Locked On Lakers - Daily Podcast On The Los Angeles Lakers - Luka Dončić Scores 43, But LAKERS DOOM THEMSELVES In 119-109 Loss to Warriors

Starting point is 00:00:00 Hey everyone, welcome to Locked on Lakers for Wednesday. Brian Kiminetsky, Andy Kaminetsky, Luke Donchich, scores 43 points. But the Lakers lose by 10 in the opener, what went wrong? 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 making Locked on Lakers first listen to every day.

Starting point is 00:00:32 Monday through Friday, no matter how or where you get your podcast. This one's always going to be free. behind a paywall. Because locked on Lakers on YouTube, Andy, too, is where you can go to check this thing out live. If you want to watch the magic happen, over

Starting point is 00:00:46 36,000 subscribers doing it there. So many more doing it through the audio product, whether that's Spotify, Apple iTunes, however, get your podcasts, all of whom, Andy, each and every one of those people, not happy with what they saw

Starting point is 00:01:02 on Tuesday night. Lakers lose in the opener, 119, to 109 in a game that, quite frankly, didn't feel that close, at least not after the, after halftime. Luke Adich had 43, AR had 26,

Starting point is 00:01:21 thus end of the highlight reel. Yeah, it's funny, actually. It was a double header kicking off the new NBA on NBC era, which in of itself very fun, like particularly if you are old enough to remember the NBA on NBC, theme and the graphics and, you know, MJ at half time, I thought, looking a little sloshed, but whatever, he's allowed. But, like, all of that was fun, but the opening game of the Thunder and Rockets went to

Starting point is 00:01:53 double overtime, which pushed the Laker game to premiere on Peacock, which you could tell through everybody for a loop. And it almost felt like a microcosm of the Lakers just not quite being where they were supposed to be, whether you mean literally on NBC or whether you mean on both sides of the ball, different spots. There was just a lot lacking cohesion for the Lakers tonight. It was funny. Like, you know, in the broadcast for people watching, I know there, I know judging just by people's responses online, there were a few people who are apparently now realizing I might need to subscribe to Peacock,

Starting point is 00:02:38 but like they did that old school thing where like having screaming service on their building. Who don't want to pay for that? I get it. I understand why people. I'm glad that we eliminated cable so we could remake cable, but more expensive. You know, they did that. They had to do that sort of old fashioned thing. Like it's almost like, you know, like they do when you cut from the national football game into the other one.

Starting point is 00:03:02 It's like, we welcome the viewers who are just joining us from the Vikings versus the, you know, the buccaneers. It's like, you know, they had to restart the broadcast. Every time they brought up peacock, they sounded like apologetic. It is an arrogant bird in the peacock. But look, I mean, you start with, you know, Luca and the Lakers got what they needed out of Luca by, by, all that and more. It wasn't even just like a 43 that were, you know, off, you know, horrible volume or something. Like there was 17 and 27 from the field.

Starting point is 00:03:43 He had 12 rebounds. He had nine assists. I mean, like, this was the Luca performance that the Lakers. What's crazy. He actually got off to an inefficient start from the field. Like after his first seven or eight shots, it felt like he barely made. missed because he actually barely missed. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:04:05 So, I mean, that part went quite, quite well. Austin Reeves was not perfect. You know, he was, you know, he was very quiet coming out of halftime in that, as we will discuss, he had plenty of company. But overall, you know, 26 points for AR 9 assists. He did have five turnovers. So, I mean, well, again, it wasn't a perfect night. but it was certainly a good enough performance from Reeves.

Starting point is 00:04:34 You ought to be able to absorb it. But then you start looking around at kind of what went wrong. And early in the game, the Lakers, I thought, were sort of sloppy but scrappy. You know, they were playing very hard. I thought some disorganization, they did not carrying a trend to last year. They did not respond well when Golden State zoned them up early in the game. they had a terrible time generating good looks. They couldn't shoot their way out of it,

Starting point is 00:05:06 couldn't get themselves into the middle of the zone. That hurt them. Then when things got a little bit better, they go in the halftime, they come back out, and they were just dead coming into the third quarter, just flat out, lifeless coming out of the break. And JJ talked about that after the game. Some of his quotes included,

Starting point is 00:05:23 we continue to be a terrible third quarter team. They're not ready to start the third quarter. He said that this is something he and his staff need to figure out. It's as he noted something that had happened with them last year. But frankly, it's been a trend for the Lakers for a while. Like this is something that preceded JJ Redick. It preceded Darwin Ham. I would need to really start thinking back to how much it preceded Frank Vogel.

