164. How LeBron let the Lakers down

here at the start. That was probably the most heartbreaking loss of the season I can think of, because it was one of the best Laker efforts in terms of the things that haven't gone well for the most part

this season, that went well tonight. You know, I talked a lot last week on the show about how much this next stretch of Laker games, this next twenty four games, was gonna really test their metal because under the circumstances where they are in the standings, their situation, with how much talent they have and how and how poorly they've played all season, and with the Anthony Davis injury, that there would be kind of a loss of hope, Like what's the point of us putting in all this work,

if there's not something achievable at the end. I had a feeling that that type of test would come several times over the course of the next month and a half, and it came early in this game when the Clippers shot incredibly well to start the game on difficult shot profile while the Lakers were doing their job on defense. And then meanwhile on the other end of the floor, you keep seeing like wide open three for Malik Monk Clank, wide open three for Camelo Anthony Clank, and next thing

you know, you're down three. After you know, Luke Kennard makes another crazy contested thirty footer and I'm like, here you go, here's your first test. Here's your first opportunity to decide whether or not you really want to do this, And they did. They decided they wanted to do it, and that effort in the second half down the line was probably the best that I've seen this entire season outside of Lebron. And I have to start with Lebron here because this is one of the most unusual stretches

of games from him that I can remember seeing. I would say that he was number one to blame for losing against Golden State a couple of weeks ago before the All Star break, he was horrific in the fourth quarter on both ends of the floor. Defensively, he was throwing the ball away. On offense, he couldn't finish around the rim. He was really struggling with Golden State's length, and we all threw it away. Right, You're like, that's weird. Lebron doesn't do that very often. That's that's just an

outlier performance. We move on, and we were all proven right when all of a sudden against Utah, he reaches deep and and just pulls out one of the best performances in the fourth quarter that we've seen from him in recent years. I think he had fifth in the fourth and basically carries the team to a victory against Utah. And then here we are against the Clippers, as a second half run from Malik Monk and Carmelo Anthony and Taylor Horton, Tucker and Dwight Howard has amounted to elite

in the fourth quarter. I believe they were up six at one point, and it's just teed up there for Lebron to carry him home. And I tweeted out, they just need to get something from him. They don't need a lot, they just need something, and they got almost nothing. I tried to look at it. There were a couple of contested defensive rebounds he got and then there was that one picking pop where he hit Carmelo Anthony for the three. Outside of that, it was a lot of

missed defensive assignment. Team is back to back switches on the perimeter, one that gave Robert Covington a wide open three, and then another that gave Luke Nardo Coffee a wide open three at the top of the key. He he had a play where he like kind of got out of his rhythm and started talking trash to Robert Covington and then just lost the handle and and and gave

up a foul the other way. Like it was just it's a really I I can't remember a time that I've seen Lebron have two this bad fourth quarters in such a short period of time. And it's really unfortunate because down the line, everyone else on the roster, We're gonna touch on them all at some point tonight. Everyone else on the roster did everything necessary to win that game,

not just to win that game. If they shoot a little better and they get more out of Lebron, that group can be above five hundred even with this intense schedule without Anthony Davis over the course of the next month. That's how well they played tonight. That's how well they did their jobs in the in the varying lineups that they that they went with tonight. And so I feel bad.

I feel bad for the for the team, and I feel bad for for the fans because you know, they couldn't let it go and they went for tonight and Lebron just wasn't there. And again, like you gotta give Lebron a huge amount of benefit of the doubt because his resume is so extensive, and even his recent resume, he's still one of the top two or three players

in the world. But this was bad. That was That was a game where if you get even more out of Lebron, you win, and instead you lose because you get nothing from him and and that and that's really discouraging. I was talking with one of my producers before the show. I would have gone to Russ on that last possession. How wild is that? Like that that's the type of night Lebron was having. He wasn't dribbling the ball well, he wasn't shooting the ball well, he wasn't making reads well.

