Posted: Fri Nov 04, 2022 9:46 pm Post subject: JAZZ -at- LAKERS - 11-4-22 - Thoughts and :-(( Ratings
Giving Up 130 in Our House... Last year, the Jazz were excellent when you didn’t switch on them. They have great pull-up shooters that feast on that and have now added bigs that can hit from the perimeter.
The Lakers typical defensive coverage of not switching and working out of drop coverage is made for the Jazz to chew up. That’s what the Jazz did in the first half, scoring a season-high 75 points. Despite the Lakers shooting 44% from three in the first half, they still trailed by 13 as they could get stops.
During a timeout late in the first half, the Lakers made some adjustments to switch on the perimeter screens. In the third quarter that adjustment started paying dividends as they Lakers trimmed the lead down to 2.
They had a chance to tie it up but Reaves made a bad decision in transition to cough the ball up and give up a 4-point switch. That was as close as they would get.
They were still in striking distance down 8 with 6 minutes left, but their defense wasn’t on the same page on their screen coverages and the Jazz made them pay. If you made a mistake against the Jazz in this game, they made you pay for it. The Lakers fell 130-116.
They shouldn’t have been in that defensive coverage out of the gates in this game. They got torched as a result. Poor prep coming in, but they did adjust and kept things pretty much even after that point. Even with that adjustment, there was still a bit too much poor D in transition, bad angles or just upright and not locked in and ready on D. You’ve got to have a little more pride in your house on defense if you are going to hang your hats on that end of the court.
"We didn't have it for 48 minutes," LeBron said. "In order for us to win, we've got to defend."
LeBron -- -- A slow start (slow middle and finish) from LeBron. He had just 6 points on 3-10 shooting in the first half. The perimeter shot was MIA early and late (he’d airball a three on his last attempt). In the first half, he’d make one midrange and score a couple of layups (neither of those off the dribble). Multiple times he couldn’t finish around the rim. Just no juice/pop in his game again unless he had an open runway. He was also getting a bit distracted with the officiating in this one. He tweaked his ankle/foot late in the game on a drive (that same left one that has been bothering him). He just looked really sluggish all game still, and it will be hard for the team to weather that. It also felt like the Jazz started to target him on some of those screens in some key junctures just because he wasn’t sharp. Inefficient tonight. The Stats: He scored 17 points on 7-19 shooting (0-5 from three, 3-5 from the line) to go with 11 boards, 8 assists, 1 block, 3 turnovers and 3 fouls in 34 minutes. He was a -11.
Davis -- -- He had 14 points on 6-10 shooting in the first quarter and would finish the half with 20 points. Just 2 points in the second half! In the first half, Bron and Russ found him for a couple of lobs. Russ hit him on a drive and dish for another dunk. On the perimeter, he’d make one three and airball another. In the second half he would score on a putback dunk off a Russ drive. Nothing on any setplay or sequence for him. You’ve got to have him make the Jazz bigs work. But we did the opposite in the second half. The Stats: He scored 22 points on 9-17 shooting (1-2 from three, 3-3 from the line) to go with 8 boards (3 offensive), 2 assists, 2 blocks, 1 turnover and 3 fouls in 35 minutes. He was a -8.
Walker IV -- -- His only hoop of the first half was a soaring dunk on the break after a steal. In the third quarter, he’d pick it up, attacking the rim and getting out on the break. He’d score 12 points as a key part of the third quarter momentum shift that helped the Lakers get back into the game. That burst wasn’t sustained by the Lakers. He’d hit a late three, but the game was over by then. He’d score 15 points in the second half. Defensively, some bad angles at times. It felt like several of the guys weren’t 100 percent sure of how they wanted to cover things. So a late reaction will result in getting yourself in a bad situation quickly on that end. Still, pleased with the overall impact we got from him in this game. The Stats: He scored 17 points on 6-12 shooting (2-3 from three, 3-3 from the line) to go with 1 board, 1 assist, 1 steal and 2 fouls in 30 minutes. He was a -12.
Brown -- -- He rattled in a three on the first possession of the game. Then miss most of his next attempts. He had three attempts in quick succession in the second half and finally knock down one from the corner. Like Lonnie above, Brown had his own bad angles on D not being decisive on our coverages. It just felt like a lot of second guessing because we weren’t used to switching things up. We’re trying to play him up at times and the team can look a little small when we do that. Hopefully, we see Bryant back in the mix before too long. The Stats: He scored 12 points on 4-10 shooting (2-6 from three, 2-2 from the line) to go with 2 boards, 2 turnovers and 2 fouls in 22 minutes. He was a -14.
