Locked On Lakers - Daily Podcast On The Los Angeles Lakers - Lakers are HUGE Underdogs against the Thunder. What Should this Mean to fans?

Starting point is 00:00:00 The Lakers are heavy underdogs against the thunder. Everyone thinks they're going to get annihilated. What's the point of all this anyway? We'll tell you next. You are Locked on Lakers. Your daily Los Angeles Lakers podcast, part of the Locked on Podcast Network, your team every day. Thanks to everybody for joining Locked on Lakers, Brian Komeneski, Andy Komeneski,

Starting point is 00:00:28 getting everybody ready for game one Tuesday in Oklahoma City, a rapid fire. be a second round at the playoffs. They're playing every other day. So the action is going to be moving quickly through this series. And Andy, it's interesting. He's like a lot of, I think a lot of fans are looking at this second round in a kind of a negative light, which is, you know, they're really not expected to win. The Lakers, to put it mildly, struggled against the Thunder.

Starting point is 00:01:05 this year. And that was with Luca for some of that time. So like you look at this and you say, all right. It's a really tall order because of that. Like there are a lot of kind of fatalistic fans I think are looking at me like, geez, like what's the point? I'm not going to tell fans how to fan. Like do it however you want. But I got to be honest, I'm already over this bleep. Like, I'm already over that attitude and that mindset heading into this. Like to me, it's, It's just such a silly way and kind of pointless way to frame competition in general. And like the reason that we're all gravitating towards sports in the first place, like the reason that I and our entire audience fell in love with a team like the Lakers in the first place. Obviously, the history and the championships and stuff like that, that's a big part of the fun and the pride that you.

Starting point is 00:02:05 take in being a Laker fan, but they don't win every single year. They don't always even come close to winning every single year. And you've still found something from the experience of loving this team and watching your team compete even when they don't win the whole thing. And in a lot of ways, not winning the whole thing is the point of competing in the first place. You do it because you want to compete. You do it because you want to summon the best version of yourself, even while underdogs, which, by the way, is what the Lakers did in this first round series against the Rockets. Like it was not always pretty, and there were times where the Lakers seemed like they might be either letting go of the rope

Starting point is 00:02:57 or water was seeking out its own level in terms of everybody's expectations heading into the series. But they won that first round while short-handed as underdogs. And you're undercutting that achievement and the enjoyment Laker fans should feel from it. If your immediate reaction is, well, who effing cares, man? All we're going to do is get our asses beat by the thunder. Again, I'm not going to tell people how to fan, but it just seems to me like you rob yourself of so much enjoyment from the process, but also pride you should be taking in a team that assuming they approach this series against the thunder like they did get into rockets, they're going to compete their asses off, man.

Starting point is 00:03:43 They're going to make the thunder beat them to the best ability that they have. Yeah, it's interesting to you mention like, you know, undercutting the first round like that. Like I was thinking we were, we had asked kind of like how much flack would LeBron take if the Lakers became the first team to blow a three nothing lead? Even with all the kind of caveats of like not your ordinary three nothing lead, not your ordinary team up three oh, all that kind of stuff. Like how much grief would he get for that? Like,

Starting point is 00:04:13 you know, would it go on his permanent record and all that? And at least nationally, among the older hot takers, like that seemed to be a yes. Well, the flip side of that is it's worth then noting that LeBron helped carry an underman,

Starting point is 00:04:33 Lakers team through a major upset win in the first round. And he did it at 41 and he did it with maybe not exactly the same kind of like prime LeBron dominance and all that numbers are still pretty good. You know, 23 a game and, you know, eight and six or seven or whatever it was. And a lot of that is dragged down by by game four. But it's like there were moments in that series. where LeBron controlled what was going on,

Starting point is 00:05:06 where LeBron had vintage moments leading a team passed a heavily, was doing that stuff that you were like, a LeBron's gonna get like, well, he did. And then, you know,

Starting point is 00:05:16 there's the last 30 seconds of game three. Like all of these things that happened. You know, it was funny. Like the, we'll take a break here in a second, but the 20th, I believe it was anniversary of the Kobe shot against Phoenix.

Starting point is 00:05:31 Um, was at the, either over the weekend or the end of the last week. And, you know, that clip was going around. This is one of the iconic moments in, you know, for Kobe's career, like in terms of just video and, you know, what people remember and they know the shot. Everyone immediately knows what it is the moment they see it. That first round series against the Suns in 2006. You know what?