Starting point is 00:05:55 And I'm not counting the years where it was just, you know, off in the wilderness with the kids disorganized, but like it's been a trend for a while that the Lakers have really come out flat for third quarters. And you could see over the course of this game. We'll get into some of the specifics that really hurt the Lakers, but the lack of cohesion and connectivity

Starting point is 00:06:22 and just overall synergy between a team like the Lakers that has a lot more new parts to put on the same page. They don't have LeBron, which is obviously a big deal. And as we talked about a lot, I certainly don't think they got the fullest use out of their training camp, regardless of how much you think it was justifiable the approach that they had or they had no other choice, played the cards that they were dealt whatever. The lack of cohesion or the difference in cohesion between them and a team like the Warriors that had something of a disconnected training camp themselves, but they've had a lot of guys there for a while.

Starting point is 00:07:02 And the foundation of Steph and Dremon, they can run that system with their eyes closed. And it looked in the first half like they were trying that a little bit, you know, because the Warriors were not, you know, did not play clean early either. I think the bit, to me the biggest, there are two things about this. So first of all, the Warriors, as we discussed in the, you know, the preview episode coming in, The Warriors are a weird team to play. You know, I realize they played them in the preseason, but nobody's sort of doing their stuff in quite the same way.

Starting point is 00:07:39 The games aren't moving at the same speed and all that. You know, but the Warriors are just a weird team to play. The matchups are strange and all that kind of stuff. But where I really think that level of cohesion stuck out isn't so much like the score because the Lakers were only down by one at half. You know, they, they turned the ball over. They were in double digits at halftime. I forget exactly the number.

Starting point is 00:08:08 But the Warriors were almost right behind them. So it's like it wasn't like Golden State was playing great, but what you did see, it was so much easier for Golden State to generate an easy bucket, like back cuts and things like that. The Lakers just didn't defend well. And then in the third quarter, when Golden, when the Lakers were super flat, couldn't get a bucket, Golden State continued then to find those easy. It wasn't they were drilling all of these incredible shots. They made their shots, but they also had gimmies for every other trip down the floor.

Starting point is 00:08:49 And that was the big difference. That's where you say, oh, okay, these guys know the system. They know what they're doing. And they respond well to it. Like you mentioned, they were pretty sloppy themselves in the first half. But when they needed to get it together and get it together for sustained periods in the second half, that's where you see everybody knowing exactly what they're supposed to be doing. And again, that foundation of Steph and Dremont that have been running this system for a decade,

Starting point is 00:09:24 Like you see the difference between that and the Lakers still said heading into this season, and this game certainly didn't change my opinion on it. They felt behind the eight ball from where they wanted to be at the end of training camp and where they are now. There's obviously 81 games to get to the place that they want to be. So, you know, plenty of time to work this stuff out. and obviously when LeBron gets back, that is a big component. Only 81 third quarters to go, Andy. But I'm just saying you could see,

Starting point is 00:10:04 there were issues that we were concerned about heading into this season throughout training camp and many of them surfaced during this game. Let's keep unpacking because we mentioned two names in, in Luca, who is obviously, you know, beyond outstanding, you know, whatever the next level above that is. And Reeves, who was certainly good enough. We didn't mention any other names, and that is a problem. And we'll discuss that next.

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Starting point is 00:12:09 But Built isn't just about rent. It's about rewarding you around your entire neighborhood. So, you know, when you're grabbing food at your local restaurants, heading to the gym, you can feel like you're earning rewards, you know, while you're doing those things just, again, off of your rent payment. So Built has made everyday life feel more rewarding from your neighborhood to your travel plans, turn your rent into rewards and start earning points around your neighborhood by going to joinBilt.com. That's J-O-I-N-B-I-L-T dot com slash Lockedon MBA. Make sure to use that link so that they know that we sent you. I think you and I were very optimistic about the DeAndre Aiton era beginning here for the Lakers.

Starting point is 00:12:59 Or the signing. An era may be premature. If it goes really well, it may only last a year. Right. A short era. But it is certainly fair to say that there are great many skeptics and that there were a lot of people. who maybe, you know, didn't light their torch, but had it with them,

Starting point is 00:13:25 maybe weren't carrying their pitchfork, but knew where it was, and we're ready to grab both at the first sign of poor play from DeAndre Aiton. And while I actually thought the first couple minutes, he wasn't bad and had a certain energy. Overall, this was not a strong game from Aidan. He was the only other person in the Lakers lineup

Starting point is 00:13:47 to hit double-fif. figures, five of seven from the floor, 10 points. But surprisingly inert on the glass, only six rebounds, had one block and just wasn't, didn't look comfortable, wasn't in the flow. Not a good matchup, I think, for somebody like Aden, given what the Warriors do. We'll see on Friday, for example, when the Lakers play against Minnesota, a little bit more of traditional centers there for him to work on. off of, but not a good debut for DeAndre 8.

