Losing to the Wizards without Kuzma was somewhat surprising, the Lakers led by 16 points at the maximum, and finally they were turned over by the Wizards!
One of the biggest highlights of this game was that James overtook Carl Malone to become the second highest scorer in history, which was a great achievement.
James completed the overtaking with a layup, surpassed the classic step by step, and could catch up with Abdul-Jabbar as soon as next season and become the all-time scoring champion. The slowest one will take two seasons, which is also very fast. Looking at James' current state, it is very easy to keep 20 or 25 points or more next season or next season, so surpassing Abdul-Jabbar is a very simple thing, it is a natural thing.
A bit more difficult is the impact of 40,000 points.
As the injury break increases, James' scoring rate will slow down, and considering that the Lakers' signings in the next few years will not be too good, the risk itself is also very large. But James himself is very disciplined and cautious, and it is very possible to hit 40,000 points. If you kill 40,000 points at the end of your career, that is the most classic thing.
James has had too many kills in his life, basically the first place, if the final kill of 40,000 points, it is a beautiful and brilliant picture. Do you believe James can do it?
Back to today's game. We saw that the Lakers' performance in the first three quarters was very good, there was no collapse in the first quarter of the first few games, but in the fourth quarter they still couldn't hold on, and the single quarter was played a wave of 13-2, what does this phenomenon explain?
This phenomenon illustrates two problems: first, the Lakers are indeed not advanced enough in defensive skills and offensive skills; second, the Lakers' physical and mental concentration is not enough to ensure the control of the whole field.
Because of the lack of skills, it will leave the other party with an opening, and this opening may appear somewhere, but it will appear in the case of lakers' lack of physical strength or lack of concentration. Before was the first section, today is the fourth section. I have to say that James performed well overall, but the performance in the fourth quarter was a bit less focused, a little wave. I think it has to do with his physical strength.
After all, he is 37 years old, what else can he be asked to do? Although the current situation of the Lakers requires James to do everything well, he is a human being and an ordinary person who cannot take care of the overall situation, and he needs the help of his teammates. Then we look at the data again, we will find that James's impact on the game this time is positive, but many of the plus-minus of the substitutes are negative, indicating that the person who really lost the score is the substitute.
Anthony, Augustine, Bradley, Tucker, gabriel all have negative plus-minus, with Augustine and Bradley having the lowest, at -17. But the two and Gabriel only have a maximum of three shots each, and the focus of the attack in the playing time is not on themselves.
The most injured was Tucker, who shot 5 times and didn't hit a single one.
Tucker had two 3-point shots, all of which were offside. In fact, Tucker is the Lakers' shooter, because of the inefficiency of multiple offenses and put the Lakers into a bad situation, but it is difficult to blame Tucker. Because he wasn't a strong man in the first place.
Tucker, a second-year student, had high hopes because he had a certain talent, and in my opinion, his talent was not projection, but assault ability.
In the Lakers with James, the role players' stable and efficient immediate combat strength is the best, and Tucker, as a second-year player, is exactly when it is time to exercise. He doesn't have much ball and can't exercise to be an efficient person. Linked to the Fact that the Lakers may not have much of a strong training and supervision, Tucker's growth is slow.
Asking Tucker by the standards of James' best sabre guards is self-inflicted trouble.
Similarly, the situation is similar for Westbrook. Under the premise of ensuring and maintaining LeBron's output, it is difficult to take into account the upper level of Wei Shao's power.
This is a paradox. Theoretically, it would be much easier for James to change to play without the ball than it would be for Westbrook to change to adapt to James, because James is more capable. But in the logic of reality, it is impossible for someone like James to cooperate with others, and this is the case in the logic of any part of the world.
People with greater abilities certainly have more initiative and cannot go behind the scenes or willingly give up power for a so-called collective better strategy. Because once part of the power is relinquished, it is equivalent to changing the collective structure, then the component of individual honor is diluted, and the structure of power will change.
In this loss, there is another conspicuous problem that has been highlighted again - the Lakers' internal problem.
Because of this problem, Vogel has been criticized many times and is considered to be unable to work around. But I think things are complicated here, Vogel can't be stupid to this point, then it can only be the Lakers for a certain concept, choose such a process to carry out.
The normal logic is that when the Lakers' inner line encounters the opponent's internal line, the coach must be replaced by Howard, which is the role of Howard in the championship season - to stop the loss in time. This is perfectly normal logic, but now it doesn't work at all.
Howard played the Raptors and managed to curb the madness on the inside when the Raptors played the Lakers on March 15, and that's where Howard can be. There have been countless times this season when Howard has been available, and there have been countless times when Vogel has replaced Howard with a scene that can show Howard's weaknesses, and many times when Howard is depressed, it seems as if to tell the fans "He really can't do it!" ”。
These phenomena tell us nothing more than one thing: in the Lakers, there must be someone who does not like Howard very much, which may be basketball or outside of basketball.
We analyzed before that Howard's posture when he joined the Lakers in 2020 was very low because of the unpleasantness and immaturity with Kobe At that time. Although it is said that the prodigal son will not change his gold, it depends on the attitude of those in power. Generally speaking, when the prodigal son turns back, those in power are not happy, not sincerely accepting, but for a certain purpose. To get Howard, it's for Davis.
After winning the championship, Howard was directly ignored by the Lakers, affirming this possibility - the Lakers as a whole did not pay much attention to him and did not value him much. After that, the Lakers could not withstand the pressure of the internal line, and could not withstand the leisurely mouth, welcomed back Howard, and after the return, they suppressed all kinds of pressures, never smoothly and smoothly gave him playing time, which confirmed the overall attitude of the Lakers.
If from basketball, Howard is inhibitory to James, at least not a promotion.
Howard was reused in the championship season, only against big centers such as Jokic, but in fact, it was used very few times, and it was not reused. When the Lakers are relatively healthy overall, the team runs the Group James system, and in the James system, the role of the center is minimal.
The second singles player, the other two positions of the shooter, the space type of big forward, plus James's possession of the ball, is the most complete James system. You will find that the role of the center is minimal, because the middle line is the breakthrough route that James left for himself, everyone should be out of the way, and LeBron can't feed the center again and again.
This is the difference between James and Paul and Harden, whose scoring tendencies (especially the tendency to hit the inside line) are very high.
If on Howard, the Lakers' crotch pulling in other positions will highlight Howard's efficiency, then James will have to feed the inside line again and again, which will lose his route and his scoring composition. Another point that cannot be ignored is that Howard has not been more efficient enough, certainly not more than the peak season.
Efficiency is the problem, not efficient is also a problem, then in summary, the Lakers' choice is to not go to Howard, not on.
James likes a small lineup with projection ability, as long as the components are not too crotch-pulling, then they can be driven by one person. The Lakers' problem is that the small lineup is too crotch-pulling, pulling crotch to the point where James is very irritable, which highlights all the problems.
Next season, the Lakers' goal is to attract reinforcements and see if they can harvest some leeks cheaply.