Locked On Lakers - Daily Podcast On The Los Angeles Lakers - Lakers Lose 118-106 to Orlando... How Worried Should Fans Be After Two Decisive Losses?

Episode Date: March 24, 2025

Over an 82 game regular season, it's important not to become a prisoner of the moment, whether the short-term trends are positive or negative. This is particularly true for teams where the stakes,—and the expectations—are high. So big picture, the Lakers are still in a good position, even after dropping Monday's game in Orlando, 118-106. Small picture? There are definitely some red flags. The defensive numbers aren't great over the last two games, but perhaps more worrisome is the disappearance of any real offensive flow. Monday's game was a series of one-on-one possessions, starting with Luka Dončić, and then with LeBron James and Austin Reaves. Sometimes one of those guys made a shot, quite often one of them was fouled. (Luka and LeBron combined for 18 trips to the line.) But overall, it wasn't efficient, and more importantly, it took all the pop out of LA's offense. There was very little ball movement (19 assists ain't a good number) and even less player movement. The Magic are a very good defensive team, but broadly it seems that the league has started to adjust to the Lakers with Luka, particularly when LeBron is available. Orlando played the Lakers pretty straight, picking the lesser of two evils—basically, it's better to let those guys go iso and live with the results than it is to open the floor to guys who see it at the level of LA's star trio. This strategy has the added benefit of making Jaxson Hayes less effective, cutting out a couple free buckets a game for the purple and gold. So is it now a situation where the Lakers have to adjust to the adjustment? If so, a trio of Luka, LeBron and JJ Redick seems like a solid braintrust responsible for figuring it out. But they need to figure it out, and relatively quickly. The supporting cast, which was (save Dorian Finney-Smith) non-existent Monday night (LA's bench was outscored by Orlando's Anthony Black 17-14) depends on the high shot quality the Lakers can create with great ball and player movement. A good offense keeps the defense in rhythm, keeps players energized and gives the Lakers more margin for error. It's not going to get easier, but there's still enough time to get it straightened out.  HOSTS: Andy and Brian KamenetzkySEGMENT 1: Another clunker for the Lakers.  SEGMENT 2: What happened to the offense? SEGMENT 3: The bench needs to be better.  Your favorite podcast now has a newsletter! In One-stop for ultimate team and league coverage delivered right to your in box. Sign up for free now, at lockedondaily.com.Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!Monarch MoneyTake control of your finances with Monarch Money. Use code LOCKEDONNBA at monarchmoney.com for 50% off your first year. GametimeDownload the Gametime app, create an account, and use code LOCKEDONNBA for $20 off your first purchase. Terms apply. Download Gametime today. What time is it? Gametime.FanDuelRight now, new customers can get TWO HUNDRED DOLLARS in BONUS BETS when your first FIVE DOLLAR BET WINS! Download the app or head to FANDUEL.COM to get started. Bet with FanDuel—Official Partner of the NBA.FANDUEL DISCLAIMER: 21+ in select states. First online real money wager only. Bonus issued as nonwithdrawable free bets that expires in 14 days. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG (CO, IA, MD, MI, NJ, PA, IL, VA, WV), 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342 (AZ), 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat (CT), 1-800-9-WITH-IT (IN), 1-800-522-4700 (WY, KS) or visit ksgamblinghelp.com (KS), 1-877-770-STOP (LA), 1-877-8-HOPENY or text HOPENY (467369) (NY), TN REDLINE 1-800-889-9789 (TN)  Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Hey, everyone, welcome to Locked on Lakers for Tuesday, Brian Komenetsky, Andy Komenetsky. The Lakers, according to J.J. Reddick, are in it a little bit and not in a good way. They lose in Orlando pretty convincingly. We'll explain what happened 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 making Locked on Lakers. First listen to every day.

Friday, no matter how where you get your podcast, this one's always free, never behind a paywall locked on Lakers on YouTube. It's where you can go hang out with 34,000 subscribers, Andy, who quite frankly are probably a little bit concerned. I know that's one of the things I want to talk about in this episode is how concerned should you be following the Lakers 118-106 loss to the magic in Orlando. Second straight game, the Lakers have taken one on the chin. and second straight game, the team looked very disjointed, particularly offensively.

Third straight. It's actually the third straight. I'm sorry. Well, I was thinking second straight with the team intact. Sure. But it is technically the third straight. And that one, make no mistake. They also took it on the chin. Yes. The one against the bugs. I found that one to be. We're, of course, referring to last week's game against the the nuggets where like Andy and I were the starting front.