He was all over the place. And Russ had it going in the fourth quarter. He had a couple of drives to the basket. He had a mid range jump shot that he made around the foul line. He had a little floater that he made like Russ. Russ had it going, I would have gone in that direction. Now. That was ended up working out fine because the Clippers ended up sending a double at Lebron. But they just didn't execute well out of that. And obviously you're not

gonna love a contested thirty ft three from Mellow. But at the end of the day, if you want a silver lining, Lebron's not gonna play that bad. And they didn't shoot particularly well, and everything that they did from top to bottom with the role players is replicable. Those are things they can continue to do moving forward. And so I want to go piece by piece through through some of these guys just to talk specifically about what they did so well. So I want to start with Dwight.

You know, I I talked a lot this season like Dwight is a good backup center and a lot of the issues that have come with him this season have had to do with circumstance. Injuries have forced the Lakers to lean more on him than you'd want to. Instead of using him sparingly as a bench big, he's been forced to play big minutes on a lot of nights, and as a result, he's looked old, which is something that happens when you don't have that type of gas

in the tank to carry you through those stretches. But tonight, I don't know if it's the All Star break or if he just was showing some fight or what the deal was. That was as dominant a defensive performance from Dwight that I've seen in a long time, and he was killing on the offensive glass, doing some catch He had bobbled a few passes around the rim, but he

was really good on the offensive end as well. And so you know, particularly in the first half when the wheels were coming off, when the Lakers were missing all their shots and the Clippers were hitting everything, that could have just as easily been a twenty five point game at halftime, and Dwight Howard was a huge part of

why they were able to stay competitive. One of my favorite things about Dwight is he's active in drop coverage is one of the I hate drop coverages when you're doing them with someone like DeAndre Jordan's where he's kind of just waiting around the rim and it's like, yeah, if you drive right into me, I'll block you, but if you take anything from fifteen to five feet, it's all yours, bro, Like, I'm not even gonna go out there.

That's kind of the DeAndre Jordan approach. What Dwight Howard does that I love is he's active and he's up on the ball handler and he got a bunch of strips tonight where he he's so crafty with his hands. People forget that's part of what makes him such a good defensive player in his prime. It's not just that he's a freak. It's not just that he's superman. It's because he has amazing defensive instincts, and those defensive instincts show tonight throughout the game, and he got a lot

of cool strips and things along those lines. Melo had another kind of similar game like that, particularly in the second half. You know, uh, he they use the Lakers use him too much and drop coverages. I prefer to switch him because it's just he's just not quick enough to cover ground the way they need him to. But he did a lot defensively in the second half to stay active. He also had a bunch of strips and had a couple of key strips down at the end

of the game to get stops. Those are those are veteran players on this Laker team that are gonna need to step up moving forward and if that can be continued Mello, particularly on the defensive end, and Dwight Howard at Dwight Howard just night and night out doing what he does as a backup center, that if they can get that moving forward, he gives it gives you a better chance, especially if Lebron can play a little bit better.

The next thing I wanted to hit on was this idea of Malik Monk and Carmelo Anthony and what you do when they're not shooting well, because you know, in the first half Malik Monk and and Carmelo Anthony were breaking every thing, including wide open shots. But what's important is like when you're coaching other players, like if you're coaching Avery Bradley and he's missing everything and his head's not in the game offensively, you need to bench him.

If you're UH coaching Stanley Johnson and he's doing the same thing, you need to bench him. With Mellow and Malik Monk in particular, I think it's so important for the Lakers to give them a super long leash to shoot through their slumps because when they get going, that is what makes the Laker offense so dynamic. Is what those two bring as those lethal shooters, and Malik Monkey even getting to the rim. Molik Monk got his rhythm tonight just putting his head down and going to the basket.

And so I'm a big believer and letting him shoot through that. The same two guys that weren't making anything in the first half, and we're part of the reason they were losing, were the same two guys who got hot in the second half and allowed that run to kindle and and get going for the Lakers and actually get them to a position where they can win the game. So, but those two guys in particular, I'm a big believer

in letting them have a long leash. For those of you who are just joining us, this is Lakers Tonight, presented by FanDuel here on the volume. We're just breaking down the Laker game right now. Stick around at the end, I'll be talking a little bit about James Harden and Joel Embiat as well. I wanted to talk about Russ

for a second. So Russ is on a three game stretch here, or he's starting to play pretty well, And I don't think it's a coincidence because it doesn't really have a whole lot to do with what he's been doing in the box score. You know that that's an easy place to get distracted. You hear way too much this season, like oh Russell Westbrook is shooting a higher field goal percentage than Steph. Don't care. He's not been nearly in the same stratosphere as a player as Stephen Curry.

