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loseyourname
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Joined: 01 Aug 2004
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 Posted: Thu Jul 01, 2021 7:34 am Post subject: |
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| I wonder if every fanbase out there has a thread like this going. The biggest mistake of the 2020-21 season was made by the NBA, choosing to come back too quickly. They're going to end up with all the best teams eliminated by injury and the champion will just be the youngest team that wasn't in the playoffs last year but is still reasonably good, outlasting better teams by resisting injury. |
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yinoma2001
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Joined: 19 Jun 2010
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| Posted: Thu Jul 01, 2021 7:42 am Post subject: |
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I think the compressed schedule at the end of the season, lots of teams with 4 games in 5 nights, multiple back to backs in consecutive weeks, etc., really hurt the league, literally. Remember, they didn't even have the 2nd half of the season published. It was ad hoc, created after March.
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Hanging from Rafters
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Joined: 31 Jul 2018
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| Posted: Thu Jul 01, 2021 8:58 am Post subject: |
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Injuries were certainly PART of the problem but...
Atlanta won without Trae Young
Flippers beat Utah without Kwiwhi and won a couple games against Suns
Suns won games without CP3 in Covid protocol
Utah closed season at #1 with Mitchel hampered
Denver went from 5th to 3rd after Murray injury
The Lakers are constructed to fail due to injuries instead of succeeding in spite of injuries. If that reality is identified then the process of overcoming that deficiency can be a possibility otherwise the denial puts us at the mercy of gambling on being fortunate like last year.
We may not be able to overcome the TOP heavy team that the Lakers are, but admitting that we are too susceptible to failure due to injury will open a chance to build a team that can absorb some injuries and not fall from 3rd to 7th and get eliminated in the 1st round. |
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danzag
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Joined: 28 Apr 2013
Posts: 22375
Location: Brazil
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| Posted: Thu Jul 01, 2021 9:08 am Post subject: |
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| Hanging from Rafters wrote: | Injuries were certainly PART of the problem but...
Atlanta won without Trae Young
Flippers beat Utah without Kwiwhi and won a couple games against Suns
Suns won games without CP3 in Covid protocol
Utah closed season at #1 with Mitchel hampered
Denver went from 5th to 3rd after Murray injury
The Lakers are constructed to fail due to injuries instead of succeeding in spite of injuries. If that reality is identified then the process of overcoming that deficiency can be a possibility otherwise the denial puts us at the mercy of gambling on being fortunate like last year.
We may not be able to overcome the TOP heavy team that the Lakers are, but admitting that we are too susceptible to failure due to injury will open a chance to build a team that can absorb some injuries and not fall from 3rd to 7th and get eliminated in the 1st round. |
In the end, all those wins were meaningless. Denver went from 5th to 3rd and so what?
Winning 3 or 4 more games wouldn't make a difference. Injured AD/LBJ = no ring |
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yinoma2001
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| Posted: Thu Jul 01, 2021 9:13 am Post subject: |
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All I know is we were up 2-1, and whooping them in game 4 when AD went down.
But Suns survived this battle of attrition. Props to them.
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Goldenwest
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Joined: 28 Nov 2009
Posts: 2802
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| Posted: Thu Jul 01, 2021 9:29 am Post subject: |
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agreed, it wasn't what Rob and the lakers did or didn't do, it was the season of injuries. you can nit pic about not having better rim protection or pg play, but AD and LBJ getting injured will sink any team. We were on the way before the injuries, Booker was about to cry at the end of game 3....even he knew it was hopeless...and then fate stepped in...