The box. The box, yeah, where Andy and I played. And we did our best, but we just couldn't really bring it home for Lakers fans. This one was good until it wasn't. And even when it was good, it wasn't great. I'll explain what I mean by that in a second. I want to let people know. Today's episode is brought to you by Monarch Money.

Take control of your finances with Monarch Money. Use the code locked on NBA at MonarchMoney.com for 50% off your first. year, entire year, half off. We talked about this for Monday's show. I was really excited and very interested to see what the Lakers would do in this game. Coming back from a disjointed effort against the Bulls, very flat in that one, not a lot of that rhythm and excitement and pop that they have had so much when things were going well in the post-Luca trade era.

made a big deal out of it of it, Andy. And needless to say, this game did not meet my expectations. On both sides of the ball, I thought this thing devolved as it went along into not as big of a mess as it was against Chicago. I mean, they played better in, they played better tonight than they did against Chicago, and they did it against a better team. Orlando's record is misleading. They're below 500, but it's because they've spent.

a lot of the season without Paulo Bancaro, Franz Wagner, or both, and then right as they got both back, they lose Jalen Suggs. So they have been dealing for a lot of this season without their best players. When those guys are available, particularly Bancero, who has been crushing it of late, like they're a good team. They're a team that I know heading into the season I expected to be top four or so in the east and like a legit, yeah. you know, there, maybe not to win a championship, but they were a legitimately good team.

You know, one of those, like, young team that makes the next step based on what they did last season. Yeah. And they got off to that kind of start before like I got hurt. I know that this is going to go into the ledger of games that the Lakers lose against sub 500 teams. And it's not an acceptable loss. I'm just saying I don't look at this as a loss to a sub 500 team. I look at this to a good team. But here's the thing about it.

Like, it's no better. to be clear. I'm not trying to sure the way they play. The opponent isn't the issue. It was the it was the how and yeah. I think you can look at Chicago and say well the Bulls went on a kind of a an unusual

shooting stretch. Defense aside you know just probability says the Bulls don't get that hot from from you know the field certainly from three. Orlando shot way above their level in this game

and you know when they went cold the Lakers went on a run when they didn't. Orlando is a really good defensive team, really bad offensive team, or a shooting team, I should say, and they shot the ball very well in this game. I'm not leaning into that either. At some point, your defense influences all of that stuff, and the Lakers didn't do well on that end,

but there were too many easy buckets for the magic, but what really disturbs me and what makes me concerned, even though it's what I'm calling sort of a two-game losing streak with everybody back and all that stuff. The Lakers, the stuff that they were doing, the flow of the offense, the easy shots that were created between LeBron and Austin and Luca, obviously, what they were creating for the group has completely disappeared. You know, it is, this game in Orlando on Monday night was a series of isolation possessions that sometimes resulted through a kickout on the perimeter. But while the Lakers took a lot of threes, the quality of those threes were way down. And most of the time they were isoing, maybe looking for fouls, very little ball movement, virtually no player movement.

I tweeted during the game at Cam Brothers that regardless of whether the possession ended with a make or miss. it felt very your turn, my turn between LeBron and Luca in ways that we had not seen with them before. We talked a lot about before LeBron got hurt for all the things that they needed to figure out with Luca now in the fold. What are you doing without Anthony Davis to a lesser but still tangible degree Max Christie? Like all of that stuff. and Luca getting into better physical shape, mental shape, all that stuff, the play between him and LeBron, that symbiosis, that seemed really good. And that seemed like something that they had figured out pretty quickly because they're both high IQ players.

And something that you and I both thought, heading, getting them back on the court, obviously you have to get yourself back in a rhythm to where everything feels more like a short- hand, but I did not expect it to be as awkward, certainly as it was against Chicago, but then definitely tonight. Like Chicago, everything was such a disaster. You can't even look at really anything specific. In this game, I just kept getting struck by how much it was, Luca dominates the ball for possession. Then LeBron dominates the ball for a possession. Then Luca, then LeBron, Luca then LeBron. Then occasionally it's Austin. And while this is not an acceptable response by Austin. There were times where it felt like Austin was like, well, bleep, man, this is the only

