Given their shortened off-season, defending champions Los Angeles Lakers are doing just fine. While their Final opponents, the Miami Heat, managed to set a 3-4 record to start the 2020-21 season, the Lakers had six wins, most of which were tied in the Western Conference.
It’s no surprise that the Lakers are making the season easier. MVP candidates LeBron James and Anthony Davis play fewer minutes and score less. Head coach Frank Vogel is trying to figure out how new pieces fit Marc Gasol, Montrezl Harrell, Dennis Schroder and Wesley Matthews as they try to find a role for emerging rotation player Talen Horton-Tucker. Thursday’s 118-109 defeat to the San Antonio Spurs, in which the Lakers never led by as many as 15 points in the first quarter, could easily be dismissed as an expected bump on the odd road to a repeat.
Davis, however, did not see it that way. The All-Star big man, who rarely shows extreme emotions on the track, knocked over a wagon during the game in response to his team’s sub-game.
‘Just a lot of frustration. I have [knock over the cart]”Explain Davis after the loss.” Frustration of our defense tonight. Frustration of me missing two releases. So, you know, I just walked in and knocked over the damn car. ‘
Davis does not stop with his sideline performance. He relentlessly criticized the Lakers’ defensive effort after the Spurs, who entered 12 games per game, were 16-for-35 from deep.
“We did not play any defense. Our defense was sh– tonight,” Davis said. “We did not play a single defensive game, and they did what they wanted. They came comfortably in this game … We never played defense from the first point to the last buzz. That’s why we lost.”
According to Davis, it was not a one-time event. He said the Lakers defense was not constant on their standards and that communication and effort needed to improve.
“Some nights we bring it defensively and some nights not,” Davis said. “We have incentives in the game where we are defensively pretty good, but for a constant base for 48 minutes, we have not. We know there will be mistakes, teams are going to make shots. You will not be perfect. The whole 48. But we are not performing what we have to do.Our communication was, I think, terrible for the first nine games we played.We have to be defensively better if we want a chance to defend our title.
“There’s no excuse for it. Defense is not about schemes or things like that. It’s about energy and effort. It takes nothing to leave it on the defensive side. You can not control on the offensive side if shots go in or out. not, but defensively you can control how hard you play. ‘
Davis further outlined his criticism, saying the Lakers are generally well defensive for the first 10-15 seconds of the shot clock, but they fail to continue the effort to full possession, leading to open shots. or penetration. The Lakers did particularly poorly against Spurs big man LaMarcus Aldridge, who is 11-for-18 off the field, including 3-out-7 from the three-point series in Thursday’s victory.
You can see what Davis is talking about here, because the Lakers have an outline of simple pick-and-pop coverage that leaves Aldridge with a wide open practice jumper. Notice James’ frustration at the bucket.
The Lakers get almost the same fate on the next Spurs possession, but the passing of Dejounte Murray is just a bit off, which caused Aldridge to frolic. Even with the deception, he simply swings the ball to DeMar DeRozan, who knocks off a three-pointer without a defender in sight. This time it’s Davis’ turn to show his frustration.
It shows a lot about Davis’ development as a leader that he felt the need to publicly call out his teammates after an unacceptable defensive display. It would be easy for him to get it until the shortened off-season or the team’s unfamiliarity in light of their new players – after all, the Lakers still have the sixth best defense in the NBA. Instead, he made it clear that this team is not just going to drive through the regular season and hopes to turn things around on playing time.
This is just another proof that 27-year-old Davis inside and outside the track continues to develop as he waits to take over the reins of the franchise as and when LeBron decides to call it a career.