Beverley -- -- Multiple times he was not on the same page when we were in switching defense mode, and it caused problems. It was driving me a bit crazy in the second half. The Lakers had several bad breakdowns as others were expecting to defend one way and he introduced some chaos into what was working. The Jazz did not make many mistakes off our miscues. It was like a hanging fastball that they’d tee off on just about every time it occurred. Some sketchy moments with the ball in his hands trying to create, but he was at least efficient in his shot. Dennis would have helped a bit in this game to set more tone defensively. That should be Bev's job but nope. The Stats: He scored 5 points on 2-2 shooting (1-1 from three) to go with 5 boards, 1 assist and 2 fouls in 28 minutes. He was a +2.
Westbrook -- -- Easily our best player tonight. He came in after just 4 minutes and scored 10 points on 3-3 shooting, making both threes he attempted and scoring a layup in the post against JC in his first shift. He’d sit to start the second. When he returned, he bullied his way to a couple of layups through defenders to finish the half with 14 points in 14 minutes. He was the point-a-minute man just about all night for the Lakers. You wanted him back in the game sooner in that fourth quarter as LeBron was floundering. He’s playing with a lot of confidence. His finishes around the rim are better. The team’s energy with him on the court is better. The crowd was giving Russ the “M-V-P” chants while at the line in the second half. I’m glad to see the fans cheering for him and giving positive energy everytime he checks in. I was worried this offseason that things could sour a bit and that’s not good for anyone, even if this isn’t a great situation for him. Maybe sometime we can get him, LBJ and AD all firing at the same time. Russ said the team played a step slow defensively. We saw a lot of second guessing on D. It also felt like everyone in this game had at least one blow by where they just weren’t locked in, Russ included. The Stats: He scored 28 points on 9-14 shooting (3-5 from three, 7-7 from the line) to go with 3 boards, 6 assists, 2 steals, 4 turnovers and 1 foul in 29 minutes. He was a -1.
Reaves -- -- Man, that turnover in the third in semi-transition really lost the team some momentum. I’m not sure what he was thinking. I know he wanted to keep the pressure on, but just got indecisive. He had a few assists tonight, including a nice one where he lost his man with a behind-the-back dribble, drew the help D and fed his shooter, Ryan, for another three. He was feisty again on D with a steal and a couple of blocks. Not a lot of that from the team as a whole, though. The Stats: He scored 5 points on 1-1 shooting from three, 2-2 from the line) to go with 2 boards, 3 assists, 1 steal, 2 blocks, 1 turnover and 1 foul in 22 minutes. He was a -4.
Nunn -- -- He came in for a minute of garbage time and managed to go 0-2. The Stats: He didn’t score on 0-2 shooting in 1 minutes. He was a -2.
Jones -- -- We’ve gone small, so just a minute of garbage time for him. The Stats: He didn’t score or shoot and had 1 offensive board in 1 minute. He was a -2.
Toscano-Anderson -- -- Good to have him back in the mix. Not a lot going for him offensively. He drew FTs on an interior feed from Russ. He also had a nice cut to take a pass and then make the extra pass to Gabriel for FTs. Defensively, he was out there when we made the shift to switching. Prior to that the Lakers were getting beat multiple times in a row on the same high screen sequence. We started using him as a bigger defender on the smaller players so we could switch on those screens and he could take the big. The Stats: He scored 2 point son 2-2 shooting to go with 1 board, 1 block and 1 foul in 14 minutes. He was a -9.
Ryan -- -- We put a defensive lineup around him with Gabriel, Bron, Reaves and Beverley. That helps get him some run. He made a three off a Reaves kickout. He made another three that was erased on a weak moving screen call on Bron. Should have given him that one. The Stats: He scored 3 points on 1-4 shooting (1-3 from three) to go with 3 boards and 1 foul in 10 minutes. He was a -3.
Gabriel -- :wink :-- His one bucket was a layup he scored while weaving his way through some traffic on the break. Very nice. He was fouled on a dunk attempt, he couldn’t quite power in. Reaves also set him up for some more FTs. In our smaller more mobile lineups I’d really thought switching would be automatic for this team tonight, but not so. The Stats: He scored 5 points on 1-1 shooting (3-4 from the line) to go with 4 boards, 1 assist and 1 foul in 11 minutes. He was a -4.