time I'm going to be touching the ball for the next three or four minutes. I'm hanging on to it. And again, that's not an acceptable response, but I get why it happened. And they need, you know, Robert Ori on the post game show for Spectrum Sportsnet talked about how Austin seemed to him to look kind of left out. And also how he and Luca were having a really good time during that period picking up the slack in LeBron's absence. And I don't think Ory meant it as a dig against LeBron or, you know, something about those two not liking playing with LeBron. I mean, Austin and LeBron love playing it with each other. Like that's been well documented. But there's now a layer of complication that has been added that I think these guys also realized,

too, we only got like 11 games left or whatever. I think they're trying to fast track this. trying to fast track some wins and getting into some step skipping along the way. Yeah, I mean, we've got an interesting question here from Todd Packer, which maybe we'll talk about in the next segment. I'm sorry, hit the wrong button here, but it's moving, you know, maybe move Reeves to the bench. And, you know, we can talk about that, but I will tell you, I think that doesn't address really the issue.

And one thing that I made, some of this is a function of Orlando, they are a good defensive team. They have size. So they actually match up nicely against the Lakers as well. But teams are given the alternative. If you have to say, like, you know what, we're just going to let LeBron kind of go one-on-one. We're going to get Luke could go one-on-one. If those guys get hot, AR, like, they could put up 120, 120, 125 points, and we could lose. but the alternative is you send doubles,

you do all that other kind of stuff, and you open up passing lanes all over the place and movement for somebody like LeBron to be hit by Luca on a pass. It is, if you become abundantly clear, that when you double Luca, no matter where it is on the floor, the Lakers had shown the ability

to make teams pay for that, whether that's easy basket, you know, with penetration, whether it's wide over, open uncontested threes that, you know, are like, you know, shoot around type things. And so Orlando at the very least did a really nice job playing the Lakers straight up. And I think encouraging them to try to play in this way where it's very ISO heavy, it's very one-on-one, it's very foul hunting.

And in the first half, the Lakers, I think, got the line 20 times. That part of it was effective in terms of generating points. but it was very ineffective in terms of generating a rhythm in your offense. And then in the third quarter, when they weren't able to get to the line, they weren't able to knock down shots and whatever, they scored 18 points. They went 30, 30, 30, 18. And they had no base to generate real offense.

And one quarter, that was enough to kill them in this game. And that's the same thing that will happen. in terms of one quarter will kill you as you go down the stretch and certainly in the playoffs. So that's my concern. And I want to ask you about it. Real quick, just to clarify, before we go to break, 14 free throws in the first half. 14 to your point, but 8 of 20 from the field. And other than DFS, I believe, hitting threes.

There wasn't much of that. No, they were terrible from the going on. The three point disparity in this game is, you know, it is hard to win in the NBA when you are that badly outshot. You know, they were outshot. Three points attempted. Lakers 32. They made, you know, made 15.

They were minus five at the three point line against Orlando, who is not a good three point shooting team. So I want to ask you about this level of concern and whether or not I'm overreacting to essentially two bad games with the team intact again. We'll do that next. Locked on Lakers is brought to you by Monarch. Money. You ever check your bank account and wonder, where did all the money?

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Click on Lockdown Lakers and things delivered to you five days a week. I understand Andy Prisoner in the moment. but as expectations get higher and hopes go up. And the Lakers, sorry, you did that with all that really good play. You got everybody daydreaming about what was possible this spring. These kinds of flaws and moments where people seem to throw sand in the gears and the response isn't there, they raised some red flags and concern. So when you see these last couple of games and how much they have flipped 180 from what they were doing before, how concerned are you? I think I need to see a little bit more before I really start getting concerned that they can't rediscover it.

The bigger concern I actually have is they're going to start thinking too much about the standings and start thinking more about the result than the process and start doing things like, and this might be in. indicative of what we saw tonight with the my turn, your turn, my turn, your turn. We're talking about largely between LeBron and Luca, where it becomes about get the win. That's all that matters. And we'll worry about the other stuff later. And I get it in the sense of these wins are all super precious. They really do matter. But you also don't have a lot of time to get yourself running the way.

that you want to and having that precision and the cohesion. And I feel like it was interesting. Austin Reeves, this was in reference to the defense as opposed to the offense. But he was asked about the lack of defensive execution. And it really was pretty bad in this game. In moments where it was okay, but they were just every good run of defense was stopped by a bucket or two that were just too easy. Yeah, it was down the stretch of the fourth quarter where the Lakers started to rally.

