NSFW: LANGUAGE glad he didn't want us to get DFS. But i agree with him on Claxton. Think that's best case this summer.
Any good centers in the upcoming draft? Would prefer the Lakers draft a big and just develop them. Get them for the cheap and long-term.
I’m not sure we have any picks in this draft, maybe one 2nd. I think we sent the Clippers 2nd rounder in the DFS trade, and the Pelicans own our first rounder this draft. We likely will have to look to trade for a center again.
We can always buy seconds but I hope our center situation isn't solved with a 2nd rounder rookie. I think Claxton would be the main one. He's balling out recently, having a ton of blocks. Pretty mobile too
i agree with the other podcast guy--no indication claxton was for sale, and likely not for what we had to offer. capela's the guy i'm watching. guessing we'll offer tpmle for full years (is it 3?) and also consider trying to s&t for him using maxi and change or via ntpmle via lebron paycut. both of those invoke a hard cap that i don't like, though. anyway, yes, DFS was a great add. the addition of luka afterward made it like, 10X sweeter, too, as i've discussed previously.
Finney-Smith impacted the game late in the fourth when it was close. We were being in a shootout to somewhat of a lockdown defense when we went up by over five.
Love the way he plays, it’s only a shame he’s not a few years younger and we got him so late in his career
He's the type of 16 game player who is going to win us at least one playoff game because he's built for that s***.
Finney-Smith is our Utility/Garbage Man who executes/cleans up so the Main Leads can do their thing. What he does doesn't show up the stat sheet but helps the rest get there.
Another team high in +/- with 24. A couple of timely shots, nice defence and just making the right play every time whether it's boxing out, good screens or hustling to 50/50 balls.
I know he had a botched wide open lay in crunch (which he should have just dunked), and a missed FT, but it’s hard to deny that DFS is a freaking difference maker. +24?!?! Incredible. He’s the right guy to start as Rui continues to get healthy.
I felt the same way after the Luka trade, however, I'm of the opinion now that both Reaves and Rui should start - for a number of reasons. Luka is actually better defensively than we all give him credit for, laterally he is much quicker than I thought and he is excellent at positioning and using his body to herd a player. Also he is a very good post defender with his strength and size. Lebron is playing excellent defence, which I thought was a thing of the past. AR is playing better defence than he has in years due to having less of an offensive burden. Rui is playing the best defence he has ever due to JJ's coaching and also putting him into positions where he can use his size and strength as a positive and not get exposed with his average lateral quickness. The other positive is, our first two players off the bench are DFS and Vando for Lebron and Hayes followed by AR for Gabe. All 3 are defence minded players and two of them are good shooters. So I like coming out and punching teams in the mouth offensively with the Luka, AR, Lebron, Rui lineup and then having Vincent Van Doe come in and wreck havoc defensively. The rotations have been really good by JJ and the staff.
Love DFS game and hustle but he's been horrible shooting the ball the past 15 games, which is around 32% from 3. Gotta be much better than that... He's getting wide open ones and it just clanks. I wonder how much of this is just due to fatigue since defensively, everyone on the Lakers are just scrambling multiple coverages because AD isn't there anymore.
He’s been atrocious shooting the ball he proved the rule rather than the exception on the Laker shooting curse