Christie -- -- A minute of garbage time. The Stats: No stats in 1 minute. He was a -2.
Ham -- -- Key Moment: Let’s go with the timeout late in the second quarter after we were getting killed on the same high screen play over and over with our drop coverages. It took 20 minutes and some 70 points or so before we decided to change up our screen coverages. I think that cost us. We should have had a better game plan from the start. We gave up 130 points. The 55 in the second half is manageable. We just got torched out of the gates.
Key Substitution: Russ off the bench is crushing it right now. So some criticism for the defensive game plan, but some props for really helping Russ get back to playing to his strengths.
Key Stats: The Lakers shot 42% from three. They made 25-28 from the line … and lost this game. Just awful on D. As weak as the game plan was, there were numerous breakdowns in transition or guys just standing too upright or taking bad angles. A lot of stuff that the coaching staff can’t be blamed for in this one. But, essentially, failure on multiple levels.
Thanks for the write up...appreciate it! Even after a loss it's therapeutic to read about our performance from a fan's perspective that breaks it down like you do.
Posted: Sat Nov 05, 2022 12:07 am Post subject: Re: JAZZ -at- LAKERS - 11-4-22 - Thoughts and :-(( Ratings
DancingBarry wrote:
Key Stats: The Lakers shot 42% from three. They made 25-28 from the line … and lost this game. Just awful on D.
Our worst loss of the rocky start to the season was due to poor defense. Hopefully the front office recognizes that as they poke around for deals from now until the trade deadline. Pursuing small shooters would not address the main problem.
On a related note, Vanderbilt looked nice on both ends of the floor tonight.
Joined: 03 Oct 2003 Posts: 8327 Location: Santa Monica
Posted: Sat Nov 05, 2022 12:57 am Post subject:
I guess we were due for a bad defensive outing. Time for coach Ham to revisit his defensive schemes and for the players to regain their sense of urgency.
Russ is killing it… shame we wasted his efforts. Seems like LeBron needs to take a break and get his legs under him. Really concerning start to the season
Joined: 14 Jul 2003 Posts: 4108 Location: Space City
Posted: Sat Nov 05, 2022 3:45 am Post subject:
Thanks DB. Didn’t see the game but given Ham’s posture on making sure we build good habits(by doing the same thing) and their defensive scheme of drop coverage, it’s easy to see why a hot shooting team will smoke us. Glad to hear he made adjustments, so that’s a habit Coach needs to build. It’s not like we don’t have the roster or players to be able to play that type of D.
Glad to see Russ having a great game and the fans eating it up. _________________ Darvin
Joined: 24 Feb 2003 Posts: 6400 Location: Past left field
Posted: Sat Nov 05, 2022 4:51 am Post subject:
governator wrote:
Them young Jazz bigs look good
Yup. Good young bigs who can shoot without clogging up the paint. Gee the Lakers could use some guys like that. _________________ Darvin Ham is an idiot!
The Jazz started Vanderbilt, Olnyk and Lauri, that's a lot of size. You would think that a lineup like that, we'd be able to roast them defensively, meaning make them pay with their lack of foot speed. But we didn't. We began pretty well with AD going off early on, but it seems we went away from what was working on offense and just let AD become a ghost. We should have been able to get far far more switches for Lebron/AD against one of Lauri/Olnyk.
I know a lot of fans are hopeful with this Bucks style offense, but from what I've seen so far, it isn't very effective. The moment we don't have some defense, like we didn't last night, we're toast. You need to have a reliable offense in the NBA to survive unless you are absolutely dominant defensively. We have to seek out the mismatches with AD/Bron and milk them.
Just concerning to me that we couldn't get AD or Bron going against a Jazz team that I feel is weaker defensively. Their 12th in the NBA defensively, so they're not that bad as a team, and we shot well enough from 3. Weird. If Pels don't miss 2 FTs + Ryan doesn't make that 3 we're sitting at 1-7 right now. This has been a very weird start to the season with our offense as Westbrook even has come off the bench and played quite well in that role. Not happy about a game like this where we don't see AD or Bron go off for 30+.
Defensively it was an off night, happens. As DB said could have been the way we played the drop coverages.