They cut it down to 10. Even then as they were starting to make good things. By the high is 18, correct? I think it was. I believe so, yeah. You'd start having momentum scuttled by, I mean, this is stuff that happened at some point in probably the last six or seven minutes of the fourth quarter. LeBron gets called for a pretty blatant travel. Jackson Hayes has an illegal screen.

LeBron got defensively sealed off too much by Franz Wagner close to the basket, really easy score for him once he was fed. And, you know, that's LeBron. LeBron should be strong enough to hold off Wagner. Luca gets beat off the dribble pretty easily by Van Kero, which led to an easy score. Austin Reeves left Anthony Black way, way too open for three. And that three, by the way, was answered by one from DFS. And I guess if you're looking for anything positive in this game, it was DFS as shooting.

Yeah, he really, that was one of the silver linings for sure. Because that is something they really need. Yep. But Austin afterwards was talking about the need to, he said, like pay more attention to details, competing on every possession. He said, guarding, guarding, guarding, phrasing it that way. And it had to be a collective group effort. And that stuff you hear all the time.

What jumped out to me, though, was he said, said that, you know, defensive communication in spurts is good enough, but it's not good enough in spurts. And in particular, he said, I'm paraphrasing a bit, but like, they're going to score a few times. And like, that's fine. They're going to score, but you can't just communicate on the stops. It has to be all game. And it sounded to me like what he was saying is once Orlando started getting going, they stopped talking. Like, they start getting discouraged by it. And, they stopped talking. And that speaks to not minding the details, but I think it also speaks to an overall impatience. And it, they're going to have to. Yeah, I'm sorry, go ahead. I was just going to say,

like they have to walk a line between getting these wins, because the wins really do matter, but you can't skip whatever steps are necessary to rediscover what was working before. So, So they got to figure out that formula. I'll go back to agree with you. I don't think anything you're saying there was wrong. I'm less concerned about what you're talking about in terms of compromising process because, you know, we've got LeBron who's been to 10 finals. I mean, you know, we've got Luca who's done, we've been around the block. J.J. Redick is clearly a process guy like Gabe Vincent came from Miami.

process process I I'm not I'm less worried about that than I am with like the the time to this is the adjustment like our man Todd Packer is really quite on fire today on the chat here on YouTube he made it you know know like you know people have tape on the Lakers at this point they've seen enough of the Luca Lakers Luca LeBron and NAR to be like oh this works this doesn't work we talk about it with Dalton connect with other rookies like, okay, you've now come out, people didn't know what you were. You make people look bad. They've got the tape.

They're going to adjust. Now you have to adjust to the adjustments. I think that's maybe, if I'm going to talk myself down, it's the Lakers are now in a position where they now need to adjust to the adjustments. And there probably aren't two better guys to do that in terms of figuring. out what really works than Luca Donchich and LeBron James and JJ Redick seems like a pretty good guy to have on the bench to be able to sort like I I can talk myself off the ledge here a little bit with with but the just I think what you're talking about some of that communication problem

that you're talking about defensively is related to the offense when guys stand around when there is no go even when people aren't moving they're not excited they're not touching the ball. It's not intentional. They don't start, it's not because they're pouting. But things like communication and talking break down. You need that constant engagement throughout the game. They need to fix the offense because the defense was carrying them in ways that, I don't know, it may have been a little bit unsustainable in terms of just how good they were. you need an offense that is, you know, top 10 caliber and all that stuff. And they've not had it of late.

Yeah. When you were saying about it being unsustainable, when we get back, there's another way that I'm thinking about it as well. I also want to get into the bench. And in particular, how the lack of ball movement affects the bench as it's currently constructed. And Andy, who is coming off the bench and who isn't? Yeah. So we'll get into all that coming up next. Real quick, before we get into that question of the defense and sustainability, shout out and congratulations to Dwight Howard, former three-time Laker and Laker champion.

He was inducted during this game into the Orlando Magic Hall of Fame, which is obviously really awesome for Dwight. He was clearly having a great time at halftime or whenever this happened during the game afterwards. He was basically holding what could be best described as a dance party with, I think, like, the magic dancers and people in the crowd. It's very Dwight. It feels on brand. Very on brand for Dwight. It's obviously very well deserved.

Other than Shaq and maybe a couple people I can't think of off the top of my head, but he is certainly in the conversation for best players in that franchise's history. It's easy to goof on Dwight. And Lord knows we've done it. he opens the door to that kind of thing. Speaking of which, I'm very, I was going to say, I'm very proud of Dwight for being restrained enough not to use the opportunity with the magic to ask Jeannie Bus

and Rob Polinka to put him back on the lake. He really buttoned down and read the room well. But it's easy to goof on the guy. We do it. You just did. But it is also easy because the last few years, of his career were kind of occasionally sort of a parody of himself, you know, like just how dumb.

