What is up, fellow thermonuclear affers. I am dance in the valley,
coming at you with a conversation, a soapbox sermon if you will on le
Bron James and the Los Angeles Lakers. But what else are we going to
talk about? This team just gives us fodder by the day before we get
started. Please remember to continue rating and reviewing and subscribing wherever you consume us.
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time to time. But I think with that it's time to talk about Lebron
James and an Instagram captions. Because I'm an adult, We're all adults around
here in this way. We need to talk about not Twenty four hours after
the Los Angeles Lakers dropped to oh and four in the season, Lebron posted
a kind of cryptic but not totally Instagram caption Thursday that has reading between the
lines sluts buzzing. How long will you be taken for granted? Keep going,
kid, is what it said. Perhaps this caption is a code for
absolutely nothing. Maybe it's an innocuous nod to the picture of a thirty seven
year old soaring through the air, defying age and gravity and by extension science.
This post might be Lebron's way of saying, nobody appreciates what I'm doing
at my age, at this level nearly enough, and he'd be right.
His longevity is acknowledged and cherished, but there is no fully comprehending or treasuring
his lastingness. Counterpoint, though, yeah, no, that's not with this
caption is doing It can't be. The timing is too incidental to be coincidental.
He's sending a message he has to be. The twenty twenty two two
twenty three Lakers are spiraling, and Lebron, it seems, is fed up,
and on the surface, he has every right to be. Next season,
isn't a given for him. He turns thirty eight on December thirtieth,
giving him precious little time to play meaningful basketball, no matter how much of
a generational anomaly his aging curve remains. But the Lakers are nowhere near playing
meaningful basketball, let alone actually sniffing title contention. Sure, four games doesn't
have to be profoundly telltale, but los Angeles winless start is merely the sum
of all its long standing flaws actualized. Russell Westbrook remains a putrid fit on
offense. Trading for him while also bankrupting their wing depth during the twenty twenty
one off season was an obviously bad decision then, and it looks even worse
now. To what extent Russ deserves blame here, though, is questionable.
He has not reinvented himself on offense, is a high volume ball screener or
reliable spot up threat. That's not a surprise. He didn't undergo functional fate
slifts in Oklahoma City or Houston or Washington. Expecting him to dramatically change in
Los Angeles nearly fifteen years into his career is an irrational hope. It's a
minor miracle. He's played so hard on defense this season. If we're being
honest, none of this means he's above critique. Before suffering that hamstring injury,
he was shooting eight point three percent from deep and thirty five point eight
percent on two's. Both marks would be career lows and are absolutely positively disgusting.
Between his gargange win forty seven point one million dollars salary, critically bad
offensive play, and just his overall poor fit, Westbrook has received a lion
share of the blame, as if his very presence is the loan barrier separating
the Lakers from contention, or at the bare minimum, simply not sucking.
It's not. The Lakers as a team are shooting in a league worse twenty
two point seven percent from three and ranked dead last in point score per possession.
Overall. That's not all Russ. Everyone shares in the brick Lang.
Anthony Davis has verged on dominant for stretches, but followed up last year's sub
nineteen percent clip from three with another sub nineteen percent clip from three so far.
Kendrick Nunn is a career thirty six point one percent shooter from deep and
is currently nowly just twenty three point five percent of his trays, while also
having notched more fouls seven and turnovers nine than assists six. Patrick Beverley is
a career thirty seven point six percent three point sniper, yet presently joins ad
in the sub nineteen percent club. Lebron himself is banging in just twenty five
point seven percent of his triples, which would be a career low. Lonnie
Walker, the fourth meanwhile, is second on the Lakers and three point attempts,
which he's burying at a seventeen point four percent clip. Merely removing Westbrook
from the equation solves very little. He wasn't on the floor, and the
Lakers lost to the Nuggets and their lineups on the season in which Lebron and
a d play without Russ remain offensive, clung fess and in the net negatives.