It seemed like the team missed many chippies right at the rim
LBJ + AD seemed a one or two step slow (understanding that LBJ was under the weather)
Yet with the Bad D (cuz of wrong coverages and/or lack of execution) and bad decisions at key points of the game, still had a chance to win. Ironically, that is a good thing because the team might have thought that a subpar effort could win games. The Shaq/Kobe or Kobe/Pau teams are mature enough to understand, but not this team
Ham is placing Westbrook in positions where he can flourish
We will see if this team (collectively) learn from this lesson
Big Game Rob highlighted where our stars (tonight) wasn’t ready to defend. As Big Game Rob shared, how do you get ready - by always being ready
Russ got it going, Bron didn’t, maybe the minutes distribution should’ve been altered a bit but this one is on AD, 2 pts in the 2nd half and less than 10 boards while letting their bigs do whatever they want, unacceptable
Thanks DB. Didn’t see the game but given Ham’s posture on making sure we build good habits(by doing the same thing) and their defensive scheme of drop coverage, it’s easy to see why a hot shooting team will smoke us. Glad to hear he made adjustments, so that’s a habit Coach needs to build. It’s not like we don’t have the roster or players to be able to play that type of D.
Glad to see Russ having a great game and the fans eating it up.
Well, it's not all peaches and cream with Ham's "posture on making sure we build good habits" this season. While I do think he is doing a fine job overall so far in general (I'm happy to have a coach that FINALLY understood WB needed to come off the bench, which I wanted for over a year), his weakness is how little control he has shown over Lebron.
There have been way too many games, including the bad loss last night, where Lebron's head was in the wrong place throughout. We all know that as great of a player as he is, he has never been great at everything. Yet LBJ continues to make choices far too often on the court that are detrimental to the Lakers' success so far by insisting on doing things he should rarely be trying.
What does that have to do with Ham? He's not reigning Lebron in for his mental mistakes! We know that because Lebron keeps doing them over and over and over again.
- Why does James still keep taking (and missing) all those lazy threes? Because the coach won't make him stop. Don't tell me he's sick... pass it out instead of doing something stupid if your energy is low. He missed all his 3P attempts last night, BTW.
- After being fouled while on a fast break by the Jazz, why did Lebron go to the line to shoot the FT (73% this season and career), which he missed? The rules allow any Laker on the court to shoot it, but "coach" Ham didn't tell Lebron to stand down so Reaves (93% FT this season!) or even Ryan could do it instead.
That's just from last night. We all know how horrible LBJ's decision making was that almost lost us the Pelican game the other night where he kept dribbling out the clock in the 4th with no ball movement to shoot a well contested long shot that clanked... over and over again. Where was "coach" Ham demanding Lebron to either move the ball around or give it to AD who was cooking and had no one of size guarding him that quarter?
So until I see Ham take control of this team himself instead of allowing Lebron to make the same mental mistakes seemingly every game now, I'll hold back on believing his speeches about "making sure we build good habits".
Russ got it going, Bron didn’t, maybe the minutes distribution should’ve been altered a bit but this one is on AD, 2 pts in the 2nd half and less than 10 boards while letting their bigs do whatever they want, unacceptable
Russ got it going, Bron didn’t, maybe the minutes distribution should’ve been altered a bit but this one is on AD, 2 pts in the 2nd half and less than 10 boards while letting their bigs do whatever they want, unacceptable
IMHO you don’t change anything with Russ other than maybe keeping him in 45 seconds longer last night. Ham found his sweet spot.
He played less than 30mins, could’ve taken over some of LeBron’s minutes
Thanks DB. Didn’t see the game but given Ham’s posture on making sure we build good habits(by doing the same thing) and their defensive scheme of drop coverage, it’s easy to see why a hot shooting team will smoke us. Glad to hear he made adjustments, so that’s a habit Coach needs to build. It’s not like we don’t have the roster or players to be able to play that type of D.
Glad to see Russ having a great game and the fans eating it up.
Well, it's not all peaches and cream with Ham's "posture on making sure we build good habits" this season. While I do think he is doing a fine job overall so far in general (I'm happy to have a coach that FINALLY understood WB needed to come off the bench, which I wanted for over a year), his weakness is how little control he has shown over Lebron.
There have been way too many games, including the bad loss last night, where Lebron's head was in the wrong place throughout. We all know that as great of a player as he is, he has never been great at everything. Yet LBJ continues to make choices far too often on the court that are detrimental to the Lakers' success so far by insisting on doing things he should rarely be trying.
What does that have to do with Ham? He's not reigning Lebron in for his mental mistakes! We know that because Lebron keeps doing them over and over and over again.
