Caruso isn’t a good shooter.
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Hes not, he shot 27% for us in the playoffs in 2020 when we won in the bubble, he’s a great perimeter defender tho 
This is also a statement that’s annoying to me. Go watch the playoffs in 2020, ya know who was on the floor for us in big minutes next to Lebron? Rondo…who is also a ball dominant player that offers very little spacing because historically he’s not a good shooter. Russ is Rondo on steroids so imo once they figure out how to play together we will be fine.
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Rondo shot 40% from 3 in that playoffs bro. Leave Rondo and he was punishing teams for giving him that space. So far Russ hasn’t been able to punish teams for baiting the shot.
During that playoff run, Lakers had KCP and Danny Green who had to be guarded on the perimeter. With Westbrook they don’t tend to guard him and teams are successfully baiting him into taking the open shot.
Rondo was our best 3 point shooter in the bubble by far. Green and Caruso were shooting bricks. Our 3 point shooting overall was mediocre at best, it’s not why we won the championship. Once again Melo and Bazemore are shooting over 40% from 3 this year, Monk is at 39% we have plenty of floor spacing, our shooting has improved from 2 years ago. My whole point is that if we win or lose its not going to be because of the whole floor spacing debate.
On a micro level if you really want to get into a conversation about why we lost last night, it’s because OKC switched to a zone defense in the 2nd half and we never adjusted. In the first half we had our way inside scoring dunks and lobs at will against their man defense. The team as a unit is still very new they are going to have to learn to play against that.
I’m not saying that’s why Lakers won the chip. Green may have been shooting bricks but teams had to guard him. Caruso was likely playing 20 minutes a night, mostly on the second unit. His defence made up for any such shortcomings when it came to his shot.
Westbrook is starting for the Lakers alongside DeAndre Jordan, and is playing around 35 minutes a night. He’s not a good defender either.
The composition of that Lakers-5 isn’t conducive with winning Basketball. If the Lakers separate Westbrook’s and Lebron’s minutes, it will serve the team better in the long term imho.
Monk and Baze have essentially replaced KCP and Caruso, they are playing the same roles getting comparable minutes. Both of the new guys are hitting 3s better than their predecessors. So how you make the leap from they had to defend Green and Caruso, to they don’t have to defend Monk and Baze…doesnt make much sense to me.
Westbrook is one of the better on ball defenders in the league as far as metrics are concerned, right now our issues are as a collective unit not one player. We are getting killed on the high screen roll. Jacob Poertl scored a career high against us the other night and looked like prime Tim Duncan, that’s a team effort thing.
And you’ll never convince me of this because the Lakers were the number one seed in the West just a year ago and won the chip as well with a comparable team. We had no good 3 point shooting or floor spacing. We won by defending well and getting out in transition. We are able to do that because we had a good rebounding guards (Rondo/LeBron I know he’s a forward but he handles the ball). It’s exactly what we did last night in the first half to the tune of 72 points in 24 minutes. What’s lacking is the defense and effort.
I’m mainly talking about your starting 5 and I’m comparing it to the starting 5 that won the chip.
I didn’t say you had to guard Caruso either. Read again what I said in relations to Caruso’s minutes and why his shortcomings weren’t that huge. I haven’t directly referred to Monk or Baze in my post either. I’m talking about Westbrook’s minutes mainly.
I wouldn’t mind seeing those metrics 
That I don’t doubt.
You aren’t making an apples to apples comparison tho, that’s the issue. Our starting 5 in 2020 was Bradley, KCP, Bron, AD, Javelle Mcgee. The guys who were finishing games were completely different. But let’s focus on the starting 5 for now. Avery Bradley was our starting PG, he’s not a floor spacing player. Mcgee and Dwight both played heavy minutes in the regular season. Not floor spacing players. KCP was the one shooter that usually started for us, exactly like Bazemore is doing now. Largely the lineup is the same.
Now onto what we had in the playoffs. Bradley refused to go to the bubble, so our rotation was basically Rondo and Caruso at the 1/2, Green and KCP at the 2/3, Bron was playing a small 4 and AD as a small 5. That was for the playoffs only that we played mostly without a 5, and that’s because you don’t want AD logging heavy minutes as a 5 in the regular season because he’s injury prone and it takes a physical toll.
So we still have Rondo, who’s a similar player to Russ anyways. Then you’ve got like for like with Monk, Baze, and Melo for Kuz. The team that got the #1 seed is largely the same, in fact I’d say upgraded offensively. The real issue is that KCP and Caruso are both plus defenders. Monk isn’t there yet. Baze is a good defender, our shortcomings are defensive. Floor spacing doesn’t matter at all, unless you are trying to play like Mike Dantoni who never won shit 
Westbrook might be a decent on ball defender when he puts his mind to it, but I will say lots of the times I think he gets very careless in team defence schemes @BigWeng_4LYFE .
I have concerns about how well LeBron and Westbrook will mesh together but it’s still early days.
I’ll also agree with you that you didn’t win a ring in 2020 due to spacing and you were a relatively poor shooting team at that point. The defence was elite though.
I’m starting to think or be it he’s still a star and I love him as a player, is LeBron can be the same dominant player as he was 2 years ago ? He’s 37 in December and starting to suffer injuries more than he ever has.
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Agree Aussie. Those are the big questions to be answered. If Bron is Bron, and we start playing defense, he and AD will be in the finals and can win the chip. Russ is going to have to try and fit in somewhere. In the history of big 3s someone usually ends up taking a back seat and playing a role. In Miami it was Bosh, we’ll see what niche Russ can fit into. As I’ve stated before Russ and Rondo are very similar players and they made it work in the bubble to win it all.
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Steph Curry and Ja Morant are so fun to watch, delighted we get another 5 minutes here.
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The Bulls Knicks game was great.
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Knicks did their best to bottle it at the death.
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Yeah. Bull lack of paint defense cost them but they’ll work on it.
Harden has complained and now Trae is complaining. What are peoples thoughts on the NBA’s version of ‘let the game flow’?
Question time.
A. Does Kyrie give into the Tyranny and get vaccinated ?
B. Does the mandate ease ?
C. Does he get traded ?
D. Does he retire ?
C…nearer to the trade deadline. The Nets have already shown they are willing to play the season without Kyrie.
But who trades for him knowing that he is also in his last year of his deal at the end of the season, won’t be able to play games in certain places and is also an injury worry?
True. Completely forgot about his contract situation next year.
I’ll go with B…sits out the whole season, but the vaccine mandate is eased.
EDIT: Raptors-Magic. Less than 2 minutes on the clock and the Magic go on an 11-0 run. There’s a 1 point deficit with 33 seconds left. Raptors have the ball but miss…Magic rebound and Cole Anthony pushes the ball….TIMEOUT. 
Do you really want to go up against a set Raptors defence for your last possession?
Dame has started the season about 34 % from the field and 25 % from 3 through the first 6 games, absolutely mindboggling shit.
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