blame the schedule makers if you want to blame anyone. |
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AD23
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Joined: 15 Jul 2019
Posts: 3069
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| Posted: Thu Jul 01, 2021 9:56 am Post subject: |
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| NONE |
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roger_federer
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Joined: 01 Mar 2020
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| Posted: Thu Jul 01, 2021 7:17 pm Post subject: |
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| Its easy to blame everything on injuries. If we need LBj and AD to be fully healthy entire playoffs and can't miss any games, not sure if that is called good roster construction. |
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cthroatgtr
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Joined: 21 Aug 2005
Posts: 1375
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| Posted: Thu Jul 01, 2021 7:24 pm Post subject: |
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| Simple not signing Dwight. That's it. Sign Dwight, they don't try and bring in Drummond mid-season. Team chemistry is better as well. Not that Dwight is better than Drummond, but working two bigs in together is tough to do without practice time. Injuries did the team in, but perhaps the butterfly effect is in play if they kept Dwight. |
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hype
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Joined: 19 Nov 2007
Posts: 4377
Location: Lake Nacimiento
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| Posted: Thu Jul 01, 2021 9:19 pm Post subject: |
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| roger_federer wrote: | | Its easy to blame everything on injuries. If we need LBj and AD to be fully healthy entire playoffs and can't miss any games, not sure if that is called good roster construction. |
When you have two superstars taking up the majority of your cap space it is absolutely 100% necessary. You seen your boys without Kawhi, they aren't doing anything with PG13 "leading". The roster construction was plenty good enough to win it this year but not only missing AD but having Bron at only 50-60% would never be a recipe to make a deep playoff run no matter who you realistically fill the other spots with. Not sure how that is even really a question though. |
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vasashi17+
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Joined: 13 Dec 2019
Posts: 5612
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| Posted: Thu Jul 01, 2021 9:55 pm Post subject: |
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| Hanging from Rafters wrote: | Injuries were certainly PART of the problem but...
Atlanta won without Trae Young
Flippers beat Utah without Kwiwhi and won a couple games against Suns
Suns won games without CP3 in Covid protocol
Utah closed season at #1 with Mitchel hampered
Denver went from 5th to 3rd after Murray injury
The Lakers are constructed to fail due to injuries instead of succeeding in spite of injuries. If that reality is identified then the process of overcoming that deficiency can be a possibility otherwise the denial puts us at the mercy of gambling on being fortunate like last year.
We may not be able to overcome the TOP heavy team that the Lakers are, but admitting that we are too susceptible to failure due to injury will open a chance to build a team that can absorb some injuries and not fall from 3rd to 7th and get eliminated in the 1st round. |
Yeah, the prolonged tithe run, along with a historically short offseason, followed by a condescend concentrated season led to us being susceptible to the injury bug...but imho it’s still a poor excuse....only cause we inflicted it on ourselves.
Been beating this drum, but want to venture a guess how long Bron has played point before the 2019/20 season? His rookie year...yep, arcade tender age of 19, he played point for around 11 games (14% of 79 games) that season. 17 years leader he makes a triumphant return to pint guard for our 2019 title season. He played 57% of the time at lead guard. As dilapidated as Rondo looked this cLips playoff run, he was kinda Bron’s saving grace for our title run. So we basically gave Bron a run down allstar at one point (pun intended). This past season had him playing point guard at 75% of the time. “That’s tuff!” for a guy that’s in his 18th year at age 36. Yo Schro, you wanna pull a little weight there, brah?
Our 2019/20 playoff run had Bron 2nd only to the Joker @ 1860 total touches (with just under 1100 backcourt touches) compared to the entire playoff pool. Btw those backcourt touches led the entire player pool, including every opposing lead guard. Next highest was Jamal Murray and he was roughly 200 backcourt touches short than Bron. Next highest Laker was Rondo and he was about 600 backcourt touches short of Bron’s. So the grind was real. For reference, Bron’s last title where Kyrie played lead guard, a 31 y/o Bron had about 800 backcourt touches to Ky’s 1050.
https://go.nba.com/yaen
Then with the quick turnaround you jump into this season expecting Schro to carry at least most of the load for a now 36 y/o Bron...particularly in the regular season. Instead in the first 41 games of the new season, he played before going down to injury, he was the 3rd leading player in total touches behind only MVP Joker & Sabonis...and when it came to backcourt touches he logged just above 2000 touches and was about 300 shy of Trae and 200 shy of Harden, Dame, Fox & Luka. A 36 y/o Bron had more backcourt touches than Steph (bleep) Curry during that time. Next highest Laker was Schro and he was a little more than 500 touches shy of Bron in the backcourt.
