This video is about some nice sequences by Reaves, but Russ caught my eye with some defensive issues. As soon as Paul gets the ball below the 3pt line Russ turns his back on Bridges and completely loses sight of him. Bridges cuts and gets rebounding position. On the next play he has his back to Bridges again while Ayton has the ball on the baseline. Bridges cuts forcing Davis to rotate leaving the corner three wide open.
This is pretty consistent with what I’ve seen defensively so far from Russ. Once he thinks the ball is about to go up he abandons his defensive assignment and focuses on rebounding position. That’s neither good defensive nor good team rebounding technique. Coaches and players have to get in him about this. _________________ Austin Reaves keeps his game tight, like Kobe Bryant on game night.
Westbrook isn't gonna suck, but he also isn't gonna learn how to shoot or become good defensively. The question is can he contribute to what y'all are doing while sucking at both of those things?
Even if it will get better, I don't see how you can overcome some of these issues in the playoffs.
The top teams then will exploit these flaws severely.
You're right, I mean if the coach of the Birmingham Community Charter High School team can't see a way for the Lakers to overcome this, then case closed. Clearly teaching the triangle to a minor high school team and having a podcast makes him more knowledgable than an NBA coach. Coach Nick is not employed in the NBA only because it is beneath him, too easy. Might as well throw in the towel now...
Or, I don't know, maybe the Lakers can rely upon actual NBA professional coaches to figure it out? I'm pretty sure that Westbrook has actually played in the NBA Finals and that he has gone 7 games in the WCF, so I'm thinking these "severe" and "exploitable" flaws are not, in fact, that severe or exploitable with good coaching.
Everyone can see what the problems are. Acting like the Lakers can't fix it after 1 game is absurd. And the folks acting like Russ is a trash player who doesn't belong in the NBA are even more absurd. This vilification of Russ is reaching preposterous levels after 1 game. Y'all need to get yourselves some nice indica and chill...
You mean relying on the same coaching that couldn't make DS, Harrell and Drummond work for the reasons everyone else predicted based on their style of play? Lol
That's the point. The problems are so glaringly obvious and aren't something you can fix even a few months from now. Westbrook isn't going to become the shooter/defender to make this work well as the season goes on: history tells us otherwise.
He'll play better but the obvious flaws will still be there at the end of the season. Aside from health, how the lakers handle this by then will be important for their championship hopes.
This video is about some nice sequences by Reaves, but Russ caught my eye with some defensive issues. As soon as Paul gets the ball below the 3pt line Russ turns his back on Bridges and completely loses sight of him. Bridges cuts and gets rebounding position. On the next play he has his back to Bridges again while Ayton has the ball on the baseline. Bridges cuts forcing Davis to rotate leaving the corner three wide open.
This is pretty consistent with what I’ve seen defensively so far from Russ. Once he thinks the ball is about to go up he abandons his defensive assignment and focuses on rebounding position. That’s neither good defensive nor good team rebounding technique. Coaches and players have to get in him about this.
This is consistent with what he's been doing his whole career. He's always been a stat padder, a terrible defensive player, and a terrible shooter. Dude is literally the biggest fraud in NBA history with the whole "his motor never stops nonsense." People even have the gall to compare his intensity and will to win to Kobe's lol.
But like I said when the news of the trade broke, this is what happens when you hand the franchise over to your superstars. Lebron/AD are great players but they're terrible talent evaluators, the same thing happened with Drummond, but that was on a much lesser scale because we didn't really have much to lose.
The situation with Westbrook is completely different, because he's getting paid a ton of money, and the alternative would have been Hield/KCP/Caruso which would make us a much better team added to what we already have.
To all of you who called me a clipper fan for being critical of the move, thinking that he was gonna put on a Laker jersey and then magically everything was gonna change, good luck with that.
This video is about some nice sequences by Reaves, but Russ caught my eye with some defensive issues. As soon as Paul gets the ball below the 3pt line Russ turns his back on Bridges and completely loses sight of him. Bridges cuts and gets rebounding position. On the next play he has his back to Bridges again while Ayton has the ball on the baseline. Bridges cuts forcing Davis to rotate leaving the corner three wide open.
