Hoops Tonight - Lakers-Suns Reaction: LeBron James outplays Kevin Durant, Anthony Davis returns

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gonna do a quick show tonight. We're gonna do fifteen minutes on Lakers Suns and then we'll get out of here. Busy week on the channel. In case you missed it earlier today we did an hour doing a deep dive on the Minnesota Timberwolves as well as Anthony Edwards and his progressions as a passer. We hit an eleven mail bag questions that bounced all around the league. That was just recorded earlier today. That's a little bit further back

on the feed. We also did a half dozen or so deep dives on particular teams that you got can find on the feed, and then a bunch of instant reactions, so don't forget to go back and look and see. In case you've missed anything, We've been doing like seven eight shows a week so far to start the season. We're gonna take some time off around Thanksgiving, so I wanted to load up on that front. The again, just gonna hit fifteen minutes on suns Lakers tonight. You guys

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hitting them throughout the season. All right, let's talk some basketball. So the Lakers keep forgetting their identity. You know, this is a consistent theme that has happened as I've covered this team very closely over the Lebron James Anthony Davis era. Every time they've won for an extended period of time, it's been on the strength of their defense. It was in twenty twenty an outstanding defense anchored by Anthony Davis many times next to another six ' ten plus human.

Right twenty twenty one season, that identity continued throughout the year. They just ran into injury issues right with the Lebron's ankle and Anthony Davis's groin, right, But then they had a long period of struggle after that, and it wasn't until they kind of rebot into their defensive identity around the trade deadline last year that they were able to rip off a bunch of wins again and then once again post deadline, second in the league in defense, fourth

and rebounding. They were an excellent defense and rebounding team, and then they rode that defense to knock off the two seed and the defending champs in the Western Conference on their way to the Western Conference Finals. Every time they've been good, it's been because of defense. But there have been a couple of times over the course of this era where for whatever reason, they've tried to reconfigure themselves,

and I, honest to God, don't know why. But the Russell Westbrook trade, it was like, we're gonna become fast.

We're gonna take the ball out of Lebron's hands, who won the game and won the champion championship as a point guard, and we're going to play up and down fast break basketball, right And then even this most recent time, it's like, we're gonna add all this offensive skill and we're gonna be this like, you know, super skilled five ball handlers, five shooters read and react, you know, Golden State Warriors style offense, and they suck at offense because

they don't have anybody who's that good of a jump shooter or that good of a you know, quickness threat, like guys like Darren Fox and Malik Monk are to actually have that sort of offensive system work for them, right. And what's been really funny is even as they sit here at four and five, they've been deep in the hole.

And all four of those wins, we had the Suns game, down big in the second half, hillatious fourth quarter defensive and rebounding effort to come back and win, the Orlando Magic game, literally down big in the second half, hillatious defense and rebounding effort in the second half on their

way to a win. Then we had the Clippers game, same sort of thing, looked like shit in the first half, down big in the second half, hillatious defense and rebounding effort in the fourth quarter as they come back to win. And then once again against the Phoenix Sun, same thing, down big in the second half and have to ride a hillacious defense and rebounding effort in the fourth quarter to win. I don't know what it's gonna take for them to kind of understand that that's their identity and

lean into that more. But it's been a struggle so far for that team this year. They held the Suns twenty three points in the fourth quarter, finally started to get control of the defensive glass down the stretch. They actually punished the Suns with a couple of big offensive rebounds and crunch time on the other end of the floor. That's what they're capable of. I mean, again, this largely

was the same core. You know, more Ruiye Hotsumura Minutes, who's had trouble getting into Darbenham's rotation this year for whatever reason, and more Jared Vanderbilt Minutes because he was healthy last year. But aside from that, and Dennis Schroeder is a small guard who wasn't helping you on the glass that much anyway. They are just a they just the same group of guys, Austin Dilo Lebron, Anthony Davis.