https://go.nba.com/xdbw
I’ve had this discussion before with other members & I believe AH brought up a good point (pun intended again): Bron is only playing a point forward role on offense in these last 2 seasons with us, but it’s not like he plays defense against the opposing guards. So I had to look that (bleep) up and turns out, Bron does guard guards. Last year he defended opposing guards 41% of the time he was out in the floor. For reference, his final year in Cleveland w/o Kyrie, he defended an opposing guard 33% of the time he spent in the court. His 1st year as a Laker before he was moved to starting point guard, he defended opposing guards 29% of the time. Then in his first year as a starting point guard for us, he logged guard defense 43% of the time. So he was chasing these lil guys all over the floor on defense and then when he came down and was running point on offense, he routinely saw the opposing team’s best perimeter defender. So for any narrative stating he just kicked back and rested on defense..nah man, Bron did the damn thing and was putting in work as a 2way player.
https://go.nba.com/4ehr
Whoever came up with the idea that Bron become our lead guard in his 17th season, needs to go in for a psychological work up. I understand that we tried to get him a 3rd star, cause it worked well as a Heatle and again in his 2nd stint as a Cav, but when it failed, our contingency plan was pure unadulterated (bleep)ery.
The FO brought in personnel that forced Bron to take on the lead guard title. They gave Bron the keys to the offense since their coaching hires had no offensive imagination. So the biggest mistake is standing pat and remaining as is with our FO when Magic unceremoniously quit. There was a POBO vacancy for one of the most storied franchises in the league and I’m sure we could have had our pick of the litter, but instead we remained trash. |
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jheren
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Joined: 10 Aug 2005
Posts: 210
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| Posted: Fri Jul 02, 2021 8:44 am Post subject: |
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| Kuzma and Drummond sucks is what happened! Harrell being benched is what happened! and that is because of addition of Big Penguin. Doesnt help that once LeBron and AD went down there was no leader in the court, Schruder sure isnt! and biggest thing??? they all bricked their 3s! is what happened! worst in the league! |
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nevitt_smrek
Star Player
Joined: 15 Jun 2009
Posts: 2803
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| Posted: Sat Jul 03, 2021 5:05 pm Post subject: |
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I vote for playing it on such short rest. Blame the league.
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activeverb
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Joined: 17 Jun 2006
Posts: 37470
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| Posted: Sat Jul 03, 2021 5:57 pm Post subject: |
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| Hanging from Rafters wrote: | Injuries were certainly PART of the problem but...
Atlanta won without Trae Young
Flippers beat Utah without Kwiwhi and won a couple games against Suns
Suns won games without CP3 in Covid protocol
Utah closed season at #1 with Mitchel hampered
Denver went from 5th to 3rd after Murray injury
The Lakers are constructed to fail due to injuries instead of succeeding in spite of injuries. If that reality is identified then the process of overcoming that deficiency can be a possibility otherwise the denial puts us at the mercy of gambling on being fortunate like last year.
We may not be able to overcome the TOP heavy team that the Lakers are, but admitting that we are too susceptible to failure due to injury will open a chance to build a team that can absorb some injuries and not fall from 3rd to 7th and get eliminated in the 1st round. |
I have the opposite reaction to your list than you intended. I see a bunch of teams that were eventually fell by injuries. I think this will be a season where the last man standing wins.
Anyway, I don't think there's anything we could have done to construct a team that would have been able to withstand injuries to AD and Lebron. I mean, we could have gone all in and traded for Lowry, but I question if that does more than extend us another round or maybe two. |
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Hanging from Rafters
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Joined: 31 Jul 2018
Posts: 4434
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| Posted: Sat Jul 03, 2021 7:17 pm Post subject: |
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| activeverb wrote: | | Hanging from Rafters wrote: | Injuries were certainly PART of the problem but...