Starting point is 00:05:57 They lost the series. Oh, not only Brian, did they lose that series? they lost after having a 3-1 lead in the series. And you know, you and I covered that series, to be honest, I think the son's no business being up three-one. Right. The Sons were actually the better team. But it doesn't change the fact that that moment for Kobe, that game winner was

Starting point is 00:06:21 incredible. The other anniversary that was also making the rounds was Kobe's dunk on Steve Nash, you know, where he had, you know, his huevos in Nash's face. It was an incredible, again, iconic, everybody instantly remembers it. Part of a series where the Lakers lost. And over time, you know, in the moment, it stings a lot. Over time, you can start to just enjoy the moments for what they were. Like 0.4 for Derek Fisher.

Starting point is 00:06:54 iconic moment in Lakers history. And they won that series against San Antonio in 2004. But it led to lose. losing in the finals against the Pistons, a finals loss that ultimately led to that three-peat core being completely dismantled. And it was ugly as bleep at the time. You can look back on it now and just enjoy the moments. And those moments like now, like the game three against the rockets, no matter what, even if the Lakers get swept in the second round, you should remember that game. as an instant classic and something awesome.

Starting point is 00:07:35 Or LeBron's performance in the first round, like what he was doing at 41. He's even said this is a rare, I'm taking the time to smell the roses type of thing. Like you don't do that in a sec. Yeah, it's, it's, I just, maybe it's me getting older, but like, you know, you talk about it,

Starting point is 00:07:54 and we'll take a break here, but like we talk about why. Like, you know, you can't, you can't only find interest At least I can't only find interest if there's a ring at the end. So much about what makes sports fascinating and what makes these players fascinating is in this part of it. What do you do when you enter a series where nobody thinks you can win? What does that look like?

Starting point is 00:08:22 How do you compete? And what do you learn? Because there are some things. The Lakers need to learn from this series. And I'll break a couple of those things down next. Locked on Lakers is brought to you by Better Help. May is Mental Health Awareness Month, an important reminder that whatever you're carrying right now, you don't have to go through it alone. Life can feel overwhelming sometimes, whether

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Starting point is 00:11:13 Head to FanDuel.com to get started. FanDuel, play your game. It's not like this series is without stuff. Like the Lakers, even if you want to say, like, you know, guys, you know, that first segment, it was a really compelling argument. But you're just a bunch of soft baby loser faces who don't understand what it's like to be a Laker. If anybody calls me a baby loser face, I am totally uninterested in what they say next. I mean, seriously, don't give a bleep what you say.

Starting point is 00:11:44 But you know, you guys are just, you don't get it. This ain't advanced calculus. It's not that hard to understand. Right. I just, you know, so even if you, even if, but even if you completely reject the comprehensive. For competition's sake, the importance of what they did in round one, the majesty of competition, all of these things. There actually are some really important things the Lakers are still trying to figure out heading into an offseason because what do you do with somebody like Rui Hachamura, who is currently the greatest three-point shooter by percentage in NBA playoff history? and he's a free agent and he's flawed and, you know,

Starting point is 00:12:29 maybe a rough fit with whatever it is you're trying to put around. But on the other hand, he can say, at this point, you can say, at the very least, Rui Hachemur does not shy away from the playoff experience. What do you do with that? You know, all of this information about how he Rui plays now in the second round. It's going to be important. We've talked about Austin Reeves and what he's got coming in front of him. You have to figure out, you know, what you do with a new contract for Marcus Smart, I would think.

Starting point is 00:13:03 Do you need to try to figure out a way to upgrade over DeAndre Ate, who has got the team option to come back, but that does not mean... Player option, I mean to come back. But that doesn't mean the team has to just make him their starting center for next year. there's three months ago the whole talk was like everything goes but now like well kind of maybe we want to keep luke canard around like you know i don't know ruy hotchewen never misses a three-pointer in the playoffs it's like all of this stuff matters in terms of deciding what you are and what fits best it would be better if luca was there he's not that doesn't mean that there are no valuable pieces of information that can come out of the second round, even if, again, you reject the notion of sort of romantic

Starting point is 00:13:57 notion that Andy and I expressed in the first segment of just, hey, let's enjoy when good things happen and get out there and compete and see what happens. To be totally honest, I don't even consider a romanticized version of as much as if you are around these guys, like forget just from the fans' perspective, but if you have a job like Brian and I've had for a while where you don't just cover the teams and the athletes, but you actually spend time around them. And you start to really understand what it means to compete at a really high level. Like, you know, short of actually going out there and playing,

Starting point is 00:14:38 I think this is about as good of an understanding as you can have because you see it up close. One of the things that you come to realize is just how hard it is. It doesn't mean things can't be disappointing. It just means that... Sure, of course they can. But it's... Yeah, I just feel like, again, I don't want to tell fans how to fan. But to me, if you feel like there's no value to any outcome other than a championship

Starting point is 00:15:03 or there can't be value to an outcome in a loss, then in a lot of ways, rooting for a team becomes seemingly a meaningless, pointless, waste of time and emotion. because you're going to be disappointed by that very strict viewpoint. You're going to be disappointed for like 80 to 90% of your time invested in a team. If you're a Laker fan, and if you're a non-Laker fan, it's going to be about 95%. Yeah. And it just seems like a very myopic way of viewing what really is a very emotionally connected experience as a fan for the Lakers for all the right reasons. I wish, you know, and I think NBA discourse is really bad about this.