Starting point is 00:14:22 No, I said heading into this game that I was curious exactly what they would do with DeAndre, specifically on the defensive end, because there's no natural matchup for him at all in this game. There were a few times, like I remember, for example, he had a really good challenge on Al Horford in the corner and forced a miss, and it led to a Laker possession. but for the most part, there's not a natural defensive assignment. He was noted by the commentators a few times. He is not comfortable spending a ton of time in space,

Starting point is 00:14:56 and the Warriors are a team that spreads things out a lot. Again, it is not a good matchup for him. And then offensively, the D'Andre Aiton piece of this, I think is in a lot of ways emblematic of the overall lack of cohesion with this team right now because they're clearly trying to get him involved. Like they are looking to make DeAndre Aiton a part of the offense, like a pretty, I think, prominent part of it, especially while LeBron is out.

Starting point is 00:15:30 But it is, to put it mildly, a work in progress right now. And everybody is not on the same page. And D'Andre Aiton's comfort in what they're doing to get him the ball is clearly not there. And their comfort in execution in getting him the ball often led to some of the sloppiness that we saw offensively. I do think it is important to note D'Andre Aten had company. You look around the starting line up just before we even get to the bench. Rui Hachamura had a couple shots in the second half or the second quarter I should say go down they look like he might get going but he finished with nine points that's not going to be

Starting point is 00:16:16 enough only six shots too he was three of six from behind the arc those were his only six shots again gets back to my general concern even before you've even with LeBron out just will Rui be involved enough in this offense. And just was a night where he wasn't. Just the ball, the ball wasn't kind of popping around a little bit. And, you know, I, we'll get into some of this over the course of the rest of the week. Like, what is different when LeBron isn't there and the offense becomes so centered around Luca? It was going to be that way anyway.

Starting point is 00:16:59 It was going to be centered around Luca, but it's different. It's different when it's the two of them. versus the one. And that's something to look at. But Gabe Vincent, the fifth starter, he did start this game. He had three points on four shots. He had no assists. He had one steal.

Starting point is 00:17:15 And so, like, the impact here, there was a minus five. He kind of went along with the rest of the starting lineup. But, you know, that's not, you got 43 from Luca, 26 from AR, and 22 from the other other three starters. I think at halftime when the Lakers had their 54 points, it was 49, I believe, was the number that either AR and Luca scored or assisted. Well, I mean, just gives you an idea of how dependent on those two the offense was. Well, to put this in perspective, Luke had 27 shots, Austin 16. those guys both got to the line 10 times,

Starting point is 00:18:02 both missed three free throws apiece. The Lakers missed 11 as a team. And again, just the things that were in the Lakers control that went poorly, you know, 11 missed free throws combined with 19 turnovers. Like that in and of itself is a foundation, you know, 23 points off turnovers. like that in and of itself is going to make it difficult to win games.

Starting point is 00:18:31 But those two guys had 43 shots between them. The rest of the Lakers, the other seven guys who stepped on the court, had 33 shots. So obviously the imbalance is pretty striking. It was funny too because not, I don't think people would consider it funny, ha-ha, but it was funny. Like the, you know, the, the Lakers defense. certainly if you were kind of following the game on social media and, you know, checking your Twitter feed and all that kind of stuff was getting filleted online.

Starting point is 00:19:05 And you look at it's like they gave up 55 points in the first half, which is not awful. And that was while turning the ball over every other trip down the floor, not getting good shot quality to get their defense, you know, kind of aligned, even when they did turn it over, didn't turn it over, they they were still not balanced offensively and set up well defensively. It was the third quarter where things really truly fell apart for them defensively. I thought the numbers in the first half were not awful,

Starting point is 00:19:40 even if you kind of weren't buying it. You could think it's smoke and mirrors, whatever. It was really that second half where, you know, it just, it completely fell apart. And, you know, I know the starting lineup is going to be something that is going to be a point of contention over the course of the rest of the week until the Lakers play again and probably for the until LeBron returns. The bench, nobody would sort of jumped off the page, I think, on the bench necessarily to say like this is how it should be. And even then, like, I think even if you did swap out the right guys, and again, I would be starting Marcus Smart. I think Marcus Smart made a, his, his overall, I was going to say his overall stat line doesn't jump out as, okay, he has to be put in there. But if you watch the game, I think his overall energy and at times some of the things that he was making happen while he was out there,

Starting point is 00:20:51 I thought Marcus made actually a pretty good case for himself. I, and I, that's where, it's where I would go, have gone, would go, will continue to go. But overall, I want to ask you what you thought about the bench generally, because even if you swap out Vincent for Smart, you know, in those 13, you know, seven minutes, I think it was the difference in their playing time. Marcus Smart played 23, Vincent played 20. So six or seven minutes. Let's say you just reversed that.

