The 2021-22 regular season ended, some teams went straight to the playoffs, some teams had to play playoffs, and the Lakers ushered in the offseason.
Pulling the time back to August 2021, Westbrook went to the second floor of the Lakers Training Hall after the transaction was completed, where the team owner Jenny Bath's office was located, and on a special bookcase in the house, there were 11 championship trophies, which was a brilliant achievement of the Bass family after buying the Lakers.
"I'm glad you're here," Jenny said to Westbrook, "my father bought the Lakers in 1979, and that season was also the magic's rookie year, and they won the championship at the beginning." Dad's goal is to surpass the number of titles over the Celtics, counting the previous trophies, we already have 17 titles, and we are interested in the number of 18. ”
"We know what needs to be done." Wei Shao said with a smile.
The smile that was once full of expectations, after 8 months, turned into a frustrated expression, and the Lakers did not get the "18" they longed for, but instead "cut the waist" of this number into an embarrassing "9", which was the ninth time the Lakers missed the playoffs in the Era of the Bath family.
The league's play-off system has actually given the Lakers extra opportunities, but they still can't grasp it, the team with four 75 superstars, lost 49 games, the winning rate is only 40%, the record is bad to this extent, has broken through the bottom line.
In exchange for Wei Shao's operation, it was nailed to the column of shame, but from the basic concept of the transaction, there is nothing wrong with "change for whole money", and the Lakers got the thick eyebrow brother and won the 17th crown in this way. From the basic thinking of reinforcement, the Lakers are also right to introduce a big core with the ball, James had two years of trapped injuries in the first three years of Los Angeles, and won the championship in the year of health, his physical condition determines the upper limit of the Lakers, and it is imperative to reduce the burden.
However, there is a problem with the Lakers' operational goals. Wei Shao is a former MVP, the historical triple-double king, he is by no means a parallel star, but Wei Shao's game characteristics are destined to be less matched than the Lakers' other two trading targets, DeRozan and Hield, in the offseason, which requires more time to integrate and needs to pay more costs.
Wei Shao has gradually found the right positioning and rhythm after the All-Star, his shooting efficiency and error control have come to a more reasonable level, but only "more reasonable" can not save the team, the Lakers collapsed after the All-Star, 6 wins and 18 losses directly fell out of the playoffs.
As the highest paid player in the team, the Lakers have fallen to this point, and Wei Shao can hardly blame him, but this pot only allows Wei Shao to carry it alone, is it really appropriate?
From the salary point of view of the Lakers, the typical "top-heavy", Zhan Meiwei accounted for 75% of the team's salary, outside the three Tucker is 9.5 million, Nunn is 5 million, and all other basic salaries or two-way contracts. The Lakers left Tucker to abandon Caruso, and although Caruso was willing to lower his salary requirements, Tucker went from a potential stock last season to a negative asset this season, losing! The Lakers mini midclass signed Nunn, did not play for a season, failed! Munch and Anthony are the Lakers' more reliable reinforcements, but their function is limited to the offensive end.
Compared with the auxiliary lineup around Zhan Mei when he won the championship in 2020, the Lakers' supporting cast group in the 2021-22 season is older, shorter and more functional, especially the defensive end completely deviates from the purpose of the championship season, and the quality of defense has shown a catastrophic plummet, so it is more necessary to be driven by the three stars of the salary head, if they can play together healthily, the championship may still be exaggerated, but it will not be rejected by the playoffs.
However, the "360 combination" only played in 21 games, the most scolded Wei Shao was the highest attendance of the three (also the highest in the Lakers), James missed 26 games, and the youngest brother in the "360" was the least durable, playing 16 games less than the old Zhan.
James in the 2018-19 season because of the groin injury caused by the lack of playoffs, he has realized that time has caught up, so he changed to point guard, delegated power to thick eyebrows, and then strengthened personal offense when needed, the two worked together to kill the championship, although the Finals MVP is old Zhan's, but the more dominant playoffs should be thick eyebrows.
If you look at the two dynasties before the Formation of the Lakers in Zhan Mei, they are both double-core big brother with little brother, Abdul Abdul and Magician, O'Neal and Kobe, big brother is the basic disk, and the growth of little brother continues the dominance of the combination. Zhan Mei could have also followed this path, thick eyebrows won the championship is 27 years old, this is the golden period of the player's career, in the idealized script, the Lakers can continue the transfer of the first core from James to the thick eyebrow brother, but the attendance rate of the thick eyebrow in the next two consecutive seasons did not exceed 50%, so that the script can only stay in the imagination.
James's knees and ankles, physical condition, can not support him to copy the Cavaliers period of the team leadership ability, and the fragility of the thick eyebrows makes the old Zhan have to bear the burden that he can't bear at this age, the addition of Westbrook brings the lineup run-in problem, the Lakers also have the pressure to win, Vogel swings a large number of small lineups, Zhan Mei all go to play five, the body is further consumed, forming a vicious circle.
The fundamental problem of the Lakers is that the trio, which occupies 75% of the team's salary, has not formed an effect of 1+1+1 greater than or at least equal to 3, but has dragged each other down, and even less effective than last season's 1+1, at least the Lakers also entered the playoffs last year, and now the threshold of the playoffs can not be touched.
There is inevitably a question here, injuries are part of the game, Lakers and City Team Clippers also have the trouble of star injuries, why can anyone enter the playoffs? This is the ability of Lu's guidance, the upper limit can win the championship, and the lower limit can guarantee eight. The Lakers had the opportunity to sign Lu Mentor when they selected the coach in 2019, but they were only willing to give a 3-year contract, because James had not renewed his contract at that time, and there were 3 years left in the contract with the Lakers, and the Lakers believed that Lu Mentor was a coach who needed to hold the old Zhan's thigh, which hurt Lu's self-esteem, and he voluntarily withdrew from the negotiations.
In the 2021 offseason, DeRozan has designed a plan to join the Lakers through agent Aaron Goodwin and the Spurs, but the Lakers refused to give a three-year contract because James's contract has two years left (he is renewed early in 2020, the contract until 2023), the Lakers are only willing to match according to two years, and Westbrook's contract is exactly like this. The same is true of Vogel's contract, which the Lakers extended only a year after winning the championship in 2020, expiring in 2023 like James.
From the current results to the reverse process, we can say that Vogel is not as good as Lu's guidance, Pelinka is mediocre, Jenny is nepotism, and girlfriends "control the government", but it is these people who are now criticized and ridiculed who pushed the Lakers to the top of the championship a year and a half ago.
The Lakers are the most star-oriented team in the league, they pursue a Hollywood-style superhero plot, to have a "Show time", so the Lakers will not play Spurs-style basketball, they refuse to be "simple", they want luxury, they want a star battlefront, even if it is only superficial, even if it will be "head broken and bleeding".
In the final analysis, the 37-year-old Zhan can no longer support the "gorgeous" that the Lakers want, although he can still play beautiful data on the offensive end, but even if it is not compared with 2018, compared with 2020, you can also see the decline of the body, and people will eventually become old.
The Lakers should be glad that they caught up with the last tail of James's true peak and got the trophy, and now the Lakers want to revive again, according to their team building habits, there are only two ways, one is that the thick eyebrows suddenly become durable, and the other is to find the next superstar.
Otherwise, no matter how the offseason is tossed, in the end it will be just a copy and paste of this season, like a beautiful looking boulevard, but it is full of broken dreams.