Our biggest weakness (besides injuries/COVID)

[slavavov]

... is our frontcourt. Other than LeBron and AD, and Dwight to a certain extent, our frontcourt is garbage. I know this sounds like captain obvious, but it's extremely glaring. We have a real lack of other frontcourt players who can defend and contribute something offensively, and other than AD everyone in our frontcourt is old.

DJ is still a decent rebounder and can sometimes block shots, but he doesn't really do anything else well, and I guess that's why he's fallen out of the rotation.

Melo gives us a lift when he gets hot, but besides that he's a dead weight. Even worse, he's been having good games even less often than he did in October and November.

THT and Bazemore are simply too small most of the time to comfortably play the 3 defensively.

Stanley Johnson is a keeper. I know we're concerned that he's a bad 3-point shooter, but he can put the ball on the floor and get to the rim and score a little bit. Plus, he's young and active and makes things happen on D.

If Ariza has enough left in the tank, he'll help us with similar things, plus he can comfortably play the 4. But I'm not counting on any of that since he's old.

These small lineups we've seen throughout the season are momentum killers. LeBron at the 5 can work when the other team is really small. Otherwise it's asking for trouble.

Playing Melo at the 5 anytime is just straight-up dumb.

Our backcourt is solid and has a solid mix of young guys and older (but not old) vets. But our frontcourt this season is preventing us from getting leads or holding onto them.

We also don't have any frontcourt players at all who are a consistent 3-point shooting threat.

[Halflife]

Stop with other than AD. Has he played like dpoy like he said he would? Is e top 5 like everyone claimed? And you can’t take injuries out of equation. He’s brittle.
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Kobe.
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[Goldenwest]

We're missing a big (5) that could rebound and hit threes.

[LakerSD]

Can’t sustain for a 48 minute game.

Basically we are saying the return of Ariza, Nunn and additions of Stanley and Collison will solve that issue.

I’m skeptical.

I guess if Monk continues to ascend along with Reaves getting heavy minutes maybe they can look more like an NBA team as some of the old, no defending players will not get significant minutes.

[Lakerz113]

Redundancy in the lineup, not enough D and 3 players, not good enough 3 and D players.

The team fouls so much, and doesn’t get to the line on the other end. I don’t even care that they suck at the line, but I would like to see them get in the first place.

[defense]

Defense
Chemistry
Fit
Size
Athleticism
Motivation
Too many chiefs
Not enough Indians
We have players that should be retired
We lost a good coach in Kidd
No continuity
Depending on "the switch"
We have no switch

I have more, but I need to drain my pool.

[troy]

My take is different. I'd say our number 1 deficiency is Anthony Davis.

We can't win with just one 37 year old superstar. The Lakers success has always been dependent on a 1-2 punch of Lebron and AD. And herein lies our biggest problem.

Anthony Davis simply cannot be relied upon.

His combination of uninspired play and poor physical constitution causes a negative ripple effect on this Lakers team. Lebron has to overplay to compensate, which only serves to wear him out and render him ineffective in post season play. And there's Russell Westbrook, who has to push himself too much when AD is out. The problem there is that when RW pushes himself, his energy level goes too high and he plays hyperactive and out of control. This compromises his concentration level, and the end result are turnovers and missed layups/dunks.

You also have defensive issues when AD is out. With no AD as a defensive presence, then we have to rely on sagging defensive schemes to help out DJ or Dwight in the paint, which means our perimeter defense is compromised. The end result is guards and wings from opposing teams either bomb us from the 3 point line, or drive passed our desperate closeouts for easier scores. And Rob Pelinka has no competent wing players (other than the old, unreliable Ariza and the new Stanley J.) to slow this down.

Some teams can adapt to injuries to key players and continue to play well, due to their constitution and mindset of players and coach. That's not the Lakers. The Laker are like a train. They follow a specific system, prioritized by our two key players at the head (Lebron and AD). When one of those players are not playing, or playing poorly, the train derails, and the team loses.

And sadly, even if Anthony Davis comes back from one injury, he is likely to get some other injury and be out again. You see, you can't rely on saying "when AD comes back from his injury..." because all likelihood is that his coming back from one injury just means another one is on the way, and we're right back to square one.

This is why I say, even though it's not popular on LG and I know it will never happen anyway, that the Lakers would be better of trading Anthony Davis.

Our system; what makes us a successful team, cannot work if our number 2 player is constantly hurt, or underperforming. I'd even go so far as saying I'd keep Russell Westbrook OVER Anthony Davis, because with Russ, if he's not stressed out and over-excited, he's actually an effective player. He's also mostly healthy and tries hard every night. None of of those attributes I just mentioned an be applied to Anthony Davis.

AD is our biggest deficiency on this Lakers team.

[PenG_]

We’re worse than the 2019-20 team in pretty much every way.

[RI Laker]

[wolfpaclaker]

Weakness?

If I had to pick one?

Motor.