And like that first stint with the Lakers was such a disaster. It's easy to forget just how dominant a player he was at his peak. So, you know, he's he's a Hall of Fame candidate now, like the actual Hall of Fame, he should be in it. He's, we both, we both said at the time when the original top 75 list came out, Dwight got screwed. Dwight absolutely. I mean, he's unquestionably a Hall of Famer.

But there were players on that top 75 list that with all respect to them, they're all great players. Dwight should have been ahead of them. But yeah, it's just, you know, I think, you know, you get into this stuff with, you know, whether it's the bench, whether it's the offense, whether it's the defense, as Redick says. Like they're kind of in it right now. They're kind of going through it right now. And that is coach speak for everything is, you know, all the pieces which were aligned, the moving parts lined up perfectly.

Now they're all spread out again. We got to get it back together. You know, it's, it is interesting though. Like, you know, the, the bench, which was, on a scale, of one to ten of effectiveness, about a two on Monday. It's a problem. You know, Jared Vanderbilt has had a couple really bad games in a row. Dalton Connect has done something.

He's not trusted right now by the coach. I'm not surprised. I mentioned this after the game on Saturday against the Bulls where had there not been garbage time, Dalton wouldn't have played at all. It was very clear. if JJ is starting to whittle down what he's guessing will be a nine-man rotation, Dalton is clearly guy number 10. But, you know, Gabe Vincent missed all four of his threes.

That really can't happen. Rui, still, I'll give Rui a little bit of grace just because he's coming back from injury. And I don't think he's completely healthy yet, obviously. We talked about it. He said he's a 70, 80%. He's got to get used to playing like that, but he only gave you five points in 24 minutes. you know, you know, Goodwin didn't score

in 13 minutes. Like if you are, you know, like that's not enough. I don't ever, the Lakers are going to be top heavy. It's going to be Luca. It's going to be who had 32. It's going to be LeBron who had 24 on 9 of 18. It's pretty efficient night from LeBron.

And it's going to be Austin, you know, who is inefficient, 7 of 16. They're always going to be top heavy, but you need enough from those other guys. And your leading. score off the bench at five points is not enough. First of all, just the idea, when you mentioned before, I wanted to finish the thought of the defense when you said before, you know, whether or not is sustainable, how much

they've been carrying the Lakers. Even if it's sustainable, it's not practical. I think there's an element of impracticality. What do you mean? Explain that, because it's an interesting distinction. It is very, very difficult, I think, both in terms of execution for this team because, you know, they're not as small as I think people sometimes make them out to be with only one working center. Right. But they're not, they're not a big team in terms of just dominant size.

And the way that they play that required so much energy, so much movement, so much rotation. They clearly can do it because they did it over a few months sample size, but it takes a lot out of them. And even if it is sustainable, the idea of relying on something so taxing to be your bread and butter as opposed to the thing that supplements the offense, and all of a sudden your offense is humming and you're choking off opponents, I think that to me is the difference between the question of sustainability versus impracticality, even if it is sustainable. I don't know if it is.

It's certainly not the ideal way to win in today's very point-centric NBA, trying to hold teams to under 110 every night, under 105. Like, that's just really hard. It's good to know you have it in your bag and you want to be able to flex that muscle in the playoffs. But if that's what you're. counting on to get you there by the time you do, what he got left? And then I was thinking about specifically, too, the lack of ball movement in this game and a lot of your turn, my turn. It hurts the entire offense, but in particular, somebody like

Rui, who if for the time being is playing off the bench, he's your, clearly your primary bench score. I mean, he's the best source of points currently coming off the bench. But you have to get him the ball. Like you don't want, you're not going to have on a lot of levels. You're not going to have Rui dominating the ball like that. He needs to be set up on some level. If you're not setting up Rui, like I've talked about this a lot earlier in the season where Rui was a little bit more inconsistent, but he was also getting like seven shots

a game. And I kept saying if you're only going to give him seven shots a game, then you really should trade him because you're not getting the best use of him. I didn't want him traded. I just don't want a guy not being used to his strengths. You have to get Rui the ball more if you want utility from him. Yeah, I agree. And I think, you know, they started DFS again.

