D'Angelo Russell Discussion: Adopting A Professional Attitude

We definitely need patience with D'angelo, but I'll be the first to admit that Jahlil posting 26/7 in his first game makes it a bit harder.

 

i posted before the game that the other rooks were having great debuts, and i kind of feared this for russell. what i didn't expect is for him not to play pg. if that's the plan, don't start him. he's a pg and needs to play it. i think byron tried to fix it by monkeying with the rotation in the second half. unfortunately, that meant going away from the unit that built the lead in the first half. sorta bad all around there.

don't like that russell looks tentative out there. clarkson never really has, nor has randle. he torched a double team once and then lost the ball because he didn't have the confidence to go right at the rim/defense.

discouraging game, to be sure, but a lot of the issues look fixable to me. many even in the short term.

edit: and i wanted okafor on draft night, too. i've sold myself on russell, but there's no way that won't always be in the back of our minds.

 

I watched a good bit of the other games.

I must admit, I liked Kristaps and think he could prove a lot of people wrong before its all over.

Mudiay is a good playmaker. I liked that the Nuggets are just living with his mistakes and letting him run the point. He had a lot of turnovers but a solid debut for him.

Okafor was what I expected. Good on offense but not very good on defense. He will put up great numbers most nights though because the Sixers are awful again.

Saw a few snippets of Justise Winslow And Montrezl Harrell and both looked solid from what I saw.

Overall, I think this is going to end up being a really good crop of players.

 

I don't know. I was real high on DLo when we picked him, but after watching summer league, pre-season, and the first game, in my opinion, he hasn't made that much improvement. He is real hesitant, he isn't quick, he can't stay in front of his man, he can't get by his guy even with a pick being set for him. I get it, he needs time to improve and adjust, but it's real hard to feel good after seeing what all the other rookies did.

 

Come on guys, it took Kobe a couple years to even become a consistent player.

Russell has shown flashes of what he can do, and that's what we got from a young Kobe.

It'll be hard to watch there other more "NBA ready" players seem to outplay him, and constantly compare him, but this is what we've gone with and it's the first game of the season. I'm sure many Laker fans were scratching our heads wondering why we traded a good center for an 18-year old kid, while many other college proven players were still on the board.

Just be glad he stayed healthy to play the next game and enjoy his development through the season, because you're going to see lots of it.

 

Yeah. There aren't a lot of shots left with so many shooters and score first guys.

 

My expectations for Russell statistically weren't that high to be honest. 8 to 10 points with handful of assists and rebounds.

My frustration was more how we used him than anything else.

 

Yeah once Russell starts to mess up, Scott is gonna take him out for lou will or Huertas.

 

I do want Russell to play PG though not SG as he did yesterday. I don't think Byron knew what he was going to do with Russell at all.

 

And we saw the same thing with Kobe. Kobe didn't even start.

We had Shaq, Nick the Quick, Eddie, Ceballos playing ahead of him. Kobe ultimately just made things happen despite having a garbage coach like Del Harris.

It's up to D'Angelo to make strides, command the ball, and make things happen on his own. Byron can only stand there and call out plays. If D'Angelo is going to be that next level player, he's going to be able to make those calls himself. Ultimately, he will get the time, the ball, as some players fade out.

 

I think Russell will have more freedom with the 2nd unit. Swap him with Lou. Let him and Huertas run the 2nd unit.

 

On a team with Kobe, Clarkson, Lou, Randle, and Swaggy, we don't really need Russell to average a ton of points. We need someone who can run the offense and get the ball to our scorers.

 

Honestly it probably won't matter who is starting or coming off the bench as long as our coach is Byron Scott. We are playing pickup basketball out there, and we are at a coaching disadvantage literally every game we play.

 

Byron isn't even calling plays. They aren't even running an offense. They put the ball in Clarkson's hands and he'd either drive it or give it Kobe and let him chuck up 30 footers. This is a young kid who needs to have plays called for him. He needs to be involved. Clarkson and Kobe were so ball dominant there wasn't much Russell could do. Clarkson and Russell need to be the predominant ball handlers and Russell with his court vision and play making ability needs the ball in his hands and Kobe needs to play off the ball.

 

Byron makes Sam Mitchell look like Phil Jackson