The Los Angeles Lakers have a brand new head coach and a brand new defensive scheme, and the identical outdated issues with transition protection. Sunday night time, the opposing coach bailed them out.
The Lakers enable 1.2 factors per possession in transition, the third-worst mark within the NBA. Monday, when LeBron James missed a three-pointer with the Lakers main by a degree, Collin Sexton of the Utah Jazz grabbed the rebound and drove down for a go-ahead layup — solely to see it waved off when Jazz coach Will Hardy known as a timeout earlier than his shot.
Los Angeles held on for the 105-104 win, however the play was emblematic of the group’s poor transition protection that is been an issue for the final 4 seasons. The Lakers surrender 26.1 transition points per game, fourth-worst within the NBA.
Final 12 months they ranked fourth-worst with 24 points per game, in 2022-23, they have been fourth-worst with 23.4 transition points and in 2021-22, they have been the NBA’s second-worst transition protection group, with 22 points per game.
That abysmal transition protection efficiency spans three head coaches, from Frank Vogel to Darvin Ham to JJ Redick. The widespread thread is the group’s personnel. LeBron James remains to be a wonderful offensive participant, however as he will get older, he is much less and fewer inclined to hustle again on protection. And extra more likely to jaw with the officers.
In fact, James can be one month away from his fortieth birthday. The a lot youthful Anthony Davis additionally has a behavior of strolling again on protection and groups have exploited this by attempting to run towards the Lakers, even off of made baskets.
It is the group’s greatest flaw, significantly as a result of they’ll defend properly within the half courtroom. Davis is a wonderful rim protector, however he has to truly make it all the way down to the basket to take action. It does assist the Lakers total that the group shoots 47.9% from the sector, minimizing the quantity of misses, however they do not significantly get offensive rebounds (twenty sixth in total offensive boards, twenty fifth in offensive rebound share).
It is merely a harmful technique to play. The Lakers are successfully giving up free factors each recreation, both as a consequence of fatigue or lack of effort.
Perhaps the group must relaxation its stars and maintain them contemporary. However in addition they want James and Davis to guide by instance. If the superstars do not get again on protection, it is arduous to anticipate the position gamers to hustle sufficient to cowl for them.
Or anticipate the opposing coach to save lots of them with an ill-advised timeout.