LABron James Discussion: The Final Year?

Luka out there f***ing off too dude. He's young what's his excuse?

 

Luka isn’t playing well but I think the issue is that LeBron still has a big impact on the tone of the team even if it isn’t his team anymore.

There’s plenty of bad to go around right now from the players to coaches but he and Luka both gotta step up.

 

in several of those clips luka is defending pretty well and battling on the defensive boards. luka's turning it over too much and is in a long-range shooting slump, but i haven't seen him just checking out defensively like lebron has.

problem is that jj's friends with lebron, so the upcoming film session won't be as "uncomfortable" as it needs to be.

 

#disappointed

 

And in several of those clips a few people were just standing around. Ayton our starting center, played 36 min and only had 2 rebounds. Rui only had two rebounds. The oldest player in the league wasn't the only one loafing IMO.

 

no, but he's consistently set a loafing tone for most of his tenure here. and because of his stature (and his personality), he can't be called out on it.

ayton and rui are awkward fits with our stars. both good players with flaws that are the wrong ones for us.

 

Yeah, he needs to go next summer. As of now, we have to deal with it. Can't do much else except possibly stagger is a** without Luka or get Rui the hell out of the starting lineup.

 

I'm going to disagree here professor. Lebron is the oldest player in the League. Luka should be setting the tone energy wise here. Ayton and Rui have to play with more fire too.

I hate the Rockets. but I'm not a blind Homer. I'm going to lose a lot of money this season against the firecrackers if we don't get more length and athleticism at 3-5. They played 6 guys over 25 min, and 4 of them, are 6'11 or better. This is going to be a problem if Rui and Ayton can't bring more energy to the boards. No Lebron wasn't great last night, but were are going to need more fire outta these young dudes, against teams like them, OKC, Sas, Denver etc

Folks keep talking about POA, but I'm not convinced that is really our biggest weakness.

 

I expect him to close things out with us or Cleveland but we will see.

I do think he can definitely play better than he showed yesterday.

Rui definitely should not be starting. Not a knock to him but the lineup clearly isn’t giving us what we need and he’s the odd man out.

 

Yeah, the issue is I think there's a fit issue between him & Luka. Could be the players that are in the starting lineup, but we'll see. Smart is probably going to be taking Reaves place in the starting 5 since Reaves will likely be out. I just think he needs to go this summer period. Rui isn't a fit for sure; however, our best units featured Rui at the 4 when LBJ was out. Go figure...

 

I think the fit with Luka is clunky but can work. But LeBron has to play like he did when he first came back, deferring to Luka, Austin and the rest of the team while still giving effort in other aspects of the game. The decline is there but he can still be productive particularly with rebounding.

He has to understand how much his energy and effort rubs off on the rest of the team though and that’s what bugs me most about his off games. I give him leeway given his age but he has got to play with energy because the rest of the team still feeds off of him.

I think Smart should be starting if he’s healthy.

I think changes to the roster are coming just not sure how fast that is going to happen both with the change in regime and our current options.

 

no one said luka doesn't need to set the tone as well. but lebron doesn't get a pass because he's old. he makes super duper star money right now still. he comes off the bench for the vet min, and you won't hear me whining about him missing a box out here and there or conserving energy in general.

the teams in first and second in the conference play hordes of athletic guards. you're just picking houston (who's basically right on our tier this year) because they fit your bigs narrative. the best teams in the nba right now are hyper athletic on the perimeter. this was also how indy went to the finals last year. if we traded lebron for deaaron fox right now, we're right in the thick of things.

 

The King is going to have to put his crown down and realize he isn't 25 anymore. Play more of a supporting role

 

Not just yet. And not while we don’t have AR. Keep running better offense all around for the team like they did tonight. We need that kind of secondary scoring output from him. Was great tonight and was making the usual right plays with his passing.

 

No.the best teams in the West are NOT guard intensive. Yeah..Hyper Athletic with a bunch of 6'8 or better guys! If not name them then. Look at Indiana now..Haliburton is a pretty good player. Every single playoffs contender in the West have better 3/4 than we do professor. That load up on the guards stuff, is already behind the curve. s*** changes quickly in the NBA. That's why nobody has repeated in 7 seasons and OKC won't this season either. Even though SGA is a MVP caliber big guard. We don't need more guards, we need more forwards. Absolutely without Lebron.

Anyway...Lebron James is still our 2nd best player, not Austin Reaves. And if Lebron walked this summer, and we over pay Austin..we are going to suck bro. And folks maybe even you, will be calling for Reaves to be traded. We need to flip these expiring contract this season for wing help.

 

So. Racial.

 

OKC: SGA, wallace, caruso, dort, mitchell, joe, wiggins, even jalen williams is only 6'5".
SA: fox, castle, harper, and vassell (all 6'5" and under) play all the guard minutes.

the top 4 guards on each team are all very fast, two-way players. neither team really plays athletic wing types at all. both have abnormally tall pfs and beefy screen-setting centers who can't venture outside the paint.

detroit and houston play your preferred lineups. and if you can find even bigger guys with the requisite athleticism to defend POA and score on the other end (imagine vando + offense), then yes, get that by all means. problem is there's like 7 of those total, and none are for sale or hitting FA ever. we need to find it where we can, because right now, our guard rotation is reaves, smart, and gabe. our 6'8" guys are lebron, luka, and rui. and we're not getting beat by people of this size brutalizing us or shooting over us. we're getting beat because we can't contain ANYONE off the dribble.

lebron and luka are our 3/4. i guess jj slots rui in at the 4, making luka a 2, which has never and will never work defensively, but whatever. on well-built teams, luka is a 3/4 defensively. jj or his replacement will figure this out.

when lebron goes, we need a rangy athlete who can play the 3/4 defensively, rebound, and do some helpside rim protection. like pre-injury haywood highsmith at the low end. aaron gordon or jabari smith would be outstanding, but those guys were high lotto picks who never hit FA. not sure there's even a version out there right now.

false. neither by the eye nor the numbers.

you really can't overpay for someone who produces like reaves. everyone who does is paid max, period. before he got hurt, his defense was trending the right way, too. basically, reaves last year was the same player as cade cunningham last year. reaves is substantially better than kyrie irving at this point--a player you wanted to trade the AD package + reaves for a couple years ago.

put it this way: we'll be in WAY more trouble if we let reaves walk for 5m per more annually somewhere else. like, "we'll have to trade luka" bad. of course, you thought caruso wasn't worth the money, either (and was only good cuz lebron).

if we suck it's because we didn't make good use of our space. we should be able to get two to three players who fit around reaves and luka.

i'd be very surprised if i was calling for reaves to be traded really at any point.

flipping expirings for these mythical guys you seem to think are available isn't that easy. nobody flips expirings for anything anymore. most of the time, you get nearly washed up vets for playoff runs (e.g., DFS) at those prices, and even those cost a first or multiple seconds (which we don't have). like, nobody's trading us ausar thompson for gabe/kleber and a 1st, man.