Anyone bellowing obscenities at ross from the stands or behind the protection of an
avatar list social media account is one overdue for some serious soul searching, and
two misplacing most of the blame. The Lakers are not built by Westbrook or
in the image of Westbrook. They were assembled by general manager Rob Polinka and
the rest of the front office. A majority of the outrage must be directed
there. Across so many different fronts, Polinka and Company's cardinal sin remains the
same. They watched the Lakers win a title in twenty twenty by surrounding Lebron
in a d with complimentary shooting and defenders, and then decided not a full
year later to dismantle that nucleus in favor of what Westbrook might possibly, potentially,
if they're lucky, be able to sort of do when one of the
two greatest basketball players of all time wasn't on the floor. That is watertight
logic. So is letting Alex Caruso, one of their most important defenders,
walk in free age see on a contract that was neither egregious nor outside the
Lakers price range. With one of the goat candidates on their roster still playing
like a superstar, the Lakers acted like a small market franchise, equally inexcusable
doing so little in the aftermath of last year's implosion. Yes, the Lakers
turned over their supporting cast, but only because most of that supporting cast is
now out of the NBA. There's nothing noble about steering into decisions made for
you, or for stockpiling largely ball dominant guards. Almost everyone's favorite pastime is
now leaking Westbrook trades the Lakers could have made but didn't. That is damning.
It suggests a complete lack of urgency in the face of an extremely urgent
situation. That being Lebron's timeline, he should absolutely be pushing them to make
a move, any move, just for the sake of increasing the meaning behind
their largely purposeless basketball. Yes, the cost of doing so is prohibitive.
Trading twenty seven and twenty twenty nine first rounders that likely post date the Lebron
era is dangerous. It's one thing if those two picks ended up bagging them
Kyrie Irving or another star. It's entirely different to punt on such a massive
portion of your future in exchange for Miles Turner and Buddy Healed, or for
Josh Richardson and Jacca Peartle, or for Terry Rozier and Gordon Hayward. And
the Lakers current dilemma doesn't help matters. They are so deeply broken beyond the
Westbrook fit they might be irreparable. Why mortgage crucial assets just to not contend
and potentially eat into this summer's cap space. The answer, because you have
Lebron Fucking James. Patience isn't a virtue, not in this case. The
Lakers waiting for the trade market to expand doesn't ensure they'll have access to superior
deals. Better options will incite more competition, and their best package, while
steep for them, can be easily outstripped by teams capable of conveying a first
round pick sooner than five drafts from now. Urgency is at once obligatory and
essential. The Lakers haven't shown it. They've done everything, but they've made
head coach Frank Vogel escapegoat. They hired head coach Darvin Ham at least in
part because he sold them on making it work with Russ, yet again implying
that Russ is the lone obstacle they must overcome. Amid all these missteps over
the past year and change, the Lakers extended Polinka for some reason, even
though he's the architect of perhaps the NBA's most disjointed roster. That's worth another
few dozen or so kind of cryptic but not totally instagram captions from Lebron,
which left of his window is being squandered, and Polinka, along with all
the other folks upstairs, including Genie Buss, should be thoroughly blamed for being
so slow or unwilling to appropriately act. And Yet, while the Lakers are
no question taking Lebron for granted, he is not beyond culpability. He reportedly
pushed for the team to acquire Westbrook in the first place. It is Linka's
job to override that input from his star, from his superstar whenever necessary.
But we can't pretend like Lebron has been a voiceless bystander. What's more,
unless the Lakers promised to jettison Westbrook before the start of this season and then
renigged at the last second, Lebron still signed a two year extension knowing this
was the roster on which he'd be playing, that is eyes wide open behavior,
and it must factor into the blame game currently being played. Still,
even with all this in mind, the mess that is this season and this
team falls at the feet of Polinka in the front office. It doesn't matter
if Lebron wanted Russ, and it doesn't matter if the Lakers are so far
gone it actually doesn't make sense to ship out their draft picks. It doesn't
matter. Trade the picks anyway. Get better now, figure out how to
reload the war chest later, ad and Lebron trades will be on the table
in the coming years if your direction goes belly up once again. Polinka and
company pivoted away from a proven blueprint into aimless territory more than a year ago,
and they've yet to even sort of pull themselves out from the resulting freefall
that is franchise mail practice, and so Lebron will soon turn thirty eight,
somehow still performing at a level high enough to contend for titles on a team
run by a front office that frankly doesn't seem to give a shit. The
next thing we absolutely have to talk about is the Brooklyn Nets. They have
a they've had some better games. They're lost to the Mavericks on Thursday Night.
