The Lakers won five in a row and secured the playoffs, but the ranking was really embarrassing
Unconsciously, the Lakers recently came to a wave of five consecutive wins, ranking ninth in the West with a record of 41 wins and 32 losses, 2.5 wins ahead of the Warriors behind them, basically standing firm, not to mention entering the playoffs is stable. However, the ninth-place position in the West is awkward, and the Lakers are likely to be eliminated in the playoffs, and it will be very difficult to enter the playoffs in the quarterfinals.
According to the rules of the NBA league, the playoff play-offs adopt a single-game elimination system, and the winner is determined by one game, and the competition is fierce and cruel. The 7th and 8th teams in the division will play first, and the winner will advance directly to the playoffs quarterfinals as the 7th seed, and the losing side will play another match with the winner between the 9th and 10th teams, and the winner will become the 8th seed, and the losing team will end the season and go home fishing. In other words, if the 9th and 10th teams in the regular season want to enter the playoffs, it will be difficult to win two games in a row in the play-offs, while the 7th and 8th teams will not be able to enter the main game even if they lose the first game. The Lakers are currently in an awkward position at No. 9, and they don't have any advantage against the Kings in front of them or the Warriors below.
In this season's game against the Warriors, the Lakers are 1-2, the loss is a big loss, and the win is a 1-point narrow victory. If the Lakers beat the Warriors in the play-offs, then they will play against the Kings or the Suns next, these two teams have little chance of winning no matter who the Lakers meet, the Kings beat the Lakers four times in the regular season, Davis has not tasted victory in the face of Sabonis Jr. in his career so far, and he is about to be beaten out of the psychological shadow;
In addition, the Lakers are 1.5 wins away from the 8th-ranked Kings, and it is not easy to overtake them, even if they can overtake the Kings in the next 9 games to 8th in the West, then the chances of winning against the Suns in the first game of the play-offs are still not great, so after losing the first game of the play-offs, they will have to face the Kings or the Warriors, which is miserable. The embarrassment of the Lakers is that his record is just stuck on the verge of the play-offs, and he has opened a certain distance from the Warriors, he can't beat the team behind him, the team in front is stronger, James and Davis really tried their best to bring the team to such an embarrassing situation.
This season, the Lakers' lineup is average, and there are no large-scale substitutions or reinforcements, giving people a feeling of no desire. Maybe in the Lakers management feels that even if they are strengthened, there is no hope of competing for the championship, the team's two top salary players James + Davis have a total salary of more than 80 million US dollars, accounting for more than half of the team's total salary, and James is older and no longer dominant on both offensive and defensive ends, Davis does not play frequently due to the glass man attributes, and it is difficult for both of them to talk about cost performance. So this season, the Lakers are more Buddhist from top to bottom, and they can play a few games, and those who can't play don't have so many obsessions.
Maybe in the future, when James retires, the Lakers will most likely give Davis a salary cut or trade, and then rebuild.