This is pretty consistent with what I’ve seen defensively so far from Russ. Once he thinks the ball is about to go up he abandons his defensive assignment and focuses on rebounding position. That’s neither good defensive nor good team rebounding technique. Coaches and players have to get in him about this.
This is consistent with what he's been doing his whole career. He's always been a stat padder, a terrible defensive player, and a terrible shooter. Dude is literally the biggest fraud in NBA history with the whole "his motor never stops nonsense." People even have the gall to compare his intensity and will to win to Kobe's lol.
But like I said when the news of the trade broke, this is what happens when you hand the franchise over to your superstars. Lebron/AD are great players but they're terrible talent evaluators, the same thing happened with Drummond, but that was on a much lesser scale because we didn't really have much to lose.
The situation with Westbrook is completely different, because he's getting paid a ton of money, and the alternative would have been Hield/KCP/Caruso which would make us a much better team added to what we already have.
To all of you who called me a clipper fan for being critical of the move, thinking that he was gonna put on a Laker jersey and then magically everything was gonna change, good luck with that.
LOLs at stat padder. He’s done things never done and may never be done again. Zo was being celebrated for having a triple dub as was kg.
This video is about some nice sequences by Reaves, but Russ caught my eye with some defensive issues. As soon as Paul gets the ball below the 3pt line Russ turns his back on Bridges and completely loses sight of him. Bridges cuts and gets rebounding position. On the next play he has his back to Bridges again while Ayton has the ball on the baseline. Bridges cuts forcing Davis to rotate leaving the corner three wide open.
This is pretty consistent with what I’ve seen defensively so far from Russ. Once he thinks the ball is about to go up he abandons his defensive assignment and focuses on rebounding position. That’s neither good defensive nor good team rebounding technique. Coaches and players have to get in him about this.
He also doesn't fight through screens and is a terrible pick&roll defender.
Westbrook isn't gonna suck, but he also isn't gonna learn how to shoot or become good defensively. The question is can he contribute to what y'all are doing while sucking at both of those things?
I think he can, but it's going to take some work. This doesn't mean that it was a good trade or that I'm now a Westbrook fan. But I think that we can do a lot better than what we showed in the first two games. _________________ Internet Argument Resolved
Joined: 15 Sep 2012 Posts: 29286 Location: La La Land
Posted: Sat Oct 23, 2021 8:12 pm Post subject:
Aeneas Hunter wrote:
Dreamshake wrote:
Westbrook isn't gonna suck, but he also isn't gonna learn how to shoot or become good defensively. The question is can he contribute to what y'all are doing while sucking at both of those things?
I think he can, but it's going to take some work. This doesn't mean that it was a good trade or that I'm now a Westbrook fan. But I think that we can do a lot better than what we showed in the first two games.
Be careful taking advice from the guy who has been on the wrong side of Harden choking in the playoffs the last decade.
Even now. He's telling you Westbrook sucks. Meanwhile Westbrook showed up the 1 NBA finals he and Harden played in. Meanwhile Harden ... Hardened (choked in historic fashion).
Even if I put the Bron finals choke job aside. Ask Dreamshake his thoughts on Golden State in the playoffs.
We've lost our first 2 regular season games because our best catch and shoot guy is ... I dunno. Austin Reaves? When we get some people back and get some floor spacing. And rattle off wins. He'll be M.I.A. _________________ "Every hurt is a lesson, and every lesson makes you better”
I am just amazed at his defense in the sense how bad it is. The last time I saw him play significantly in 2012 series against us, his defense was so good.
I am 100% sure this is not his defensive ability. He is just so bad at stopping the ball or staying on his man. It's purely an effort thing. It's not like Melo, where the footspeed is just not there.
AD and Bron need to have a talk with Russ about the D. The Lakers can only win a ring if Westbrook adopts a Vogel style D approach. Maybe we can sub in guys like Bradley (Or THT/Nunn when they come) and put Westbrook on the lesser threat, but that's copping out.
If he wants to win a ring, he needs to defend. He may pick it up slowly, but I am certain this is not his best effort on D at all.
They would never do this, especially with a 40m+ player and a big name like Westbrook, but I think he would do better in a 6th man role. His best attributes are wasted playing with LBJ and then when LBJ sits they bring Rondo to play the PG and make Russ play off ball. Like what are we doing here?