I don't care about what he does with his field goal percentage, or what he does shooting threes, or what he does rebounding or even with his assists. All I care about with Russ is is he impact acting winning? Is he making more winning plays than he's making losing plays? And as long as he's focused on all of the things that Frank needs him to do in his role, then he has a lot of leeway to miss the occasional pull up transition three or to smoke a layup,

like he missed a fourth quarter lap tonight. He got all the way to the rim and he missed a left handed layup. I don't care. I thought he played great tonight because he had more good plays than he had bad plays. A huge part of this has been won him buying into the role and putting in more effort defensively. But two, he's playing slower, which again we

talked about this a couple of weeks ago. I have no idea why it was Shock of all people that got through to him, but Russ specifically told us, like I was told by Shock to slow down. That's what I've been trying. That's what's been working for me. And it's not coincidence. Like when you're when you're flying into

the lane at full speed, it's difficult to finish. Like just go up to your local l a fitness or something and take a lay up on aneath the rim, then go back to half court and sprint as fast as you possibly can and try to lay it up. It's just it's just tougher. Like, yeah, if you're a good basketball player, you can do it. But it's it's tougher, and Russ in those NBA settings in traffic would just throw a bunch of junk up and he missed everything.

So him slowing down and being more methodical, doing more jumping off of two feet instead of one feet, that's more of a balanced take off as opposed to a you know, off balance one ft you know, line drive type of deal. That kind of thing is really really helped him. He's also been more selective with his jump shot. I only counted one jump shot tonight that I didn't like, it a transition pull up that he took in the first quarter. All the other jump shots he took made sense.

They were against drop coverages when the big was sitting under the paint and the guard tried to go under the screen and he found himself there around fifteen feet with a lot of time for him to settle into a nice balanced fifteen footer. Those are good shots for us. You know, he's actually shooting a decent enough percentage this year on those that they're fine or you don't want. Russ is the isolation. I'm staring a guy in the face and I'm just elevating over him and throwing it

into the corner of the backboard. Those are bad shots. But Russ in general is starting to round things out with his game. It's only three games, plenty of time for him to slip back into what was not working for him earlier. But if he can recreate this and he can extend it forward, there's a good player in there. And that was always my take with Russ was never he sucks. It was that he's playing poorly because he's stubborn and he's not embracing what the team needs him

to do. He was sucking in the way he was playing, not in who he was as a basketball player. That's an important distinction. And I don't know if there was a wake up call in there somewhere or what the deal was, but we're starting to see some signs of life. I wanted to give him just a little little bit of a shout out. The last thing I wanted to hit on what was the Young Lakers. I did a video on this a couple of days ago, UM, with the help of the crew at the Volume Special shout

out to them. They got that those guys are amazing and I couldn't do anything I do without them. UM. But in this video. I was talking about why it was so important for the Lakers to play their young guys moving forward, and I pointed out through net rating. If you just Google, if you just go to the NBA dot com and you look up the best Lakers playing alongside Lebron in order of net rating, it was basically the four young guys Malik Monks, Stanley Johnson, Austin

Reeves and Taylor Horton Tucker and Carmelo Anthony. Carmelo Anthony, it's not a coincidence that he's in that list. It's because he still has an elite skill. Karmelo Anthony is such a good spot up shooter, and he's still a pretty good rebounder, and he's still a smart, savvy player. That elite skill though, that shooting allows him to succeed still in the league. A lot of the old players that the Lakers are playing, guys like Trevor Reza DeAndre Jordan,

they don't actually have an NBA skill anymore. Like like Trevor Reasa had a wide open transition layup from Lebron, and he like in his prime, you'd still be hanging on the rim and instead he like looked like his knee gave out a little bit. He just looked a step slowly, airball to three out of the corner. He was missing by a lot. Like that guy, there's just not a whole lot he can bring to the table at this point in his career. Maybe it's the ankle injury.