That group is not competing on the glass as well as they used to, and so they've had a lot of issues there, right, And so again I think it's gonna be really important for Darvin Ham to do what he did in that second half, which is like lean into the guys that are doing their jobs. You know, Cam Reddish for all of the flak that he caught for missing threes early in the season and struggling offensively, the dude has been one of their best point of

attack defenders to this point in the season. They struggled in the first half of this game, got in some foul trouble, but in the second half he was excellent defensively disrupting the ball, getting in between and like in between screening actions and getting steels and getting out in transition and obviously hit four corner threes and hit that big time transition pull up three. But like again, he got big minutes because Darvin Ham saw him competing defensively

and on the glass. Ruyach Shimura finally got like extended run in the second half of this game. Why because he was competing defensively, jumping passing lanes in the right place at the right time, competing on the glass, and it helps when he's making shots the way he was as well. Same thing goes with Christian Wood, who repeatedly has cracked into the rotation this year on the strength of him competing on the glass in particular, and Christian Wood's defense has been a little bit of a mixed

bag and pick and roll. He's been bad, but he's been really good in help and he's been okay on the ball, right, But I thought it was interesting that Darvin ham like it was a lot less of D'Angel Russell in the second half. It was a lot more of just sizing up and playing the guys that were

competing defensively. And then one of the things that's been a good trend for the Lakers, and this is something that I've talked about in some of our ramp sessions that we've done, But like last year, Lebron had a really bad crunch time season, and one of the main reasons why is, especially after his foot injury, he just wasn't as explosive as he used to be. But he used to just kind of like get switches on bigs and then settle for his pullback three and miss it

the vast majority of the time. And he just wasn't as dominant down this stretch of games as he's shown

himself to be this year. This year, it's been a steady diet of like he keeps making timely jump shots, like he just keeps doing it once again tonight, late clock situation, gets a switch against against Grayson Allen on the left elbow, and what do I always say is my favorite Lebron James jump shot that I actually think he has a good chance of making most of the time, the right shoulder fade pretty much unless he's taking it against an outstanding wing defender on the baseline, He's gonna

make that right shoulder fade it. It's the jump shot that he makes most frequently. Got to it late in the game, knocked it down consistently, was hunting switches and baiting Phoenix into double teams and making the right feeds out of that, and then kept trusting Cam Reddish again.

Like he got so much flak after that Miami heat game for making a pass to a wide open corner three point shooter which was objectively a better shot than him forcing it over a double team, and he got a bunch of shit for it, And then he did the same thing tonight and it worked. What did I tell you after that heat game? I was like, he did the same thing in the playing game against Minnesota and it worked. Like everyone wants to call out Lebron for his late game passing the ball only when guys

miss shots. But he has literally won championship after championship after championship after championship. Don't forget He's got four of those things largely on the strength of him being that type of decision maker. He leaned into it again at the end of the game tonight and it carried it

him home. I thought it was particularly interesting that cam Reddish had just missed back to back corner threes, because he made one early in the game, and then he made three in a row early in the fourth quarter, and he also made that bailout three at the end of the third quarter. But then he missed two in a row in crunch time, and Lebron went back to him and he made the big one and like again, Like That's one of the unique things about Lebron as a late game decision maker is like he trusts the

best advantage available on the court. Right. For instance, do you guys remember that stretch there where he was like, Hey, Austin, you just go run pick and roll with Anthony Davis and take advantage of Nicole of a use of nurkitchen his weak drop coverage for a few possessions and Austin made some plays, right, Like he just like what he's doing is he's looking at the floor, identifying his team's

best opportunity for offense, and he's leaning into that. Sometimes it's him, sometimes it's Austin, Sometimes it's Ad in a post up. Sometimes it's him just driving and kicking and trying to get a shooter an open look, especially when the team that they're playing against is giving that shot up.

I think I think Lebron has been amazing in clutch situations this year, which is a very encouraging trend after how bad he was on that end in that area last year just wasn't as explosive for whatever reason, and then the jump shot had failed him time and time again. So I've said this on the show before, but like all these other issues the Lakers have had, are come

somewhat fixable, right. But like Lebron and his individual ceiling, I've said since the summer, him getting back to roughly what he was in twenty twenty is an absolute requirement if this Laker team is going to compete for a championship. And once again we saw Lebron outplay He outplayed Kawhi and Paul Georgie in crunch time in the Clippers game. He outplayed Kevin Durant in crunch time twice now against the Suns, so that is really encouraging on that front.

