other team being historically good and best player injured = cop out? ok. didn't seem to be a huge issue as they mopped the floor with the other playoff teams. no. healthy boston was beating anyone that year. you think you have to have the best team on paper to win the title? actually rarely happens! cool. if we can get wembanyama, let's go after that. we have luka. denver almost beat okc last year with jokic/murray as the top dogs. because top 40-ish guys are basically unobtainable with our assets after luka/reaves. reaves is a top-40 player in the league (looked higher than that before the the injuries this year). having a top 5, and two more guys in the top-40 just isn't super easy to pull off. anyway, that response was to whoever said we need to understand that a reaves max could become a terrible contract. well...any large contract can become a terrible contract. this is a useless argument unless you're simply against signing anyone but luka/jokic/sga/giannis/wemby to a max. and again, reaves's max isn't those guys's max! because--as is being beaten into the ground--he hasn't been all nba, etc., he's going to be paid like 10 million less than say, trae young. the highest reaves can start at is 41.5 million next year. 35th in the league. same as mpj, brandon ingram, lamelo ball, etc. 10 million less than deaaron fox. if you think 41.5 is too high for him, then you're saying you think you can trade him for someone who IS worth their contract (perhaps plus other things) or that you can make better use of that salary slot in FA. i think both are simply not true.
I believe Murray had one field goal in the 2nd half, credit to the coaching staff for that strategy to make everyone else beat us.
We saw some gimmick defensive plays last season that got us a bunch of wins, they needed a mix of effort and novelty. I'm still pretty sure we can't be a consistently good defensive team with this roster.
yeah, we have to scratch out wins where we can like this, then hope when reaves gets back we can outscore most teams. barring a trade of course.
Sometimes desperation creates creativity. With the bodies at his disposal on this roster, it requires some out of the box thinking to get the requisite effort ESPECIALLY on defense. Glad he's found something that we can go to for now and eek out two wins from it. The zone, bigs + 1 guard lineups, and Timme Time has been some inspired coaching.
JJ you f***ed up man Stop anchoring Luka to that unit with Gabe/Haye/Vando - terrible lineup which is getting blown apart by team. And use your god damn timeouts. For once I'd like to see a Laker coach out duel Lue