I don't know what it is, but he's not that guy anymore. Mellow is a vet that's still giving you something. Dwight hasn't been an every night player yet this year, but he gave you something tonight. That's something you look at outside of those two guys. It has to be the youth. It has to be Stanley Johnson, it has to be uh Austin Reeves, it has to be Tailor, and has to be Monks, and all of those guys gave you something tonight in some area of the game.

Tailor I talked a lot in the video about how he's starting to come into his own as a playmaker. In the previous seven games, he had twenty six assist to just twelve turnovers. That's incredible for a twenty one year old guard. Guards are all like young guards are always a step behind with efficiency and limiting mistakes and and th HD is starting to show signs that he's kind of on the other side of that hill, which

is exciting. He was amazing in that second half on both ends of the floor, countless steals and strip aways. He had his entire offensive repertoire working. He was scoring at the basket, he was making three point shots, he was making contested turnaround jump shots in the midrange. He had everything going. He looked like the player that has had me so exciting, so excited all season. And this is again an extended stretch. This is eight games from

tailand now where he's looked really good. I went on the favor It's Another Volume podcast on Monday this or Tuesday this week, and on that show, I said, the only way that the Lakers can have enough talent to win a championship this year is if someone like Tailan takes a massive leap. Now, in order for this to be a leap, Tailor has to stay good for the rest of the season. So there's a long way to go in that department, but that this is a good

first step in that direction. Austin third quarter, especially in the first quarter and third quarter in particular, the Clippers went out of their way to try to attack Austin and as I've kept saying, every possession that the other team goes out of their offense to try to isolate Austin Reeves is a win for the Lakers because they're not warning very often, they're inefficient in those possessions, and the other four Lakers get to stand around and just watch,

and then as soon as the shot goes up, they crashed the boards and they're running the other way. And the Lakers were getting a lot of good stuff on possessions where the Clippers were foolishly attacking Austin Reeves as if he was some good option to attack. So information like, I'm it's really unfortunate because the Lakers played well enough

to win this game. It just so happens that the Lakers have played two They've put together two really good basketball games in their last three against the Warriors and Clippers, and come away with two losses because their leader, who's been amazing all season, who's been amazing for three seasons, their leader couldn't come through, And you just have to chalk it up to bad luck. It is what it is.

But the overall package of what the Lakers put on the court tonight with the Lebron that we know, not the one we saw tonight, but the Lebron that we know that group can win enough games to make a run at the seven or eight seed and get Anthony Davis back and try to get into that seven spot to try to avoid Phoenix. That's a formula there, and so that's why what I wanted to stay positive on that front. As unfortunate as this loss is, the Lakers are starting to behave and show some signs of being

a good basketball team. For those of you who are just joining us, this is Lakers Tonight, presented by Fandel here on the volume. We were just breaking down the Laker game. I wanted to take just a couple of minutes before we get out of out of here tonight to talk about James Harden's first game with the Philadelphia

seventy sixers. First of all, I was joking with with my producers this it's the least shocking thing in the entire world, was that, Uh, James Harden looked fantastic tonight Because of course, because of course, James, as soon as he gets his you know, headspace in the right space, he's got it all figured out and now he's playing basketball again and he's playing well. That what he did in Houston to try to force the trade, what he did in Brooklyn to try to force the trade. It's

just really ugly stuff. It's not a good look. You can blame it on injuries all you want, but dude, when you when you walk into Philly and you're looking super happy and all of a sudden, you're making all your step back threes and you're getting to the basket again, you're starting to draw free throws, that's that's an indicator of the fact that you were you know, we were bamboozled. For lack of a better term, you were leading the way and uh uh, you were basically trying to manipulate

the situation into your favor. There are a couple of interesting things that stood out to me. So for starters, that team is ridiculously talented, and it's something that I that didn't really click for me until I saw it. I'll put together tonight. But they have this luxury because of how much offensive creation Joel and Beat and James Harden bring to the table. They have this luxury of being able to allow their role players to focus on

the defensive end of the floor. And so now you're asking Tyree s Maaxe, who's very good point of attack defender, who moves his feet really well, has good size and strength at the guard position. And then two really good wings. Tobias Harris is a really good wing defender and Matissetibel is one of the best wing defenders that we have in the league. The dude is gonna be a perennial All Defense selection. When you put those three guys next to Joel Embiad, who's an awesome drop coverage big, then