This video is about some nice sequences by Reaves, but Russ caught my eye with some defensive issues. As soon as Paul gets the ball below the 3pt line Russ turns his back on Bridges and completely loses sight of him. Bridges cuts and gets rebounding position. On the next play he has his back to Bridges again while Ayton has the ball on the baseline. Bridges cuts forcing Davis to rotate leaving the corner three wide open.
This is pretty consistent with what I’ve seen defensively so far from Russ. Once he thinks the ball is about to go up he abandons his defensive assignment and focuses on rebounding position. That’s neither good defensive nor good team rebounding technique. Coaches and players have to get in him about this.
This is consistent with what he's been doing his whole career. He's always been a stat padder, a terrible defensive player, and a terrible shooter. Dude is literally the biggest fraud in NBA history with the whole "his motor never stops nonsense." People even have the gall to compare his intensity and will to win to Kobe's lol.
But like I said when the news of the trade broke, this is what happens when you hand the franchise over to your superstars. Lebron/AD are great players but they're terrible talent evaluators, the same thing happened with Drummond, but that was on a much lesser scale because we didn't really have much to lose.
The situation with Westbrook is completely different, because he's getting paid a ton of money, and the alternative would have been Hield/KCP/Caruso which would make us a much better team added to what we already have.
To all of you who called me a clipper fan for being critical of the move, thinking that he was gonna put on a Laker jersey and then magically everything was gonna change, good luck with that.
LOLs at stat padder. He’s done things never done and may never be done again. Zo was being celebrated for having a triple dub as was kg.
Yet he's never won a single championship. Did he even get to the NBA Finals? Then you look at Lebron who's been to the NBA Finals literally almost his entire career. This is why you don't take the stats by its face value. Westbrick's triple doubles were amazing but they were done during the regular season against a lot of much weaker opponents. Lebron, however, put up those near triple double stat in the playoffs!! We all know playoffs are the real deal. Not the regular season. Playoffs is when the best teams would try their very best to win games. Nobody cares if you've won the most games or average a triple double in the regular season (at least not the knowledgeable people). People only care about playoff wins and championships.
MVP, triple doubles, DPOY, First Teams...they're all irrelevant IMO. The only things that matter are playoffs stats and finals MVP. Sleepwalk thru the regular season. Be good in the playoffs. That's what counts.
Westbrick might hold the Lakers back from even reaching the WCF again and then people are gonna blame it on other roleplayers. Already see it coming. _________________ LeGoat! LeMazing! LeGend!
Last edited by lakersfever714 on Sun Oct 24, 2021 7:08 am; edited 1 time in total
Be careful taking advice from the guy who has been on the wrong side of Harden choking in the playoffs the last decade.
Even now. He's telling you Westbrook sucks. Meanwhile Westbrook showed up the 1 NBA finals he and Harden played in. Meanwhile Harden ... Hardened (choked in historic fashion).
They would never do this, especially with a 40m+ player and a big name like Westbrook, but I think he would do better in a 6th man role. His best attributes are wasted playing with LBJ and then when LBJ sits they bring Rondo to play the PG and make Russ play off ball. Like what are we doing here?
I agree wholeheartedly with you. On both points, his role as 6th man and that they would never do it.
Trying to get him to fit in next to James is a wasted resource. He is playing passive and is miscast as a corner spot up player. That role was perfect for Green or KCP but Westbrook?
Westbrook is an All Star by being uptempo, aggressive and in all honesty out of control half the time. It works for him. Forcing him to be otherwise is silly. He will shine on the nights James takes off or as a sixth man IMO.
Yet he's never won a single championship. Did he even get to the NBA Finals?
When he had a team capable of doing it they ran into the Warriors. A young Westbrook averaged 27 points, 6.6 assists, 6.4 rebounds, 1 steal, and 0.4 blocks in 5 games en route to losing to the Miami Heat for Lebron's first title.
Quote:
MVP, triple doubles, DPOY, First Teams...they're all irrelevant IMO. The only things that matter are playoffs stats and finals MVP. Sleepwalk thru the regular season. Be good in the playoffs. That's what counts.
