Optimism Discussion: The Laker's Sky Is Not Falling

Makes perfect sense to me. Means they have a mean streak/killer instinct... means they don't lose concentration or take nights off.

 

Our record with teams over .500 isn't super impressive, but I haven't compared anything across the board this season or historically either. However, it can be said that the NBA has attempted to lower overall travel throughout the year and have fewer back to backs, so that may also play a role.

 

That's because the league blows. And the Lakers have played 21 of their 38 games against below .500 teams.

 

If we're making Threes, we're unbeatable.

 

Shoot if we're 22-0 against teams under .500 - that means we're 10-7 against teams over .500? So we're basically playing .500 ball against good teams? THat's not good...

 

Oh wait - this is the optimism thread - Love this team! lol

 

Seriously though - we handled the Mavs without AD (yes they were without KP but AD is way more important to our team than KP is to the mavs) on the road and made it look easy. Huge props to our bench squad that held it down towards end of the 3rd - honestly that was a key stretch. Should give them confidence going forward. Dudley Green KCP Caruso Rondo was it? My god...huge props.

 

mainly Dudley when he started posting up lil dudes some players should learn a thing orn2 from.him

 

OKC: “No AD and no LeBron? Easy win”
Lakers: “mutha***** hold my beer!”

 

I'm not too worried (we're now 11-7 after today's game).

Bucks are 9-5. Boston is 10-6. That's it in the Eastern Conference.

In the west, we got Denver 8-5, Clips 10-7, and Houston 8-6.

So we're right in it with the best of them, except we've beaten more sub-.500 teams. Only Bucks and Raptors have 1 loss each, and Utah with 3.

In the playoffs, I think it's gonna come down to coaching and matchups. If Vogel plays his cards right, we continue our flow of offense for good looks to knock down, and our bigs make it difficult for any inside shots, we have a great shot at winning it all this year.

 

What else seems different about our high winning team to me .... is the much higher % now it seems of our team getting to the loose balls. After years the opposite we're getting possession on most of them now. Certainly under the basket as well.

 

I’ll take a 60% winning clip against +.500s in the playoffs.

 

haha, Nuggs about to lose to the Cavs at home.

 

They want to destroy Clippers tomorrow

 

So funny how the media pushed anti-Lakers stories to draw ratings from the haters but don't speak about our recent success. The first half of the season was about the Lakers having such an easy schedule that it was "rigged" for us.

Now:
Lakers have had one of the TOUGHEST schedules out there thus far.
We have the most wins vs .500 teams and above.
Milwaukee Bucks have had arguably the easiest schedule playing in the Leastern Conference and all you hear about is his MVP dominance but LeBron has no chance. Then you get to the Rockets who have had one of the easier schedules as well but because James Harden shoots 50 free throws and 20 threes per game while his teammates are basically there just to check him the ball gets more MVP consideration...

The narrative about the Lakers facing and beating weak teams has now disappeared. Haters talk about our record vs +.500 teams but we have the third highest winning rate vs such teams in the league. We are 21-0 vs teams under .500 teams (only undefeated team vs .500 teams so we are winning games that we should). Considering most teams have 24-25 games vs such teams already, we have played FEWER weak teams than the majority of the league. Heck, the Bucks have played 27 games vs under .500 teams - 6 more than us!

https://www.espn.com/nba/standings/_/group/league/view/expanded

Really funny how quiet they have been. I was wondering why they never mentioned it anymore. Ramona "Ms. Piggy" Shelburne pushed that narrative on ESPN for many weeks and now I guess Rob Pelinka and the Lakers management stopped leaking to her so she went to go seduce Steve Balmer instead.

http://www.espn.com/nba/stats/rpi/_/sort/SOS

Boston, Milwaukee, Houston, and Denver have had some of the easiest schedules thus far but no peep from the media. Boston/Milwaukee rank 2/3 in the easiest schedules right now. When will the Lakers get more credit? And why is LeBron not more of an MVP candidate but Giannis+Harden gets all the credit for playing the easy schedule that the Lakers were penalized for?

 

Don't look now but are we starting to GEL right around the time reasonable fans hoped we would be?