We don't have enough players that have a high enough motor. I don't think it's wing size, or specifically shooting. Austin Reaves is a great example. Here's a dude who was a borderline NBA player coming into the season. Avery Bradley another guy. Was cut by Warriors. Both those guys have been part of some really positive things for the team. It's just we don't have more of those players.

Two big weaknesses for me:

1) Role players lacking a motor. Think of Reaves/Bradley. Now compare them to Melo, DAJ, Bazemore, THT, etc. Is the motor the same across the team's role guys?

2) The big 3 have often injured/in and out. I think as a whole they've played at most 4 games in a row together. I can't think of a significant period of time when the big 3 played a few weeks together, dating back to preseason. The actual tally is:

This is how the Bron/AD/WB playing has broken down this year.

1 preseason game of 6
In RS:
Played 3 straight, then missed 2. (1-2 record)
Played 3 straight, then missed 8. (3-0 record)
Played 2 straight games, then missed 2 (1-1 record)
Played 2 straight games, then missed 1 (1-1 record)
Played 3 straight games, then missed 2 (1-2 record)
Played 2 straight games (AD Wolves game injury), then missed 7 straight ongoing (1-1 record)

So the big 3 record is 8-7 in 15 games, and a few of those games even had either AD leaving early due to injury or Lebron being thrown out. Your big 3 have played in totality 40% of the RS games together.

It's not working in large part of the roles players, but also in large part of the big 3 (Who are supposed to carry the team considering their salaries) not playing enough together.

[wolfpaclaker]

Just doing the above analysis of the big 3, I can't believe how bad our luck has been this year with the injuries to Bron/AD. It is just incredible. It's one thing if it happened into the season and we developed some chemistry. We've never had any stretch of 10 games even where you can give the big 3 some time to develop chemistry, some sort of continuity. It's crazy. Not that I am a believer of Russell Westbrook, but the things have worked out as badly as one could possibly think of.

[LakerSD]

[matigol]

What? This team has weaknesses?
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White guy to white guy alley oop

[AD23]

We miss Javale McGee

[venturalakersfan]

Injuries and COVID apply to every team so they are constant. The problem this season has always been poor roster construction. The roster is vastly unbalanced.
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RIP mom. 11-21-1933 to 6-14-2023.

[cthroatgtr]

Athletic taller than 6'5" players that can play 3/4. The plan was supposed AD at the 5 with Dwight his backup. The problem is the 4 is manned by 3 twilight players that all played SF to start their career. Further no backup to AD. Roster should have added some players that help the Lakers go small plus general forward depth. If you are depending on Austin Reaves you really missed the roster makeup. Johnson does help solve this. But the fact it took a team decimated by covid to even try is pretty sad. Imagine if they found a younger stretch 4 to compliment the roster. Young guys can eat up minutes and save the older guys wear and tear. Melo is good with rest, clearly awful in a back to back and he was playing center???

[Lurkernomore]

For the last 3 years, the Lakers have been top-heavy. The team was only going to go as far as LBJ and AD took them. More specifically, it was only going to achieve championship contention if AD surpassed LBJ as the best player on the team AND the two of them were 2 of the best 3 players, including the opponent, on the court. Neither of those has happened this year.

This year, with the RW trade, the top-heaviness was only exacerbated. As flawed as they were, we replaced guys who contributed and certainly fit better around LBJ and AD, with washed-up, one-dimensional has-beens. We counted on THT to improve (he hasn't), for LBJ to continue to fight off Father Time (which he has done better than any other athlete that I can remember, but I think we're starting to see decline) and RW to take some of the load off (he hasn't).

So to answer the poster's specific question

1. AD not playing like the star we need him to be
2. LBJ not able to carry the team in absence of AD playing as he should
3. Pelinka (or LBJ or whoever the GM is) thinking RW could somehow reverse a career of being a ball-dominant, inefficient, non-shooter
4. Our youth, relatively speaking, hasn't contributed/stepped-up the way we needed - THT, Nunn
5. Role players that don't fit around the stars
6. Too few defense capable players (whether ability or mindset)

The real problem now is that it will be hard to fix these issues. AD doesn't have the "dog" in him to become great! LBJ is only getting older! RW is untradeable! We don't have any draft capital! We don't have any salary-cap space! Yeesh!

[lakurluv]

Coaching!

[unleasHell]

Obviously our biggest weakness was the guy who played the least minutes: "Rondo" and with him on his way out, the Lakers can now get back to winning....!

Who-Ra...!
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“Always remember... Rumors are carried by haters, spread by fools, and accepted by idiots.”

[Lakersfan1211]

Our biggest weakness now is 2nd chance points, we can't box out for shhhhhh.

[Vancouver Fan]

We're old. No youth and no talent asides from players in the twighlight of their career. No vision for the future.
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Music is my medicine

[lakurluv]

I take back my earlier comment because I don't know what I was thinking. The answer is simple... "Westbrook"!

[JUST-MING]

Rebounding
Free throw shooting

[wolfpaclaker]

[paymonM]

Age