Was encouraging in many ways with the aggression you saw from Kyrie, even
some Ben Simmons moments, but they have a Ben Simmons problem, and it
was really underscored during that Bucks that Bucks lost early in the third quarter of
that Wednesday Night lost to Milwaukee, Kyrie attempted to distill what the team needs
from Ben Simmons down to three words. Shoot it, Ben. Brevity can
lack context, and I doesn't take the time to stop, break the fourth
wall and explain into the camera everything else the Nets need from Simmons. He's
also not wrong. Simmons was two of seven from the floor in Milwaukee and
three of seven versus Dallas, and is now twelve of twenty seven from the
floor on the season. The loss to the Bucks specifically marked the second time
this year Simmons finished with at least as many fouls as points. He has
tallied now twenty eight points against twenty two fouls through his five games, and
the Nets have been outscored by a total of forty two points during his minutes
on the floor. That's the sixth worst mark in the league among one hundred
and twenty players who have logged as many minutes so far. Of course,
the two most important words in that previous sentence might just be five games.
That sample size is nothing. Early season stats get warped every night, plus
minus in particular isn't always telltale. Kadi owns the second worst mark in the
league from that one hundred and twenty player group. I just referenced Leeway needs
to be given. Simmons is still working through his return from back surgery,
a sixteenth month long absence and a well documented yet poorly covered mental health struggle.
Players don't always return to previous form, and Simmons also tweaked his back
in that one game against the Bucks. We saw him on the bike,
riding it on the sidelines when he wasn't in the game to stay loose.
Kyrie once again eloquently noted this after Brooklyn's loss to Milwaukee. He wasn't He
didn't need to address it. After the loss to Dallas, he said,
you guys keep coming in here asking me, like, what about Ben?
He hasn't played in two years. Give him a fucking chance. We stay
on his shit. You just stay on him, but we're here to give
him positive affirmations. Does screaming shoot at Ben while waving your arms and jumping
up an apparent exasperation count as positive affirmation? Who's to say I'm not trolling
trolling him either. I did not interpret Kyrie's reaction to Simmons looking off the
lay up in favor of a KD jumper as ironclad support. But Kyrie deserves
nothing less than the benefit of the doubt after that little quote dropping f is
proof of positive affirmation in my book. Still, Simmons has been a problem
for the Nets at both ends, and it's okay to say that citing facts
is not akin to personal attacks or declaring his career over. Maybe he needs
more time, but at this exact moment his play is an issue. The
defense should be fine, and we even saw that at points with the Mavericks.
That turnover he was able to force off double Going to double Luca was
just vintage Ben and being able to create an opportunity for the Nets then in
transition. Overall, though, Simmons is not defending with the same circular,
unaltering explosion and force, and has committed some tiki tack fouls, sometimes seemingly
out of frustration or just disinterest in getting back in transition. To his credit,
he's also needed to guard some pretty large humans early on, Jannis Iion
Williams and Jonas Valancunis. The MAVs did a good job of making him avoid
reps against Luca nan Chich. But like these are assignments he's taking on after
such a long absence. It's tough. It's tough. It's just tough,
like rumor hasn't. When you're fully healthy, defending those guys can be tough.
A fairly long chunk of Simmons fouls are also coming on the offensive end.
That's either an aberration in the face of unfamiliar usage for him, a
slight concern, or maybe it's both. Paint me free from panic on defense.
For now, Simmons should get healthier and work his way back into game
shape. More than that, the nets as currently constructed don't seem built to
optimize how he best defends, not even with Nicholas Claxton on the floor.