- Why does James still keep taking (and missing) all those lazy threes? Because the coach won't make him stop. Don't tell me he's sick... pass it out instead of doing something stupid if your energy is low. He missed all his 3P attempts last night, BTW.
- After being fouled while on a fast break by the Jazz, why did Lebron go to the line to shoot the FT (73% this season and career), which he missed? The rules allow any Laker on the court to shoot it, but "coach" Ham didn't tell Lebron to stand down so Reaves (93% FT this season!) or even Ryan could do it instead.
That's just from last night. We all know how horrible LBJ's decision making was that almost lost us the Pelican game the other night where he kept dribbling out the clock in the 4th with no ball movement to shoot a well contested long shot that clanked... over and over again. Where was "coach" Ham demanding Lebron to either move the ball around or give it to AD who was cooking and had no one of size guarding him that quarter?
So until I see Ham take control of this team himself instead of allowing Lebron to make the same mental mistakes seemingly every game now, I'll hold back on believing his speeches about "making sure we build good habits".
Valid Points
One might consider that if none of his teammates are not moving, cutting or setting screens - taking an outside shot (something that he has worked on and has shown consistency in making those shots) is the best option
One could ask what other Laker would you want to take the shot since getting the ball to AD is impossible because the opposition are all settled in the paint or have to go to the 3pt line
With Reeves/Skywalker/Tony Brown playing more, things will get better
With MattyIce in the lineup, opposition cannot load up on LBJ
With the Lakers getting their offense to catch up with their defense, with the team feeling more comfortable on what will work during crunch time (like successful teams that have been together for a few years), things will improve
Are the Lakers perfect, far from it. As this season has shown, it has and will be filled with many surprises
Thanks DB. Didn’t see the game but given Ham’s posture on making sure we build good habits(by doing the same thing) and their defensive scheme of drop coverage, it’s easy to see why a hot shooting team will smoke us. Glad to hear he made adjustments, so that’s a habit Coach needs to build. It’s not like we don’t have the roster or players to be able to play that type of D.
Glad to see Russ having a great game and the fans eating it up.
Well, it's not all peaches and cream with Ham's "posture on making sure we build good habits" this season. While I do think he is doing a fine job overall so far in general (I'm happy to have a coach that FINALLY understood WB needed to come off the bench, which I wanted for over a year), his weakness is how little control he has shown over Lebron.
There have been way too many games, including the bad loss last night, where Lebron's head was in the wrong place throughout. We all know that as great of a player as he is, he has never been great at everything. Yet LBJ continues to make choices far too often on the court that are detrimental to the Lakers' success so far by insisting on doing things he should rarely be trying.
What does that have to do with Ham? He's not reigning Lebron in for his mental mistakes! We know that because Lebron keeps doing them over and over and over again.
- Why does James still keep taking (and missing) all those lazy threes? Because the coach won't make him stop. Don't tell me he's sick... pass it out instead of doing something stupid if your energy is low. He missed all his 3P attempts last night, BTW.
- After being fouled while on a fast break by the Jazz, why did Lebron go to the line to shoot the FT (73% this season and career), which he missed? The rules allow any Laker on the court to shoot it, but "coach" Ham didn't tell Lebron to stand down so Reaves (93% FT this season!) or even Ryan could do it instead.
That's just from last night. We all know how horrible LBJ's decision making was that almost lost us the Pelican game the other night where he kept dribbling out the clock in the 4th with no ball movement to shoot a well contested long shot that clanked... over and over again. Where was "coach" Ham demanding Lebron to either move the ball around or give it to AD who was cooking and had no one of size guarding him that quarter?
So until I see Ham take control of this team himself instead of allowing Lebron to make the same mental mistakes seemingly every game now, I'll hold back on believing his speeches about "making sure we build good habits".
Valid Points
One might consider that if none of his teammates are not moving, cutting or setting screens - taking an outside shot (something that he has worked on and has shown consistency in making those shots) is the best option
One could ask what other Laker would you want to take the shot since getting the ball to AD is impossible because the opposition are all settled in the paint or have to go to the 3pt line
With Reeves/Skywalker/Tony Brown playing more, things will get better
With MattyIce in the lineup, opposition cannot load up on LBJ
With the Lakers getting their offense to catch up with their defense, with the team feeling more comfortable on what will work during crunch time (like successful teams that have been together for a few years), things will improve
Are the Lakers perfect, far from it. As this season has shown, it has and will be filled with many surprises
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