Starting point is 00:15:50 And it's just, it's a lot of it's the Jordan phenomenon and the count the rings and all that. It bleeds into other sports. But it's, it is most focused in basketball because individual basketball players have more impact on the, on the, on the, on the, on the, on the, on the, on the, on the, on the, on the, on the, on the, on the, on the, on the, on the, on the, uh, on the, uh, on the, uh, on the, uh, on the, uh, uh, you know, because of that. you know like we we revise and build up and we like if you want to be like you can never lose you can never be flawed you can never have a bad game because if you're a fraud all of a sudden it's a very frustrating way to watch like nicola yokech did not have a good series against minnesota and denver had a catastrophic series as a team but the notion that like Nikola Yokic, and I've seen this all over NBA social media, somehow has been exposed as a fraud, or that all of the other stuff that he'd been given, the MVPs and this and that, are illegitimate, is ludicrous. He is one of the greatest players of this or any other generation. That doesn't mean, like, you know, LeBron had a bad finals against Dallas.

Starting point is 00:17:02 Kobe had almost had a catastrophic game seven against the Celtics. The best players are not perfect all the time. And I just, I wish we looked at what you said, how hard this is, you know, especially now, because I think defenses are better, schemes are better, study is better, everything is better. It is harder to be dominant every year in the playoffs now than it was 25 years ago, 30 years ago, 40 years ago. It's that line from a league of their own when Tom Hanks is talking with Gina Davis's character and he says it's supposed to be hard. The hard is what makes it great.

Starting point is 00:17:45 Like if this stuff was not difficult, why would we even care? The only reason I think this season could be considered disappointing if they lose in the second round is just because without Luca, they were robbed of what felt like an opportunity to be better than that. Right. And that's what I was going to say. It's just that like there was this, you know, March basically gave people this idea of like, okay, like I don't know if we can beat San Antonio because the time to remember the idea was they were going to get San Antonio in the second round, not OKC because they were going to finish third.

Starting point is 00:18:24 If they get through the first round, you get San Antonio like, okay, like that maybe they're beatable. like, well, the Western Conference Finals don't totally. And the optimism of that was just completely gutted with Lucas injury. And so, you know, and with it, some of the even if they lose,

Starting point is 00:18:44 it's like the value of the season, like seeing what they're, okay, now we know exactly what we need to do. Right. Going into next year, like, some of that just gets eaten away. And it's monumentally disappointed because, look, I still wouldn't have picked the Lakers to beat the Thunder, especially given how the Lakers played the Thunder this year,

Starting point is 00:19:00 but I damn well for sure wanted to see them play them at full strength. Like I was excited. Like what's Luca going to do? You know, what's LeBron going to do? What's Austin going to do? Like I really wanted to see that. And what we're going to see now is a team that plays hard and they're going to try.

Starting point is 00:19:16 And like I'm not, I'm not the one who's got to play fortunately. But it's like it's just you feel like you were, I feel like, and I know Lakers feel like fans feel like in this part, I completely agree with. Something was taken away from. Yes.

Starting point is 00:19:34 We were chained from the experience we should have had. That is legitimately disappointing. Right. But if, and we don't want to be fatalistic about the inevitable either, but if the Lakers, as widely expected, head into this series with very little chance of actually winning it, I think there should be ways for Laker fans to just enjoy the, effort and appreciate the effort, appreciate the process, appreciate the willingness to go out there

Starting point is 00:20:06 to compete, assuming the Lakers had the exact same mentality they had against the rockets, which is what I expect to happen. Yeah, and you can't do the impossible. You can't pull off the miracle without getting there. If you lose in the first round, you don't have an opportunity to do the miracle thing and do something really special and force a crazy series. and all that kind of stuff. So let's see what happens.

Starting point is 00:20:32 Like, we're all watching this with House Money. Like, if the Lakers lose three or four games by 25 points each game, it's like, okay. But like, so go out and play. I think that's the attitude they're going to have. Rylan Stiles is going to be part of a crossover episode. We'll get you really well prepared for the series with two shows on, for Tuesday.

Starting point is 00:20:55 Of course, game one is Tuesday night. Locked on Lakers on YouTube is where you can go hang out with over 38,000. subscribers we'll see everyone next time

Locked On Lakers - Daily Podcast On The Los Angeles Lakers - Lakers are HUGE Underdogs against the Thunder. What Should this Mean to fans?

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