it's just makes James Harden's job easier. One of the things I noticed that they were switching everything one through four, but then they were running traditional drop coverages with them BEAD, but then when Harden would be in the screen with him BEAD a lot of times in BEAD would switch

that one too. They're making things very easy for James and so his defensive shortcomings are just not a problem alongside this group, which allows him to stay focused on what he does best, which is score the basketball and create shots for his teammates, which is something he did really,

really well all night long tonight. One of the interesting dynamics that I was looking at is, I was like, I was thinking, you know, Joel embiad is never really played with a really good pick and roll threat in his career, not one that dictates the type of attention

that James Harden does. He's played with guys like Tyres Maxie, and he's played with guys like Ben Simmons, and he's done dribble handoff stuff with guys like Seth Curry, but he's never played with a real pick and roll threat that forces you to chase over the top and offer help from the big It's a it's a rare. There's only like a dozen of them in the entire league, and and Joe Ellen beats playing with them to playing

with one right now. And one of the things that I noticed was, and beat who's not a great rim runner. He's not your Clint Capella, you know, Nick Claxton. I'm gonna roll to the rim and just jump, and my elbows will be above the rim, and you just throw it up there and I'll dunk it like the Joel and Beads. Not that guy. And so I was really curious to see how that dynamic would work. And basically what he did is every time he'd set the screen, they'd send two at James Harden and and Bead would

just roll to the semicircle. It's kind of like a short roll. And then Harden would just throw him a baseball pass and he just catch and he would do him beat stuff right from the semicircle, just one dribble, spin lay up, but just quick turn and finish. And he was getting all sorts of fouls and all sorts of stuff right at the rim and scoring easy. And you know, when you're one of the things that sucks about being the only start, something that Lebron's dealing with

right now, something can be dealt with all seasons. Something yokis dealt with all season. When you're the only star, you don't get easy shots, so everything you do is hard, and as a result, it's difficult to manufacture the offense that you manufacture over the course of the game. When you play with that other high level player, that's what

allows you to supplement your offense with easy stuff. Joe embiad is gonna have fewer bad nights because he's gonna get more easy shots early in the game operating as a short roller off of attention that James Harden gathers and as a result is gonna get a lot of easy finishes, a lot of trips to the free throw line that will allow him to build his rhythm and allow him to get it going. That was a really

impressive win. Minnesota is good. They were eighteen and eleven at home coming into that game, they were twelve in the entire league in home net rating. That's not an easy game. And Philly just went in there and whooped their ass. And and I again, it's never you never want to overreact to one game that could lay down and take a bad loss in a couple of nights here. But as far as first showings, that's as good as

it gets. And I have one last thought because we did experience the all time foul bathing type of game from James Harden and Joel embid I. I can't remember exactly how many free throws they shot, but it was

a million. We had our classic James Harden three pointer on the right wing, where as soon as he elevates to shoot, he just literally allows his feet to swing like four or five ft out in front of him and he's literally fault like there's a still shot of James Harden before he lands on the defender where he's straight up falling, like the dude is just falling for the sake of falling because he knows the foul call is coming. But one thing I'll say this, I hate it.

It's basketball blasphemy. It's not good for the game. It never gets any easier to watch. But if there's one silver lining, it's that we know that doesn't work. We have decades and decades of evidence that that style of

basketball does not work in the postseason. So if there's one vindication in all of this, it's that if James Harden and Joel Embi'd win a championship this season, they're gonna have to do with the old fashioned way by putting the ball in the basket and stopping the other team from putting the ball in the basket on the other end. All and although I was impressed by the whole dynamic and the way that it worked, that team

makes sense in a lot of ways. I'm still not sure if James Harden and Joel and be can out execute Janice and Kevin Durant in a seven game series, but they're gonna have their chance. And as far as first impressions go, that was about as good as it gets. Alright, guys, that is all I have for tonight. As always, I sincerely appreciate your guys support. Lakers play the Pelicans on Sunday night at seven pm Pacific Standard time. I will be going live immediately after that game. See you guys.

Then the volume mhmm