After Durant bolted to Golden State Westbrook never had a championship caliber team. He got them to the playoffs in the west for five straight seasons though. Career playoff numbers of 24.6, 7.9, 7.1, and 1.8 steals. In 2017 he averaged 37.4 points, 11.6 rebounds, 10.8 assists, and 2.4 steals in the playoffs.
Westbrook doesn't play defense. He let's guys with half his athleticism go right by him.
Wasn’t he an elite defender earlier in his career?
No. If you go back and look at the metrics, he always rated as a below average to poor defender. Westbrook is one of those guys for whom the eyeball test can be misleading. He has an intense demeanor and makes mean faces. Over the years, I've seen a lot of people overrate defenders because of their apparent attitude. Anyway, someone else said that he doesn't seem to have a lot of lateral quickness. I've seen the same thing. _________________ Internet Argument Resolved
Yet he's never won a single championship. Did he even get to the NBA Finals?
When he had a team capable of doing it they ran into the Warriors. A young Westbrook averaged 27 points, 6.6 assists, 6.4 rebounds, 1 steal, and 0.4 blocks in 5 games en route to losing to the Miami Heat for Lebron's first title.
Quote:
MVP, triple doubles, DPOY, First Teams...they're all irrelevant IMO. The only things that matter are playoffs stats and finals MVP. Sleepwalk thru the regular season. Be good in the playoffs. That's what counts.
After Durant bolted to Golden State Westbrook never had a championship caliber team. He got them to the playoffs in the west for five straight seasons though. Career playoff numbers of 24.6, 7.9, 7.1, and 1.8 steals. In 2017 he averaged 37.4 points, 11.6 rebounds, 10.8 assists, and 2.4 steals in the playoffs.
Cleveland was never a championship caliber team. They definitely are not right now. Yet Lebron got them a ring. It's easy to blame the team/others for your own ineptitude. Westbrick, at his peak, was a good player at best. Not a great player. Good players get playoff wins. Great players get championships. _________________ LeGoat! LeMazing! LeGend!
After Durant bolted to Golden State Westbrook never had a championship caliber team. He got them to the playoffs in the west for five straight seasons though. Career playoff numbers of 24.6, 7.9, 7.1, and 1.8 steals. In 2017 he averaged 37.4 points, 11.6 rebounds, 10.8 assists, and 2.4 steals in the playoffs.
Okay, if we're going to kick around stats, let's paint the full picture. His career shooting percentage in the playoffs is .408, with .296 on threes. His career TS% in the payoffs is .508. In 2017, when he averaged 37.4 points per game, he took 30.4 shots per game and shot .388/.265. Westbrook averaged 14 FTAs per game, which salvaged his numbers. He also averaged 6.0 turnovers. OKC lost in five.
As I've said elsewhere, Westbrook is a floor-raiser. But we don't need him to raise our floor. We need him to be a different kind of player than what he is known for. We need him to be efficient and to exploit the openings created by all of the defensive attention on Lebron and Davis. We don't need him to chew up possessions or to fill up the stat sheet.
I think we can get there, but we're going to have some ugly times in the short run. Thankfully, we have a cupcake schedule coming up. But let's not kid ourselves about what we got in Westbrook. This is a project, not a plug-in. _________________ Internet Argument Resolved
Cleveland was never a championship caliber team. They definitely are not right now. Yet Lebron got them a ring. It's easy to blame the team/others for your own ineptitude. Westbrick, at his peak, was a good player at best. Not a great player. Good players get playoff wins. Great players get championships.
There's a difference between the Jordans, Shaqs, Kobes, Duncans, Lebrons, and Durants vs. everyone else. But even those guys don't win titles without a cast. There's a reason Lebron bolted to Miami, and Kobe demanded a trade to Pluto. Difference between the 2006 and 2008 Lakers is that the young players matured, and the talent improved. It wasn't that Kobe became a better player. He was given a better supporting cast which was capable of winning a title, where the 2006 and 2007 teams lacked the supporting cast.
In 2017, when he averaged 37.4 points per game, he took 30.4 shots per game and shot .388/.265. Westbrook averaged 14 FTAs per game, which salvaged his numbers.
Do you know who his supporting cast was on that team?
