Considering his abbreviated low season, defending champion Los Angeles Lakers is doing very well. While their opponent in the finals, the Miami Heat, has been fighting for a 3-4 record to start the 2020-21 season, the Lakers have six wins, tied in most at the Western Conference.
It is no surprise that the Lakers are paving the way for the season. MVP candidates LeBron James and Anthony Davis are playing fewer minutes and scoring less. Coach Frank Vogel is trying to figure out how the new pieces Marc Gasol, Montrezl Harrell, Dennis Schroder and Wesley Matthews fit together while trying to find a role for emerging spin player Talen Horton-Tucker. Therefore, Thursday’s 118-109 loss to the San Antonio Spurs, in which the Lakers never led and lost by up to 15 points in the first quarter, could easily be dismissed as an expected obstacle on the strange path to repetition.
Davis, however, did not see it that way. The great All-Star player, who rarely shows extreme emotion on the court, dropped a cart during the game in reaction to the game below his team’s average.
“Just a lot of frustration. I did [knock over the cart], “Davis explained after the defeat.” Our defense’s frustration tonight. Frustration at my lack of two free throws. So, you know, I just walked over and dropped the damn cart. “
Davis did not stop with his side display. He relentlessly criticized the Lakers’ defensive effort after the Spurs, who came into play with 12 points out of 3 per game, went 16 out of 35 down.
“We didn’t play any defense. Our defense was shit– tonight,” said Davis. “We didn’t play a defensive move and the guys did what they wanted. They played this game comfortably … We never played defense from the start until the final bell. That’s why we lost.”
According to Davis, this was not a single occurrence. He said the Lakers’ defense has not consistently lived up to its standard and that communication and effort need to improve.
“Some nights we are defensive and some are not,” Davis said. “We have bouts in the game where we are very good defensively, but for a full 48 minutes on a consistent basis, we didn’t. We know there will be mistakes, the teams will make shots. Our communication has been terrible, I think so, in the first nine games we played, we have to be much better defensively if we want a chance to defend our title.
“There is no excuse for that. The defense has nothing to do with schemes or things like that. It is about energy and effort. It takes nothing to put you on the edge of the defense. You cannot control on the offensive end if the shots go or not., but defensively you can control how hard you play. “
Davis went on to specify his criticisms, saying that the Lakers are generally good defensively in the first 10-15 seconds of the kick clock, but they fail to continue the effort for full possession, which leads to open kicks or penetration. The Lakers did a particularly bad job against the Spurs’ great man, LaMarcus Aldridge, who hit 11 out of 18 on the field, including 3 out of 7 in the 3-point streak in Thursday’s victory.
You can see what Davis is talking about here, as the Lakers have a collapse in the simple pick-and-pop roof that leaves Aldridge with an open training jumper. Notice James’s frustration following the bucket.
The Lakers almost suffer the same fate in the next Spurs possession, but Dejounte Murray’s pass is a little wrong, causing Aldridge to hit the ball. Even with the mistake, he simply passes the ball to DeMar DeRozan, who drops a 3-point ball without a defender in sight. This time, it’s Davis’s turn to show his frustration.
It shows so much about Davis’s development as a leader that he felt the need to publicly call on his teammates after what he considered an unacceptable defensive performance. It would be easy for him to attribute that to the short off-season or the team’s unfamiliarity due to its new players – after all, the Lakers still have the NBA’s sixth best defense. Instead, he made it clear that this team will not just spend the regular season and hope to turn things around in the playoffs.
It’s just further proof that Davis, 27, continues to thrive on and off the court, while waiting to take over the franchise’s reins if and when LeBron decides to call it a career.