on a 2 on 1 break, and lebron violated the rule. then, imo, the defense was looking for the lob--this is clearly why lebron gave it up early--so dlo had to attempt a shot against a defender.

had lebron just pushed his advantage he ends up with an and-1 or an open layup for dlo.

the announcers were on dlo after that, too, but i actually think it was lebron's mistake.