Show Ruy Hatchamura got a really unfair shake. Unfair is the wrong word, but he's gotten an unfortunate shake in the early part of this season, with him being hyped up as the starter going into the season and then losing that job, to then kind of being in the doghouse in the rotation for whatever reason, to then getting injured this like freaky you know, eye contusion that turned into a concussion protocol thing, and then even again tonight, like only eight minutes in the first half as he

seems to be kind of buried in the back of the rotation, but came in in that second half Tonight played his ass off, made a bunch of big defensive plays, made a couple of huge threes, got a big transition dunk. Rui was awesome. Anthony Davis first came back from an injury, looked like he wasn't quite as a mobile as you would expect. He missed a couple bunnies early where you could tell he was kind of hesitant jumping. So clearly whatever's going on with this hip is still bothering him

a little bit. That's the Again. One of those things is like, this team also isn't going anywhere unless Anthony Davis plays like one of the best players in the world, and so to get a win in a game where he was mostly bad is actually really really basically just one gigantic silver lining in this situation. Is you hope to eventually get more out of Anthony Davis in the long run as well, I shouldn't even say hope, you

expect to get more out of Anthony Davis. And then Austin Reeves is the last individual player that I wanted to shout out. He also got a really unfortunate set of circumstances tonight. Austin Reeves is the third best player on the Lakers. I've been saying this forever. I believe is sincerely one of the top fifty players in the NBA. He was one of the very best players on Team USA again this summer. So it's not a Laker jersey thing.

I bet you if you asked the coaches on Team USA, that's literally what they would tell you, and honest to God like for him to go through what he did tonight, which is basically like he's struggling. He's not playing good, struggling on offense outside of a three game stretch recently where he looked good and then he played really poorly against Houston, and then he struggling defensively and on the glass. Right,

But so is d Angela Russell. He's been a little bit better offensively, but he's also been inconsistent, has made a lot of mistakes, and has been just as bad as Austin defensively and on the glass, and in the big picture, Austin is the guy that the Lakers lean

on the most. You literally saw that at the end of that game when when the shit went down, Darvin went with Austin not d Lo and Austin was the guy that Lebron trusted to run the late game actions and he made the shots right, and yet he got benched in large part because they just expected him to

accept it right, And that's kind of unfortunate. He's in a situation where he belongs in the starting lineup and his coach sits down with him and goes, hey, not only am I benching you, but I'm benching you for a journeyman forward. It can't play it excellent tonight, but a journeyman forward that was a expected to not even be in the Lakers rotation at the beginning of the season, and now he's starting for you, in large part because we believe you'll handle it better than if we bench

the other guy. And that's basically what happened him, and he came out and played one of his better halves of the season in that second half effort and including that stretch in crunch time where he kind of took over the offense. So shout out to Austin. I thought he got dealt a pretty unfortunate set of cards this evening, and he handled it really well. I understand what Darvin Ham was going for because in the big picture, the

Lakers still have a lot of issues. I was texting with the buddy during the game, and literally both of these teams look like they're not even close to as good as they're going to be. Like the Suns, we're gonna talk about them in a minute. Still really struggle with rim pressure, so really struggle with off ball players getting ignored. Right. Devin Booker is one of the best rim pressuring guards in the league, and also is a just another awesome offensive player at the end of games.

That's gonna make it much harder to throw the kitchen sink at Katie the way that they did tonight. Right, So, like, again, both teams have a boatload of issues. The Lakers just came out with a victory in this one. The Lakers defensive rebounding still a massive problem, and it's like mostly like I said, it's about competitiveness and effort. There is a personnel element, right Jared Vanderbilt seven rebounds a game last year. Ruey Hachimur in a bigger role last year,

five rebounds a game last year. So, like they're missing some of the rebounding, you know, contribution that they got from some of those guys. But as a group, they're still capable of doing way better than they have been doing. It's something that they have to do a better job of. I think I think Darvinham might have to consider sizing up more frequently at the expense of his perimeter defense, especially when the perimeter defense hasn't been as good as

you need it to be. But the perimeter defense is an issue, and like that's kind of where I was confused on the on the Austin Reeves benching. I've said on my show several times, I believe dangel Russell getting traded at the deadline is one of the safest bets this season. And it's really a simple they He is a good, good player. I do believe Dangela Russell is a good player. Just don't think he's a good fit