A young Victor Oladipo was the second best player and averaged 15.9/4.3/2.6 in the regular season... But only the 10.8 points on 34.4% shooting in the playoffs. That was his #2. That would be like if Lebron's #2 was Kendrick Nunn.
The next best players were Steven Adams (11.3/7.7/1 in regular season and 8/6.8/1.8 in the playoffs), an aging Taj Gibson (9.8, 3.6) and Andre Roberson (11.6, 6.2).
They lost that series to a Rockets team that with Harden, Eric Gordon, Ariza, Beverly, Lou Williams, Ryan Andersion, Trez, and Clint Capela.
In 2017, when he averaged 37.4 points per game, he took 30.4 shots per game and shot .388/.265. Westbrook averaged 14 FTAs per game, which salvaged his numbers.
Do you know who his supporting cast was on that team?
A young Victor Oladipo was the second best player and averaged 15.9/4.3/2.6 in the regular season... But only the 10.8 points on 34.4% shooting in the playoffs. That was his #2. That would be like if Lebron's #2 was Kendrick Nunn.
The next best players were Steven Adams (11.3/7.7/1 in regular season and 8/6.8/1.8 in the playoffs), an aging Taj Gibson (9.8, 3.6) and Andre Roberson (11.6, 6.2).
They lost that series to a Rockets team that with Harden, Eric Gordon, Ariza, Beverly, Lou Williams, Ryan Andersion, Trez, and Clint Capela.
Is this going to be the standard, one-size-fits-all excuse? If you are going to hold up that series as an example of how Westbrook excels in the playoffs (which is what you did), you can't turn around and say that the reason he sucked was his teammates.
You're also getting into the message board cliche of crapping on the teammates of whichever player you want to build up, while exaggerating the strength of the other team (Montrezl Harrell barely played for the Rockets in the playoffs, and Ryan Anderson was in a steep decline). Back in the day, I can remember hearing all about how great Lebron's teammates were in Cleveland (say, around '09) and how weak Kobe's teammates were. That sort of argument is a message board chestnut that never persuades anyone who isn't already a believer. In this case, it really doesn't explain why Westbrook shot .388 from the field. _________________ Internet Argument Resolved
Is this going to be the standard, one-size-fits-all excuse? If you are going to hold up that series as an example of how Westbrook excels in the playoffs (which is what you did), you can't turn around and say that the reason he sucked was his teammates.
No I was defending him against the guy who can't make a post without referring to him as "Westbrick". Nobody expected those Thunder teams to go anyplace. The only interesting thing about those teams were that Westbrook was putting up crazy numbers, but none of those teams won more than 49 games. They were good enough to make it into the playoffs but they weren't contenders.
On the players on those two teams, I just told you the OKC players stats. The #3 scorer on that team was Kanter who didn't play in the playoffs. The #2 scorer was a young Oladipo (at just under 16 points per game) who was awful in the playoffs. The rosters:
Your point about field goal percentage does have merit though. Maybe not on that team but on some of the other teams. Westbrook excels in the open court, before defenses are set where he can force the issue and take advantage of his athleticism. In the playoffs the pace tends to slow down, there's more half court sets and his efficiency drops significantly. And due to his lack of shooting he isn't a great off ball option.
His game has some serious holes. There's no debating that. But it's also not fair for people to judge him by not winning titles when the only year you could really make the argument that they had the talent to pull it off was 2012, but Harden was awful in the finals and the Heat were hungry after losing to Dallas the year before.
No I was defending him against the guy who can't make a post without referring to him as "Westbrick". Nobody expected those Thunder teams to go anyplace. The only interesting thing about those teams were that Westbrook was putting up crazy numbers, but none of those teams won more than 49 games. They were good enough to make it into the playoffs but they weren't contenders.
Well, sure, I’ve commented on the constant juvenile references to “Westbrick.” Back in the day, we had to endure the KoMe crowd. There are probably others that I’ve managed to forget.
But my earlier point remains: We don’t need the floor-raising version of Westbrook. We don’t need the guy who puts up crazy numbers with low efficiency. We need a retooled version of Westbrook. What he did in the post-Durant era is not what we need. _________________ Internet Argument Resolved
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