Let's get started in the NBA and the race for the players. With just a few weeks left in the regular season. Did y'all see what happened to the Los Angeles Lakers last night? I know you saw it, because I know I saw it. LA was up with just ten seconds left in the game when the Bulls stole and then bound passed from Lebron James.
Kobe White got the ball drained the three.
The Lakers scored in an Austin Reeves drive to go up o one with under four seconds left, and then off the end bounced bass mister Josh Giddy, formerly of the Oklahoma City thunder nails a buzz up beating half court heave over Lebron James to win the game for the Chicago Bulls. Now, the Lakers are now four and six in their last ten games and currently hold a number four seed in the West via tiebreaker over the Grizzlies, who have the same record at forty four and twenty nine.
Some breaking news for y'all probably won't be breaking by the time this post, but the Memphis Grizzlies have just fired their coach, Taylor Jenkins.
They've just fired them.
Okay, they're tied with the Los Angeles Lakers, battling for a fourth or fifth slot in the Western Conference. Really a fourth spot because Grizzlies at the fifth spot right now, even though they're have an ithentical record to the Los Angeles Lakers and Taylor Jenkins, who I think is a pretty damn good coach. You only got about nine games left in the season. Why the hell would you let him go?
Now?
Then I looked at some numbers, and I'm sad that he's gone. All right, But here's the flip side. I think they're like four and fifteen against the top seven teams, top seven seeds in the Western Conference playoff Pitcher, all Right, they're winless against the Oklahoma City Thunder this year. They're one and three against the Rockets, they're owing three against the Clippers. They're one and two against teams like the Warriors. Okay,
and then you look at it. Then you look at them against the Denver Nuggets, they're one and two as well. You're looking at this team the way they've been struggling since the All Star break, like an eleven or nineteen record, can't seem to get things going. They felt like now was the time for change under the players attach a level of urgency.
I saw the injuries and what have you.
John Moran's been out, Jereed Jackson Junior has been out. We get that part. And John Moran hasn't looked the same this year. He's looked at it in moments in spurts. We all know what an electrifying talent he is, but the Ja Moran that used to be in terms of how he would just literally take over.
I think if he was having a great year.
Not to say he's awful, because he's Job Moran, it's impossible, but if he had a greaty year, I don't think Taylor Jenkins would be gone. They can talk about development or lack they're well for the younger players and all that stuff.
I get out of that, But to fire.
The man nine games left in the season, you know, and he's going to the playoffs, he's a fifth seed right now didn't seem to make that much sense to me.
But when you look at.
His record against some of those top tier teams, maybe that's what they're saying. Maybe that's what they're looking at, and maybe that's the conclusion that they reached. Let me get back to the Lakers, because here's what we're talking about right now.
Lakers in a world of trouble. And I'm gonna tell you why.
Because before James goes down against Boston a couple of weeks ago and suffered that groin injury, not only were the Lakers winning basketball games, the Lakers were considered one
of the top two teams in the Western Conference. It was a four gone conclusion in a lot of our eyes that they would beat Denver, whose depth we've questioned, that they would beat the Houston Rockets, whose youth we questioned, that they would beat a team like the Los Angeles Clippers, who, by the way, is playing good ball, and James Harden is really doing this thing, and Norman Powell has been a stud and Todd Lucan coaches ass off and then
you got Jeff Van Gundy, who's really upgraded their defense exponentially. But the flip side to it is that Kawhi Leonard has missed fifteen of his nineteen let the Clippers. Fifteen of the last nineteen playoff games for the Clippers, Kawhi Leonard has missed, so nobody has faith that he's going to be somebody that you could trust to rely upon for the Los Angeles Clippers, no matter how good he may be looking right now, nobody's gonna trust that, okay, Which brings us back.
To the Lakers.
If you're the Los Angeles Lakers, you were supposed to be looking it and saying, yo, they in a good spot.
They had a good spot.
But then Lebron goes down, and after he goes down, everything seems they're falling apart. Yeah, we had Luca doing his thing and be a more assertive offensively, but we're looking at the Lakers as a defensive unit and they've tailed off to some degree. Okay, for eight weeks they were top rated defense in the NBA.
Now you're looking at them and wondering what the hell is going on?
So you got that business, and then on top of it all, you turn around and not only having that situation, you gotta look at it from the standpoint that you know what, one of nine from three point range in the fourth quarter, that's what the Lakers shot Thursday night against the Bulls, one to nine from three point range eleven percent. Meanwhile, a Bulls shot eleven or fourteen seventy nine percent.
Where's this defense? Going.
Austin Reeves was bawling. Made that shot with under four seconds left. The Brother might be the best third option in the NBA. Had thirty last night, ten to seven. He's shooting all seven free throws three or nine for three point ranges. The Brother can play. Austin Reeves is a special talent. He's really showing out. And props to JJ Redick in his staff with the Los Angeles Lakers for looking the way that they're looking with them. But
right now, we got to ask ourselves that question. When you look at the legitimacy of the Los Angeles Lakers, it is such a huge, huge question mark right now because as my man, Big Perk, Kendrick Perkins said to me, if you look at Lebron James, from what his sources tell him, he's not one hundred percent healthy. He's only at about seventy five to eighty percent. Luca plays no defense. Perk keeps bringing up the statistic. He's absolutely right. Blowbids,
meaning opponents blowing by you. As a defender. Nobody gets blown by more in the NBA than Luca Doncik. Since he's become a Los Angeles Laker, he's leading the league in blowbods, so that's compromising your defense as well. And as a result, the Los Angeles Lakers don't look like a shehult in themselves. So here we are ladies and gentlemen. Even though when Luca first arrived he said the Los Angeles Lakers are gonna be severely compromised because of defense,
because Anthony Davis is being gone. Over time, we looked at them and said, you know what, this hope, this aspirations for this team. They could get to the Western Conference finals. Now we're looking at them and we're saying,
wait a minute. If you finished as a fourth or fifth seed being one and three since Lebron has returned, if you sit up there and you're gonna be in a situation where you end up as a fourth seed or a fifth seed, that means that first round series you're in jeopardy of not having the home court advantage in it number two. Even if you were to face the Methodist Grizzlies and you ended up beating them, you'd get Oklahoma City in the second round, and nobody thinks
you're gonna beat them. So the Lakers could go home before the conference finals if they fall to a sixth seed, and they were locked in at the number sixth spot and had to go against number three Denver. Suddenly people look at them and say, wait a minute, yo, kitchen, those brothers would beat them.
So you got all of that going on.
So the Lakers have gone from looking like a bona five big time threat to come out of the West and at the least get in the way and have a face off against Oklahoma City Thunder, and in the span of a week and a half to two weeks they've disintegrated from that too. You going home in the first of the second round. That's what we looking at right now. That's what we looking at right now. And
by the way, just a couple of stats. Lakers starting five last night Thursday night shot a collective eight for thirty one from three from deep.
That's only twenty six percent.
In the four games since Lebron James's return, the Lakers are one to three and have the fourth words defensive rating in the league during this stretch, allowing one hundred and twenty six point eight points per one hundred possessions. They got outscored forty four to twenty six in the
fourth quarter. And oh, by the way, In those last four games, the Lakers have been a minus thirteen, minus fourteen, minus twelve, and minus nine with Luca and Lebron on the court, and they've been outscored by a total of forty eight points with Lebron and Luca on the court together. Lebron might have had a brain fought in Chicago last night, but we know that's not something he will customarily do.
It happens Luca being blown by Luca not playing defense, Luca not be seeming in good enough shape is a different problem and a different animal altogether. It's something that we all need to pay attention to, and we cannot ignore