Starting point is 00:21:24 You're still got to figure out what to do with that bench, which did not impress me this evening. So we'll do that next. Locked on Lakers is brought to you by Ruggiette. And let's be real. Making excuses, it doesn't solve anything. We've all heard it before. It's stress. I'm tired.

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Starting point is 00:22:48 It was, you know, you start going down the bench. It was funny to me. Like, I looked up and like, I kind of was like, oh, I feel like Jake LaRavia has been pretty active. and like doing stuff and you know i like kind of the the contributions he's making and then i look i look at the box score because like intangibles you've made this point before indangibles you've made this point before indangibles are good um and you know energy and all that kind of stuff like it all matters but like you got to you got to have some tangibles we need we do need some tangibles and i look down and jake laravia's tangibles weren't very tangible uh you know you had five

Starting point is 00:23:25 points and three rebounds. And I was like, oh, felt like he was doing more. And, you know, Jackson Hayes, who actually thought looked fine. Yeah, I agree. You know, I think the extra weight, if nothing else, you know, he grabbed a couple offensive rebounds, which is, you know, he's not a great rebounder and maybe looked a little bit, a little bit harder to move off the glass on the offensive end. So we'll see if he's able to be a little bit more.

Starting point is 00:23:55 effective as an offensive rebounder. Now that the real games have begun, like, I thought he was okay. You know, but he had four points and six rebounds. And, you know, you mentioned Marcus Smart, the closest thing to tangible production off the bench. He certainly was very noticeable, like body flying around and on the ground a lot. There were a few sparks for the Lakers that felt directly connected to something Marcus Smart did that won't necessarily, again, jump on.

Starting point is 00:24:25 off the stat sheet like we were talking about before, but if you were watching, you could tell it mattered. Certainly has a certain edge. I mean, there's a Well, the communication. I think between probably how Lake is this works out well for the Lakers, how sort of Marcus Smart is viewed internally by Lakers fans that parallels how Warriors fans think of Draymond.

Starting point is 00:24:48 Nobody else likes him, but he's our guy and we like him. There's just that that heel, uh, wrestling heel edge that that Marcus Smart plays with. The two of them. It could be very useful for the Lakers, again, if this all works out. The two of them got called in succession for illegal screens. First Marcus Smart, then Draymond Green. And it felt very circle of life.

Starting point is 00:25:13 Like when the older guy and the younger guy both do the same thing that everybody complains about them doing that they're known for, I like Marcus if nothing else from the first preseason game where he was pretty invisible to where he is now. You're just starting to see more of an increase of activity, more of what you are hoping for with Marcus Smart. JJ talked after the game about how Marcus and also DeAndre for that matter. And he mentioned Luca as well. We're doing a good job as defensive communicators or looking to communicate defense. defensively, obviously their communication did not solve the problems.

Starting point is 00:25:56 Well, sometimes said like the communication was, hey, who is guarding that guy? Right. But like calling out stuff, he, JJ cited Marcus, D'And Luca specifically. But the lack of overall production, there's there's a bit of a chicken in the egg in the sense that when things start getting, you know, we witnessed this for 10 years covering Kobe's career. when some of these guys who can be very heliocentric and can become a one-man offense into in and of themselves, it can be awesome to watch.

Starting point is 00:26:32 It can sometimes lead to wins, but it can also at times lead to the other guys not ever really getting into a rhythm, not ever feeling like this is where their shots are going to be coming from and anticipating. Obviously, you know, Luca and to a lesser extent, Austin, they were moving the ball. They had nine assists each on a night where the offense, particularly from behind the arc.

Starting point is 00:26:55 The Lakers shot 25 percent struggled. So I want to make it clear. I don't think either of them was intentionally monopolizing the ball. But like if you look at the box score, for example, both of them had usages in the 30s, like mid-30s. And I don't think anybody else hit 20. So I think it just, again, speaks to a bit of the imbalance and also just the everyone not exactly being on the same page for how all of this stuff is going to work. Again, Luca and Austin were not monopolizing. It's not the way I mean it.

