The Lakers are in danger of missing the play-in tournament and their stars may not return in time to save them, writes Broderick Turner of The Los Angeles Times. Tuesday’s loss at Dallas knocked L.A. into a 10th-place tie with San Antonio with seven games remaining, and the Spurs hold the tiebreaker because of a better conference record.
LeBron James missed the game against the Mavericks because of a sprained left ankle that he suffered Sunday. He has already been ruled out for Thursday’s contest at Utah and has been granted permission to return to Los Angeles for treatment and evaluation of the injury, Turner tweets.
Anthony Davis is listed as doubtful against the Jazz, but hopes to be ready for Friday’s game with the ninth-place Pelicans, sources told Turner. Davis, who hasn’t played since spraining his right foot and MCL on February 16, was “a little sore” after practicing Monday and the Lakers haven’t decided if it’s safe for him to play Friday.
There’s more Lakers news to pass along:
- Coach Frank Vogel was disappointed with how his team responded to the challenge against the Mavericks, Turner states in the same piece. With a chance to solidify their play-in position, the Lakers fell way behind early in the game. “We executed very poorly to start the game and really that whole first half, with what our game plan was,” Vogel said. “And then as we tried to adjust to look at some Plan Bs and Plan Cs, we just didn’t execute well enough and play with enough toughness, IQ, intelligence, focus and fight in that half. So, not acceptable and just a poor performance across the board. Coaches, players, everybody.”
- Russell Westbrook had a testy exchange with reporters after Tuesday’s loss, Turner adds. Westbrook became irritated when he was asked what the team has to do for the rest of the season and challenged media members to come up with a solution. “I’m only one person. It’s a team game,” he said. “So, I don’t have an answer. You may have it.”
- Vogel is likely to be replaced after the season ends, and a source told Harrison Wind of DNVR that Nuggets coach Michael Malone could have been a prime target if he hadn’t signed an extension with Denver (Twitter link).
- Eric Pincus of Bleacher Report reviews the mistakes the Lakers have made that caused them go from a championship team to a floundering also-ran in two seasons. The Westbrook trade was an obvious error, but Pincus also points to a lack of roster continuity after the 2020 title and a troubling pattern of letting young talent leave without sufficient compensation.
Lol here comes every coach haven’t a decent year being “a prime candidate” except Vogel is getting the axe for something that isn’t his fault, partial blame sure but he didn’t build this roster, only a coach whose tryin to up his reputation will be willing to go would be my guess, someone who is a name but on their last legs in the league…you don’t win a title and strip your roster, you don’t put all your eggs in the same 3 baskets when a roster is 12 baskets at least, happy lebron hater but this is a shame, he shouldn’t end his career on a team floundering
Standing pat hurt them worse than doing a trade. They should of traded west for wall. They should of never went small ball. they should of never went aarp building a team. All the young guys they have I’m all for . But the vets was the wrong decision. Only ones I was ok with is Howard and melo
Why would Malone leave a guy who is a future HOF and will be a perennial MVP? In addition, 2 great players will be coming back in Murray and Porter. DEN is on an upward arc, LAL is fading.
Even Shaheen Holloway way better than Vogel
Lakers are done, but there is still an unless
Unless Westbrook is not overpaid
In other words, he is in the same level of current LeBron and Durant, or close to it
Same level salary-wise?
I know LBJ is going to catch all the blame for this team’s failure but I can’t question his motives. Dude wants to win and I bet, in most instances, the players he recruited were players the coach and GM wanted anyway. The Buddy Heild deal might be the exception but even I was intrigued of the possibilities once I read that prior to the trade, the threesome of LBJ, AD and Westbrook had a meeting to discuss how the trio could successfully exist and win together. I mean the idea of a Westbrook, with his motor and athleticism, playing in a more focused team oriented game and learning from LBJ was enticing. what a compliment to an aging LBJ. The idea of a more seasoned Westbrook and AD to carry the Laker torch once LBJ likely was in mind too. As for blame, who gets more, Westbrook for being what he’s always been or LBJ thinking he had the ability to change him into what he needed him to be?
I don’t blame LeBron for Westbrook being who he is. I don’t blame LeBron for Anthony Davis always being hurt. My biggest criticism in his entire career, is people always say, he makes other players better. He has never taken a young player, who was struggling and helped him become an All Star. Look at all the young players the Lakers traded away, to make LeBron happy. They are all players right now, than the players LeBron wanted to play with.
I blame the lakers for doing nothing at the trade deadline. I would of pull the plug and did the wall trade. I would of did small trades for some of the vets . We have good young players but the vets aren’t working and I would of never went small ball with a 37 year old sf/pf
I wasn’t a fan of the RWB trade over the summer, but I will say that the LA critiques are becoming slightly overdone.
LeBron was injured the beginning of the year; AD has been out since February. As bad as Westbrook has been, almost any top heavy team that misses it’s top 2 players for extended stretches will suffer.
It’s funny because Brooklyn, also a team with high expectations, is going to be a 7/8 seed most likely. Yet most people seem to understand that it’s because KD and Kyrie have missed time. Whereas with LA, AD’s extended absence is pretty sparsely mentioned between Bron and Russ critiques.
KD pushed for the Harden trade probably as much as LeBron pushed for RWB, yet Harden’s implosion this season is generally viewed as Harden’s issue, while RWB’s is viewed as LeBron’s.
I think Westbrook might’ve told LeBron and AD he could average 10 assists per game, but neglected to mention 4 of those would be via TO to the opposing team. Lol.
But seriously, looking at it objectively, I can see how LBJ and AD might’ve thought the RW trade would work. I think if RW would accept being a 6th man, it’d currently be going a little better than it is. The thing with RW is he’s a stats guy though, not a winner. Russ is an attraction, best suited to sell tickets on bad basketball teams.
That’s a great answer from Russ, right?
I mean having to deal with questions that silly all the time, those reporters must be fired for asking such stupid questions!
BTW in that defeat Russ played a very good game!
Why didn’t they ask him ’bout that?
LeGM This is for you
Lakers and Lebron’s troubles are great to see. The Media want Lebron to be Mike. He is not a leader. Rondo led the championship team.
I thought Westbrook was going to be a good fit if he was given the PG duties and Lebron focused more on shooting. But Lebron hasn’t been able to change what he does for more than 10 mins a game. The few games we’ve seen more recently where James is deferring ball handling to RW has looked promising. That said the roles they play seem to change game to game. I can see why RW is frustrated. He’s a scoring point guard and Lebron boasts to have the all-round game. So I think the original thinking was Lebron is aging and could adjust to a lesser ball dominant role and still get shots without killing himself. Instead he’s still dominating the ball and expects RW to catch and shoot while he runs the patented LBJ hold the ball for 10 seconds offence. Also, it feels like the scoring record is affecting his commitment to team basketball, but I can’t blame him. I’d be going for 40k.
@Fid
I think Westbrook’s turnover ratio and general poor decision making changed the way LBJ had to be used.
Ultimately the bug always stops with Vogel, he has an easy job, only one… highlight his players strengths & hide the weaknesses… ain’t happening with Russ, so if Russ ain’t succeeding, the fault falls fair & square on Vogel, nothing to do with Russ, as he has proven that he is an MVP caliber player, nothing more to prove for him in the world of hoops!
I agree man. That’s why I feel like Nash needs to go in Brooklyn. Paul Millsap used to be an All Star. But he was a total scrub in Brooklyn. Just feel like Nash was keeping him down, you know?