That's a problem, but not necessarily a Simmons problem. His offense is a
different story. Relative passivity warrants plenty of panic. The lack of aggression we're
seeing now is not rooted solely in his absence and recovery from injury. It's
an extension of the warts he's always hinted at, the same ones that seemed
to mushroom leading up to what became his final game and hallmark moment with the
Philadelphia seventy six ers. Playing Simmons with non shooters up front has always been
a no go. Who among us wasn't traumatized from his minutes with Dwight Howard
in twenty twenty one. The Nets are dominantly slotting him beside non shooting bigs
anyway, and their offense is paying the price they got away from it over
their past couple of games. Day Ron Sharp didn't even play in their loss
to the Mavericks, but in the eighty seven minutes Simmons and Claxton have logged
together this season, Brooklyn's offensive ratings sits at a not so robust one oh
three point four, and that mark has plunged to ninety two point one.
When Simmons sets up shop beside day Ron Sharp, and yes, when you
watch go back and watch these units these minutes, the Nets look just as
clumpy as the numbers would suggest. Part of this might just be on the
offensive structure the Nets. Even when he's the big, he won't even be
listened as the big. But the Nets are not having Simmons initiate a ton
of pick and rolls with Claxton or Sharp, and anytimes he spends. Anytime
he spends off the ball in the half court is largely moved. When Claxton
and Sharp generally need to occupy the same space, or at least they're not
enough of threats from the outside for defenders to occupy different spaces. They're going
to be able to close up gaps and just seal off cuts to the basket.
If you want to go through with the Katie post up. Playing Simmons
without a big is a trendy, hypothetical solution. I'm gonna still emphasize hypothetical
here. The Nets haven't leaned on in a ton before their past two games.
Simmons logged just twelve possessions outside garbage time without Claxton a sharp on the
corps prior to that Buck's loss. Brooklyn, though, like I said,
did give those arrangements a more thorough look against the Bucks and the MAVs,
and it's sort of worked. The lineups finished as a net plus overall.
And that's set up when you look at the game against Milwaukee with Simmons is
let's call Simmons without a big, not Simmons as the loan big. They
went on a ten o run I think to close out the half and really
make that a game, and against Walking and put them on the ropes.
Simmons without a big, without a big lineups are worth further exploration by default,
then, because what else are the nets supposed to do? They still
can't be viewed as a cure. All screening and rolling is not Simmons's natural
state, and the Nets have not meaningfully attempted to use him in that vein.
They should try more of it, to be sure, especially in pick
and rolls with Kyrier or KD please, but this type of usage is largely
foreign for Simmons and has never been considered a potential strength. More problematic than
anything, though, is Simmons's general lack of aggression. He's averaging six point
three shot attempts for thirty six minutes. That's about half of what he averaged
prior to this season for his career. His drives are not surprisingly down amid
all this. He went from averaging eleven point three drives per game eleven point
three drives per thirty six minutes in twenty twenty two twenty one to six point
four right now with Brooklyn. Some of this can once more be traced back
to his getting displaced from the ball on Brooklyn, but even his quality moments
don't feel the same. Most of his assists aren't coming deep into paint penetration.
He's throwing pitch passes or completing handoffs from above the free thront line.
He's getting rid of the ball early in transition, which, to be fair,
isn't necessarily sinister. Maybe this changes in time. Maybe the Nets need
to scour the trade market for a stretch. Big shout out Miles Turner,
shout out Mo Bamba to streamline Simmons's defensive role and open up the half court
on offense. Maybe this is just the overreaction to five games. Whatever this
is, though, doesn't change what Brooklyn needs from Simmons in the coming days
and weeks and months to come, and that's to cease toeing the line of
offensive invisibility. Let me know what you think in the comments in the mentions.
Depending on where you're consuming this, remember to subscribe to us on YouTube
and the podcast players. Appreciate every single one of you. Until next time,
I'll leave the shout out to the one, the only, the person
who could actually solve He picks everything wrong with the Lakers, Frankly dam