I think, you know, while Rui is on this minutes limit, they might continue doing that. I was, you mentioned before the silver lining of this game was that DFS's shot was good. he was really the only consistent three-point shooter the Lakers had in the game. But if Rui can get himself up to 25, 26, 27, I do wonder if they'll just put him back in the starting lineup as just kind of get that maybe get some of that continuity back that they had earlier. I one of the things that I'm really curious about and you know another moment of concern I love what Jordan Goodwin has done with the Lakers maybe we talk a little bit about more about this tomorrow as well but when they need to know whether or not he is an every night guy and I don't mean that as a criticism like he takes nights off oh he clearly does not he does not take night off it will never be an and trade Jameson does not take nights off. But I don't think any two-way guy takes the night off. No, they don't.

I just want to make that clear because when I say, you know, he's an everyday guy. Like, well, what do you mean? Like, I'm not talking about, you know, Jordan Poole or, you know, Nick Young, your guys who I think do kind of every once while take a night off. But there's a reason they've had trouble catching on. Like, can you be a player who is reliable in your role, 65, 70% of it? I'm not, you know, Jordan, go down to you. Everybody's going to have a bad game.

One point, you know, no points from Jordan Goodwin. It's going to happen sometimes. I get it. He had one point. One point. No field baskets. No field goals. Can you be a reliable guy consistently against the best.

players, especially when, and this is a problem for teams that are built on effort alone and why I think your point, just thought of this, your point about defense and the effort that it takes is a really, really important one because in the playoffs, the importance of effort like goes down. If that's one of your big skills, we just try hard, that's going to be mitigated in the playoffs because everybody's trying hard. Everybody cranks it up. And so Goodwin has been effective in part because he has been playing at a higher gear than a lot of players on the floor because he's trying desperately to stay in the NBA.

Can he be equally effective when everybody is trying as hard as he is? And I think, and I don't mean this, I promise everybody. I am not trying to say this as a criticism of Jordan Goodwin, who I love. and the work that it takes for guys like him to get in the league and stay. I mean, enormous respect for these guys. But there is, you have to break through that thing that has kept you from staying in the league and getting a consistent role. Well, here's where I'm going to give Jordan Goodwin a bit of a pass in terms of his

lack of production tonight. And this, again, gets back to the way the offense operated. Care to take a guess on what Jordan Goodwin's, usage percentage was in 13 minutes. I'm going to guess very similar to Blutarski's GPA 0.0. His usage was 3.7. Like how much production? That's a good GPA. It's not a good usage, but it's a good you what I'm saying? Like how much can you reasonably expect from Jordan Goodwin? He probably touched the ball five times in this game. Like, yeah, that's true. You know, there, I can see if I can, I don't know if they have like touch. They track touches. I don't know if they.

They have it that up to date this quickly. But like, if you want production from him, he has to get the ball. Yeah. And this is the problem in this kind of ISO, ISO drive. Right. There's no one of that reverse, swing, swing, all that stuff that gets guys like Goodwin open shots. Right. Like in this game, Austin and LeBron were both usage at about 27.

Luca was 37.5. the next closest guy was Gabe Vincent at 13, and that's basically just, you know, other than he got fed a couple times on the move, but it's larger just catch and shoot. Ruiz was under 12. Like, you can't have, you know what I mean?

Like on some ways, even if there's a pass, when the offense operates like this, even if there's, it's one pass and one shot. And, you know, so did the guy, is the guy open? Is he not? Like, you know, better hope so, because that's the only kickout you're going to get before there's a second and a half left

and somebody's got to go up. Plenty to look at. Leave us questions, leave us comments about, I am particularly interested in whether or not people think my initial like nervousness and concern over what we've seen in the last couple games is overstating it.

Is it appropriate? Am I alone? Based on the chat comments, you are not alone, Hermano. I can always rely on fans to work. You don't seem to I feel the love I feel the togetherness

It seems to be a party of one right now Right no it's like the Lakers aren't The Lakers are not connected Andy But I am connected with our people You know So I but I just I'm not I don't want to overreact I don't want to freak out

But like there are clearly some things that are now happening Where the league is adjusting the Lakers And the Lakers need to adjust back We'll see how they do because it doesn't get an easier from here, folks. Locked on Lakers on YouTube. We can go hang out with 34,000 subscribers. That's a lot.

It's a lot of subscribers. Go ask a friend to subscribe. Let's make this number go up. We'll see everyone tomorrow.