on the Lakers. He's a good player who's on an affordable deal, and so like there's but he also plays the same core position group as another player in Austin Reeves, who's more or less the same type of player, just a better version of it. But he also struggles athletically. He also can struggle at the point of attack from time to time. Right, So, like Austin's had a really bad defensive season for the record, and I say that because he legitimately was a plus defender for the Lakers

last year and he is struggling this year. I don't know if it's his legs. I don't know if it's his confidence or what the deal is. He's gonna have to figure that out, because if he keeps defending and rebounding like this, then you know, a lot of the things that I say optimistically about Austin just become not true, and he's gonna have to He's gonna have to improve in those areas. But Austin and Di Loo are redundant.

And so because they're both redundant, and because Delo is a good player on an affordable deal, and because the Lakers believe that Austin is a better player, They're gonna probably end up trading Delo. Right, So, like at the deadline, there's a version of this where the Lakers have a different lineup configuration with a better athlete in the backcourt, but that's not happening for a long time. Likedlo's contract doesn't even become available to be traded until January fifteenth.

So at the end of the day, like this group has to figure out how to compete better on the glass than they have done so to this point offensively as well, just in terms of their approach, I thought you saw in that first half in particular, the Lakers are starting to generate higher quality looks. They're starting to run more spread pick and roll. They're starting to clear the side more and give their best players more room to work they're starting to match up hunt the right way,

and they're starting to get higher quality looks. And you saw in that first half shots weren't falling, but then they started falling in that second half. I've been saying this for a while, guys, but like the Lakers have a lot of really good shooters that are not shooting well. Like Torian Prince not a great NBA player, but he is a great catch and shoot player. Hasn't been able to make catch and shoot threes this year, right, Dangelo Russell, like one of the things he's great at is catch

and shoot threes, not making them this year. Austin Reeves one of the things he's great at catch and shoot threes. I think he's two for four tonight, but over the course of the season, he hasn't been making them. Right. It's actually ironic that it ended up being Cam Reddish that kind of busted them out of their slump, because there were a lot of really good shooters for the Lakers that were missing shots. But again, like you saw what happens when they start making shots, it almost invigorates

the team. They start to play better defense, they start to compete more on the glass, and then other things start to kind of click into place. So long way to go for the Lakers, just like there's a long way to go for the Suns. But I think these four fourth quarter kind of comeback explosions that they've had, fueled by defense, are a good indicator of what this team is capable of if they can get some of

their other shit together. But I could tell you as a fan, and again everyone who listens to the show knows, like this is the one team that I actually root for. Like, as a fan, they're miserable to watch. They're a miserable team. I have so much more fun watching other NBA teams right now, and thankfully for my job, I get to watch good basketball, Like I've watched a ton of Timberwolves film.

Today I rewatched the Celtics game for a second time, and then I watched this Pelicans game again, and like, I just have so much fun watching that team because of the way they play. They play a likable brand of basketball. And there are you know, a half dozen other teams that I've been covering this year that I've really grown to like watching. I do not like watching this Laker team right now, But at the same time, I do think they're capable of becoming a team that

plays a better brand of basketball. It's just a matter of commitment on their front movie out of the Suns. So one of the things that kind of really stood out in this game was the ignoring of the off ball shooters. This is something we knew was gonna happen. This is something that happened in the playoff series last year. This is something happened that happened even during the regular season last year. But it's kind of been exacerbated this

season by the injuries. But specifically Keda Bates Job, Josh Kogi and Jordan Goodwin, and those guys are bringing a bunch of other good to the table. I thought a keya base Job did a pretty decent job playing good physical on the ball defense against Lebron tonight. Joshacog and Jordan good would have been excellent on the offensive glass throughout the season, and they've applied rim pressure and they've played good point of attack defense, but they're just getting

completely ignored on the other end. And those three guys went two for thirteen from three tonight, And when I tell you they're all wide open, looks like they are literally all wide open looks. There was a wide open three out of the right corner that Joshacoci shot like two feet over the back of the rim. So like, again, one of the things that you have to understand here

is like injuries do play a role. Like what I'm looking for a lot in the regular season when guys are in and out of the lineup is more just identity stuff, like what are their habits one of the things that they like to do on every single possession, right And like, just like the Lakers were missing a bunch of forwards and it was impacting their rebounding, the Suns are missing their offensively minded stars that are forcing them to play defensively minded players that struggle to knock

down spot up shots and play off the ball, and as a result, their offense is starting to run in some issues, right and so like again, like if Devin Booker is out of the lineup and Bradley Beal is out of rhythm coming back from injury, when we get

to April, the Sons are just gonna lose. Right Like, whenever we talk about the Suns, we're trying to envision what they're gonna be in April, and what they're gonna be in April is a team that hopefully has Devin Booker healthy, with Bradley Beal healthy and Kevin Durant healthy.