Starting point is 00:27:35 No, but it's joint. It's just the natural, you know, this, you know, again, especially when when LeBron isn't there, you know, and, and, and. And Reeves operates differently as a sort of a lead guard organist. It doesn't, it's not like it's like Chris Paul, like as your lead guard. It just works differently. Even when AR is moving the ball and piling up assists, it's a different kind of deal. And, you know, you need, there is a lack of finishing ability with the other guys that I think is noticeable when you're trying to create offense. And, you know, because sometimes it's going to be Luca making the pass to Aiton, who makes the pass to Rui, Rui's got to finish.

Starting point is 00:28:21 Or, you know, over to Vando, like Vando was a black hole offensively in this game Tuesday. It was awful. You know, I think he was doing his best to provide energy and this and that, whatever. But overall, he was just a negative force, certainly on the offensive side of the ball. And they're just, there wasn't that feeling. of aggression from anyone else on the roster. Smart had a couple finishes at the basket where you could see he put the ball. But even those, one or at least one or two of them came at like kind of, you know,

Starting point is 00:29:00 just disorganized, broken down plays and Smart just kind of goes. There just wasn't that aggression of somebody else is going to finish and get himself a bucket. I look very much at Rui for something like that. Now, I'm not saying he had tons of opportunities. that he passed up. It just, you know, like they need some of, like, you look at the Warriors and obviously you have Steph and obviously you have Jimmy Butler who had 31 points in this game, 16 of 16 from the line.

Starting point is 00:29:33 But like Jonathan Comingo was very aggressive in this game. And Buddy Heald was very aggressive in this game. And so you had those. Those guys are scores. They are, but so is Rui. Like, you know, but like, sure. You need to put yourself, you know, you need to find that too. It can't just be, you know, two guys.

Starting point is 00:29:54 I don't want to say even generate all your points, but two guys who are aggressively part of that process. And so that's something that's going to need to change with this lineup from Tuesday through games 2 through 82. Yeah, this comment from Cali Omega, I think there's truth to this in talking about also the inverse of what we were mentioning before with that heliocentric stuff with Luca and with Austin. Do you see what happened when Luca didn't touch the ball? There were some very rough possessions. Guys also turned down shots. So everything was reliant on Luca and Reeves to bail out. That's why we were saying before this is not, this night was clearly not on Luca or Austin.

Starting point is 00:30:41 they were the two guys who showed up the most, were talking about just an overall effect and thing that was happening and how it's emblematic of a team that was clearly not on the same page. That is not, to be clear, not on Luca or on Reeves. They had the two best games of everybody by far. Like, Austin was in and out of this game. He had some foul trouble. And, you know, he, I thought,

Starting point is 00:31:11 It took Austin a while to get going. But as the, I thought he started well, second half, but he really disappeared at the beginning of the second half. Like they needed more of him early in that third quarter and he wasn't there. Right. Well, it was also not there and part of it because he was on the bench and he picked up a fifth foul in the third quarter. But he got going in the fourth where they needed anybody other than Luca. But yeah, obviously this loss was not on Luca. that would be ridiculous.

Starting point is 00:31:41 Again, it's more just the idea of how out of sync the whole team was because that is what often happens when two guys end up with a disproportionate amount of the offense. It just reflects a team that is, it can reflect at least a team that's not on the same page. And look, I mean, there are a lot. You know, we talked about it. other people talked about it. It was certainly, you know, again, if you're following kind of somebody who follows the game while watching socials and all that kind of stuff, the lack of cohesion is, you know, it flows through a preseason where the Lakers didn't, you know, connect a ton.

Starting point is 00:32:26 They finished one in five in those games and were unable to, you know, get a ton of rhythm. They had moments when the line, you know, starting line, it's the preseason. and you do end up playing weird lineups and all that kind of stuff. But like this looked like a continuation of that. Like they didn't look good in this game, like look like a team that went through training camp. Forget the preseason games because I think the games have become something that maybe we all collectively focus too much on.

Starting point is 00:32:57 And what are they doing during practice? So what are you building during practice? What are you building during those that three weeks? and in the you know they do a lot of live scrimmaging they do a lot of live play and all that kind of stuff apparently what it didn't hold um for this game warriors strange team i think we will learn more on friday um but not a good start no no um again 81 more of these there's plenty of time to work this stuff out but there's also a lot of stuff to work out so chop chop um locked on lakers on youtube is we can go hang out with over 36,000 angry, angry subscribers to the channel.

Starting point is 00:33:37 We will be back with more again, a couple days off for the Lakers before they take the floor again. Minnesota on Friday at the crypt. So a second home game and the Lakers need to come out with a much better performance against another excellent team. So we'll see how they do. See you all tomorrow.

Locked On Lakers - Daily Podcast On The Los Angeles Lakers - Luka Dončić Scores 43, But LAKERS DOOM THEMSELVES In 119-109 Loss to Warriors

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