Atlanta won without Trae Young
Flippers beat Utah without Kwiwhi and won a couple games against Suns
Suns won games without CP3 in Covid protocol
Utah closed season at #1 with Mitchel hampered
Denver went from 5th to 3rd after Murray injury
The Lakers are constructed to fail due to injuries instead of succeeding in spite of injuries. If that reality is identified then the process of overcoming that deficiency can be a possibility otherwise the denial puts us at the mercy of gambling on being fortunate like last year.
We may not be able to overcome the TOP heavy team that the Lakers are, but admitting that we are too susceptible to failure due to injury will open a chance to build a team that can absorb some injuries and not fall from 3rd to 7th and get eliminated in the 1st round. |
I have the opposite reaction to your list than you intended. I see a bunch of teams that were eventually fell by injuries. I think this will be a season where the last man standing wins.
Anyway, I don't think there's anything we could have done to construct a team that would have been able to withstand injuries to AD and Lebron. I mean, we could have gone all in and traded for Lowry, but I question if that does more than extend us another round or maybe two. |
The Bucks are the next example of my opinion, succeeding in getting to finals in spite of injuries instead of failing because of. We’re all just guessing, it’s a tough game to predict...but I believe blaming it all on a injuries (some blame, actually a lot of blame is warranted) is setting us up for failure. We may not be able to succeed in spite of injuries, I get that...but I would like the team to realize that other teams are constructed to survive injuries and for the Lakers to realize that it is possible for us too if we try instead of accepting it as if it can’t be done. |
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hype
Star Player
Joined: 19 Nov 2007
Posts: 4377
Location: Lake Nacimiento
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| Posted: Sun Jul 04, 2021 6:02 pm Post subject: |
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| Hanging from Rafters wrote: | | activeverb wrote: | | Hanging from Rafters wrote: | Injuries were certainly PART of the problem but...
Atlanta won without Trae Young
Flippers beat Utah without Kwiwhi and won a couple games against Suns
Suns won games without CP3 in Covid protocol
Utah closed season at #1 with Mitchel hampered
Denver went from 5th to 3rd after Murray injury
The Lakers are constructed to fail due to injuries instead of succeeding in spite of injuries. If that reality is identified then the process of overcoming that deficiency can be a possibility otherwise the denial puts us at the mercy of gambling on being fortunate like last year.
We may not be able to overcome the TOP heavy team that the Lakers are, but admitting that we are too susceptible to failure due to injury will open a chance to build a team that can absorb some injuries and not fall from 3rd to 7th and get eliminated in the 1st round. |
I have the opposite reaction to your list than you intended. I see a bunch of teams that were eventually fell by injuries. I think this will be a season where the last man standing wins.
Anyway, I don't think there's anything we could have done to construct a team that would have been able to withstand injuries to AD and Lebron. I mean, we could have gone all in and traded for Lowry, but I question if that does more than extend us another round or maybe two. |
The Bucks are the next example of my opinion, succeeding in getting to finals in spite of injuries instead of failing because of. We’re all just guessing, it’s a tough game to predict...but I believe blaming it all on a injuries (some blame, actually a lot of blame is warranted) is setting us up for failure. We may not be able to succeed in spite of injuries, I get that...but I would like the team to realize that other teams are constructed to survive injuries and for the Lakers to realize that it is possible for us too if we try instead of accepting it as if it can’t be done. |
No team really survived injuries to there top player in these Playoffs? All the best teams were sent home and we're left with what is easily one of the most uninteresting Finals we've had for the general NBA fans that I can remember especially if Giannis doesn't play which i'm hoping he does and looks at least 70-80%. The Bucks aren't really worthy of an example since they won a couple with Giannis before he got hurt then the Hawks also lost there best player which leveled things out and Trae was clearly not right when he tried to come back early in Game 6. Giannis has missed a total of 2 full games out of these entire Playoffs. You give the Bucks credit for sure but they were also extremely fortunate the opponent were the Hawks during those 2 1/2 games without Giannis.