Like I don't think Grayson Allen is gonna be out there for Lebron to match up Hunt in a playoff series, potentially, not at the end of a game, not in the late fourth quarter phase, right, Like that's what's always weird about these regular season games, Like it probably won't be

Cam Reddish wide open in the corner. Like it'll probably be either Torny and Prints alongside Jared Vanderbilt, or it might be a traded player that they get back in the D'Angelo Russell deal, Like who knows, right, But what we're more interested in is what kind of basketball are these teams playing? Right? And that's the thing, Like when I look at the Suns, like and I look at how well Kevin Durant has handled double teams, particularly out of the post this year. He's been so good out

of the post this year. His uh rim finishing has been ridiculous. Like there are so many like good things that Kevin Durant's bringing to the table, and like, really, your ability to throw the kitchen sink and get the ball out of his hands. Is kind of irrelevant when you get to the postseason because if it ends up being you know, Kadi Booker, Beal and Nurkic and you know, Eric Gordon, like, I don't think you're gonna be able to get away with that at the end of games.

And so like, again, we gotta we kind of got to separate the realities of what the team is is going to look like from what they are right now. And what I'm seeing from a Sun's team is a team that competes defensively. I'm seeing a team that that knows how to get their superstars into situations where they can make reads out of double teams. And I'm seeing a team that's struggling to finish plays. They're they're they're struggling to knock down the shot at the end of

the play. We call that like the tip of the spear, right, that's you have your play initiators and you have your play finishers. And like, one of the reasons why I've always liked, you know, the playmaking forwards is when push comes to shove, they always throw the kitchen sink at the star and it ends up being somebody else that's wide open, and like, again, you've got to have someone

that can knock that shot down. Now, one of the things you look at from a game like tonight is it could have easily gone the other way because Cam Reddish is also one of those guys. Camradish is very much in that same level as Keita Bate's job and Josh Cogi and Jordan Goodwin in terms of the fact that, like, if you leave them open, you kind of expect him to miss, but tonight he made them right. And again like that that ended up being a significant role in

this game. One of the things that happened in this game for the Suns that is a consistent theme that I've seen from the Suns this year is they get off to pretty good starts and then Katie in the fourth quarter makes a bunch of shots in the middle of the fourth quarter, but then eventually Cadie runs out of gas because consistently making shots over like four defensive players is incredibly difficult and fatigm And even in just the two Laker games, KD had crazy stretches in the

late fourth but then in the final minute or two has had misses and it's not because Kadie's like not clutch or anything like that. It's just it's really hard to continually hit those shots time and time again against a set defense that's throwing the kitchen sink at you. And so again, like like Booker being back goes such a long way to alleviating that problem. He also helps with the rim pressure. So like again, we talked about

this with the Clippers. I told you guys after the regulation of the Clippers Lakers game that I felt pretty confident that the Lakers are gonna win an ot. One of the main reasons why was the one thing the Clippers had going for them was Paul George making impossible pull up jump shots, whereas the Lakers were executing and

getting quality shots. That's kind of the way I feel about the Suns right now, Like it's just really difficult to win games if the two shots you can get from your offense are a heavily contested pull up jump shot from Kevin Durant or a wide open catch and shoot jump shot from a player that's probably gonna miss it, right. And so one of the things I like about Devin Booker in particular is he's really good at getting all

the way to the rim for layups. He's got excellent quickness, and he's got great touch off the glass when his body's moving full speed, and then from there he's actually even better, is an even better playmaker than Kevin Durant, and so like, I think that getting Devin Booker back just fixes so many of their problems. The question is is just can he ever come back and play for more than a game or two without suffering some other

nagging injury. I hope they let him take his time to get like way back to one hundred percent and then ease him back in it and keep his minutes down. Do what you gotta do to keep Devin Booker on the court because he need him. That's at least Bradley Beal. I've talked to you guys a lot about this specific concept on this show, but like, there is a huge difference between a basketball player returning to the court and returning to form. It's trust in whatever your injured issue was,

So like I thought it was. I actually did think it was a good sign that Bradley Beal had that nasty two handed dunk in the first half, because that's one of those plays where like if you have a bad back, you don't do something like that, you know what I mean. So that was encouraging, But just in general, from there, there's like a timing and like a like a there's a timing and a rhythm element to it.

