In 2020, the Los Angeles Lakers tied the Boston Celtics for the most championships in NBA history with 17 (haha banner 18 is here baby). They were built off of the LeBron/AD pick and roll, their spacing around that go to play and their elite defense. After a disappointing 2020-21 season in which they were a 7th seed and a first round exit, the Lakers thought they needed to improve, which was fair. As a result, they sent Kentavious Caldwell-Pope, Kyle Kuzma, Montrezl Harrell and a first round pick to the Wizards for Russell Westbrook in a deal that stripped the Lakers of any chance of another title in the LeBron James-Anthony Davis era.
As I mentioned the Lakers were at their best when they were running the LeBron/AD pick and roll with shooting surrounding those guys and their defense being at the top of the league. Russell Westbrook needs the ball in his hands and is a bad shooter and defensive player. Right off the bat, this was a bad fit and I said that when the Lakers made the deal, “the floor spacing will be terrible (and) they are way too top heavy, especially with the injury history of Anthony Davis and the more recent injury history of LeBron James… overall I am not a huge fan of this trade for the Lakers.” It never made sense for the Lakers to do this trade. They had another trade lined up with Sacramento to acquire Buddy Hield for Kuzma and Harrell and while I would not have loved that trade either, at least Hield would have fit on the offensive end, Westbrook did not fit the Lakers offense and he was (and still is) a minus defender. Westbrook had had a good season in his lone as a Wizard, averaging 22.2 points, 11.5 rebounds and 11.7 assists in 65 games. He was on the court (the season was 72 games long instead of 82) and he was productive because the Wizards needed a guy who could create for others, the Lakers had (and still have) LeBron James on their team, he should always have the ball in his hands because he is one of the 2 greatest players of all time. This deal made no sense and it proved to be worse on the court than even the harshest critics of the trade could have imagined.
Headed into the 2021-22 season, many picked the Lakers to go to the Finals and win the championship (please note that I did not). The addition of Westbrook was going to push the Lakers back over the top. Only it did not happen as all the good things from the title run, disappeared. Their spacing around LeBron and AD was gone and the defense fell from 1st in 2020-21 to 21st in 2021-22. That is a dramatic fall for a once elite defense, and you can really point to all of this due to the trade. It was not Russ’ fault that the defense fell off a cliff but they sent KCP and Kuzma out in that deal and lost Caruso due to the luxury tax that they were only close to because of that deal. In order to be an elite basketball team you have to be elite defensively and the Lakers were that in 2020 and 2021, in 2022 they were bad on that end. Thus, they finished 33-49 and did not qualify for the Play-In Tournament. It was one of the biggest disaster seasons any team has ever had. Being the Lakers, having LeBron James, Anthony Davis and Russell Westbrook on the roster and being the favorites they were at the start of the season, to finish 33-49 was humiliating for the franchise.
The 2022-23 season saw Westbrook move to the bench for then new coach (and since fired) Darvin Ham. The Lakers were, again, bad and at the trade deadline traded Westbrook (and a 2027 first round pick) to the Utah Jazz in a 3-team trade that netted them D’Angelo Russell, Malik Beasley and Jarred Vanderbilt, good players but not those impact two way guys they had on the championship team. They did turn their season around and get to the Western Conference Finals after being in the play-in again. However, they were swept by the Denver Nuggets and sent home. This past season they were sent home by Denver again, this time in the first round.
The Lakers are bringing back a team pretty identical to last year’s team in 2024-25. While LeBron is not what he was during the 2020 title run, he has shown he is still an elite player who can play at a high level in big moments, he and AD are going to have the Lakers in the playoffs. This roster is just littered with guys who play one way, which is why I don’t think they can win the championship. Players like Russell, Austin Reaves and Rui Hachimura are good, even really good, offensive players but they can’t stop anyone at the point of attack on the defensive end and while Vanderbilt is an elite defender, he is bad on the offensive side, not giving the spacing that KCP, Caruso, Kuzma or Danny Green gave the Lakers used in route to the 2020 championship. Look at this past years Celtics, two way players are littered up and down that roster and they just blew their way to a championship. The Lakers had an elite team, with 2 of the elite players in the league and depth that was filled with guys who could play on both sides of the court. This team just does not have that and a big reason for that is the trade they made for Russell Westbrook back in July 2021.
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