I think we would have got past Utah without AD or Lebron as well so I don't think that says much about the Clips because the same team that beat them also beat us because of injuries (Fully healthy the Clips and Lakers both beat the Suns quite easily imo). You can argue with a different small move here or there we might have made it a bit further but when you have two players making vet max money and no young rookie scaled studs then chances are it's not going to be your year if one of those top 2 guys get hurt.
Some teams hit a stride at the right time and there role players step up which literally none of ours did outside of maybe Marc Gasol (but defensively was having a tough time in his matchup so he barely even counts). A lot of that is due to the team being built around Bron and AD though on top of our constant lineup changes all season long while I believe the Suns had the fewest by far of any team in the NBA? I believe we had around 8-10 times as many lineup changes then them which causes many of the role players to never get fully comfortable since they do not have any exact role when it's constantly changing. At the end of the day though all this is, is excuses but it's also true and very valid imo. The Suns and Bucks outlasted all the better injury ridden teams while remaining mostly healthy so while it's an extremely unattractive matchup it's not either of there fault and absolutely deserve full credit for the Championship still.
I fully believe our roster was plenty good enough to still win it though. If Lebron was as healthy as say PG13 but AD was out I believe we also still probably win it all but to have 1 fully out and the other at 50-60% is a recipe for disaster no matter what realistic supporting cast we put together. I'm all for some small changes this off season to hopefully revamp but our duo has to be healthy to actually win it all regardless. |
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statyin
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Joined: 05 Jul 2013
Posts: 440
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| Posted: Sun Jul 04, 2021 6:57 pm Post subject: |
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It was the injury. The team was never really healthy for the most part and we can only go but so far with LBJ and AD both hampered.
Other than that it was Vogel never figuring out plays for players other than LBJ and AD and the routine lineup rotation. Guys had no chemistry going into the playoffs. |
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deal
Franchise Player
Joined: 17 Aug 2008
Posts: 14911
Location: Earth
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| Posted: Sun Jul 04, 2021 9:42 pm Post subject: |
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Our players apparently suck but we want to trade them for guys
that excel.
In what world will a GM send out his high profile players for guys that
suck?
Gotta love LG.
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Lakers need to build a freaking team ! |
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M2K
Star Player
Joined: 20 Feb 2011
Posts: 2432
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| Posted: Sun Jul 04, 2021 10:36 pm Post subject: |
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| yinoma2001 wrote: | All I know is we were up 2-1, and whooping them in game 4 when AD went down.
But Suns survived this battle of attrition. Props to them. |
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A three headed monster... Jeannie, Pelinka, and Ham... another terrible season. |
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BLF2145
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Joined: 14 Jul 2014
Posts: 888
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| Posted: Sun Jul 04, 2021 11:07 pm Post subject: |
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| Hanging from Rafters wrote: | | activeverb wrote: | | Hanging from Rafters wrote: | Injuries were certainly PART of the problem but...
Atlanta won without Trae Young
Flippers beat Utah without Kwiwhi and won a couple games against Suns
Suns won games without CP3 in Covid protocol
Utah closed season at #1 with Mitchel hampered
Denver went from 5th to 3rd after Murray injury
The Lakers are constructed to fail due to injuries instead of succeeding in spite of injuries. If that reality is identified then the process of overcoming that deficiency can be a possibility otherwise the denial puts us at the mercy of gambling on being fortunate like last year.
We may not be able to overcome the TOP heavy team that the Lakers are, but admitting that we are too susceptible to failure due to injury will open a chance to build a team that can absorb some injuries and not fall from 3rd to 7th and get eliminated in the 1st round. |
I have the opposite reaction to your list than you intended. I see a bunch of teams that were eventually fell by injuries. I think this will be a season where the last man standing wins.