It's funny. I've been dealing with this achilles soreness thing that has literally ruined my basketball life over the course of the last few months as I've tried to come back from it twice now and then had to shut it down. But I came back from it because I made a commitment to play in this money tournament with this guy here in town named Luiz who does a

great job kind of organizing basketball events. And he's like, hey, like I put the money down while you play in this tournament, and I said yes, And it was like two months in advance. Then I get this achilles injury.

It's just like severe soreness in the achilles basically, and so I shut it down for like two weeks and then I'm like, I have to play in this money tournament because he's counting on me to play, and I am and like, if I just leave him hanging, it's literally gonna cost him money, right and so there were five games. Was one game the first night, and then

there's four games the second night. And it was crazy because like what I did in the days leading up to the tournament was a shot a lot, and so like I was constantly in the gym shooting, but I wasn't playing, as I was trying to take it easy on my achilles. But I actually went to the tournament and I told Louis, I'm like, hey, man, like I'm ready to go, Like I've polished up my shot in

my handle, like I'm ready to go. I'm just in kind of bad shape right now in terms of like cardio shape, and like when I tell you, I played so horrible in the first game, like it was legitimately

comical how bad I played. And then I played a little bit better in the second game, and I played a little bit better in the third game, and then I played a little bit better in the fourth game, and then we won the championship and I won MVP and we got the cash, and like literally it was like this steady progression to me getting back to what

I was. And the main reason why is like even though I had my jumper, like feeling good, I hadn't really established the timing of like five on five like a real basketball and like what it's like when someone's got their hands on you and hand checking and like when you're freaking tired from running up and down the floor.

And then god, if any of you guys have ever played the Money Tournament, like literally how it goes is everyone puts in like a three to five hundred dollars entry feet and then there's like a pot that's like anywhere from two thousand dollars to like seven thousand dollars.

And I've played in a bunch of them. I've won like four or five of them in my life, and like they are some of my favorite basketball in the world because they're like super insanely intense, Like like everyone plays so damn hard because cash is on the line, right, and like none of us are rich out here on these streets, right, so like literally literally we all want the cash, right, So, like, I like it was it was such a crazy like the latest example to me

of like this simple concept of like whenever we see a player come back from injury, we have to kind of accept that there's a there's a long runway there. It's gonna take a while for them to get to the form of basketball player that we're expecting. Right we're literally watching Anthony Davis struggle. He's coming back from this

this groin spasm that's kept him out for basically two games. Right, Like we're watching Bradley Beal like like just silly things, like you had two bad late game turnovers, and it's like, like, Bradley Beal is a good ball handler, He's not going to make those mistakes when he kind of has a better feel for the for the timing of a game. So, like, I'm not worried about the Suns. Again, when it comes to the Lakers and the Suns, I think both of these teams are pretty bad right now in the big picture.

I mean, just look at their records. They're both what four and five right now, So like, these are two teams that are that are really bad right now, but that both have top end potential. They just have to get healthy, they have to get in rhythm, they have to figure out how to play together. They've gotta build good habits, they've gotta get in better shape than they're in. Like, they just have a lot of problems that they've gotta fix.

But at the same time, that's why you play eighty two games, and that's why so many players come into the season and try to play their way into shape instead of instead of coming into season in shape. All Right, guys, I'm gonna take a couple of days off. We're gonna go Saturday Sunday off, and then we'll come back on Monday with a breakdown of the weekend's games and as well as some of the other action from the play in tournament this Friday that I didn't get to watch tonight.

As always, I sincerely appreciate you guys rocking with me and supporting the show. And I'll see you guys in a couple of days. The volume