Anyway, I don't think there's anything we could have done to construct a team that would have been able to withstand injuries to AD and Lebron. I mean, we could have gone all in and traded for Lowry, but I question if that does more than extend us another round or maybe two. |
The Bucks are the next example of my opinion, succeeding in getting to finals in spite of injuries instead of failing because of. We’re all just guessing, it’s a tough game to predict...but I believe blaming it all on a injuries (some blame, actually a lot of blame is warranted) is setting us up for failure. We may not be able to succeed in spite of injuries, I get that...but I would like the team to realize that other teams are constructed to survive injuries and for the Lakers to realize that it is possible for us too if we try instead of accepting it as if it can’t be done. |
True. Bucks did win a few w/o Jrue and then a few w/o Ginnas. They had players that shoulders were meant to carry more than other teams leaders could. But their GM built a solid roster with very capable players to help carry some of the load (Khris, Lopez, Bobby P, Tucker w/lockdown defense).
Our role players we depended on to do that (Kuz, DS, Trez) were all average at best when needed. But someone else already noted it. Our biggest mistake this offseason was not signing DS and Trez and letting Howard, Green and Rondo go as they would have DONE NOTHING w/o Bron/AD. Our biggest mistake was keeping four spots on a team for players we knew could offer NOTHING coming into a season with a shorter than normal turnaround time and knowing LBJ was aging and AD is a injury prone player.
Instead of wasting spots on those guys, had we spent a few $$$ on say Melo instead of Dudley, Hassan instead of a 2 way player and say Jeff Green or Bazemore, this team has three more players that can give you 20+ Minutes a game, two that easily can produce over 10+ a game. So now you have bench scoring, deeper rotation for injuries and a potential now at trade deadline to move Kuz for other pieces. But instead we wasted three spots on guys that could not even play with depleted rosters. We screwed ourselves. And with all the other team injuries, we easily are winning another one this year w/healthy AD and LBJ. |
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Lakers_Jester
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Joined: 17 Sep 2012
Posts: 5366
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| Posted: Mon Jul 05, 2021 11:05 am Post subject: |
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| Not pulling the trigger on the Lowry trade = biggest mistake |
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yinoma2001
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Joined: 19 Jun 2010
Posts: 119487
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| Posted: Mon Jul 05, 2021 2:46 pm Post subject: |
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| Lakers_Jester wrote: | | Not pulling the trigger on the Lowry trade = biggest mistake |
What does he do without LBJ/AD? He couldn’t even get the Raps into the playoffs. |
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GameCock-MD
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Joined: 14 Dec 2004
Posts: 4498
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| Posted: Mon Jul 05, 2021 4:31 pm Post subject: |
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Not retaining Dwight and McGee.
Not retaining Rondo.
Signing Montrezl.
Signing Marc Gasol.
If we had kept Rondo and Dwight or McGee, I think we would still be playing right now.
Think about it. We could split the MLE between Dwight (3.5M) and Rondo (5.5M, if he'd have taken it) and kept McGee's vet min contract.
That's where we went wrong.
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Build around team players, not ISO players. |
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Lakers_Jester
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Joined: 17 Sep 2012
Posts: 5366
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| Posted: Mon Jul 05, 2021 5:01 pm Post subject: |
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| yinoma2001 wrote: | | Lakers_Jester wrote: | | Not pulling the trigger on the Lowry trade = biggest mistake |
What does he do without LBJ/AD? He couldn’t even get the Raps into the playoffs. |
Im not sure Lowry wouldve changed the outcome of the post season. However, the topic asserts upon the biggest mistake, not whether or not the mistake would have changed the ultimate outcome.
Imo, having an inside track on resigning Lowry wouldve put us in a much better position headed into this off season than we are currently in now. |
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Sina
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Joined: 12 Jul 2015
Posts: 1812
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| Posted: Mon Jul 05, 2021 6:02 pm Post subject: |
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| With a healthy AD, we could handle Suns like game 2 and game 3. With Suns are going toward Finals, I don’t see it’s a losing season m, except injuries. The team has done many things right to compensate the injuries. However, it really insufficient if you were losing your number 2 guy and against a top 2 team in the league. Drummond really strengthened our edge in front court, Schroder may not be a good fit but is acceptable, Harrell may not be useful in this round but could be valuable against smaller lineups like Clippers. We just need a healthy AD and LBJ indeed |
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