LOS ANGELES — The Lakers aren’t just in a slump.
They’re on a journey of discovering who they are, what the team’s DNA is and their own identity.
When Lakers Coach JJ Redick described the Detroit Pistons before his team’s blowout loss to the visitors on Tuesday, he used the word “physicality” and spoke about how hard the Pistons play as a team – characteristics of the type of opponents the Lakers have struggled against.
Those sentiments not only wouldn’t be used to describe the Lakers, who’ve lost four of their last five games entering Friday’s home game against the Memphis Grizzlies, but also brought into question what the Lakers’ identity is.
“Still trying to figure that out,” Redick said. “And I know that’s maybe a cop out, and probably is, but I do know that we have had a lot of stops and starts. We’ve really tried to play the right way every night and have the right intent. The flow of lineups and rotations and all that has been challenging for everybody, not just the coaches. It’s a challenge for the players. And building an identity is difficult.
“I think that’s hard to figure out with this team right now.”
When a similar question was posed to star forward LeBron James, he pointed to the team’s injuries as a roadblock to establishing an identity.
Austin Reaves (left calf strain), Rui Hachimura (right calf soreness) and Gabe Vincent (lumbar back strain) are sidelined.
The team announced on Wednesday that rookie forward Adou Thiero will be sidelined for at least four weeks because of an MCL sprain in his right knee.
“We haven’t had a full team all year,” he said. “We got some very important guys out right now. And obviously, I started the year being out. And having our All-Star 2-guard out, and Rui’s now out. And Gabe’s been out for a minute. Jaxson [Hayes] just came back, there’s been a lot of in and out.
“So that’s very hard to get a rhythm of chemistry on the floor with guys that you know you’re gonna play with every night. Guys you know are going to come in with the subs and patterns and things like that. But still no excuse.”
With Reaves expected to be sidelined until at least late January and Hachimura out for a week, the Lakers (20-11) will have to make progress toward finding their identity without two key players, including a player in Reaves who’s been playing at an All-Star level.
“I feel like with each team, you never truly find your full identity until like, honestly, like game 70,” Hayes said. “It takes all year to do that. Especially, we’ve played two games with our full rotation, so it’s hard to find our team identity when we’re not playing everyone and we’re switching the lineups each game. We just got to keep playing hard and just doing what we got to do.”
At the root of the Lakers’ struggles has been a defense that ranked No. 29 across the league in December.
They were also No. 29 in fastbreak points allowed (18.3) and No. 28 in opponent points off turnovers (20.3).
“We just got to get better on that side of the floor,” James said.
GRIZZLIES AT LAKERS
When: Friday, 7:30 p.m.
Where: Crypto.com Arena
TV/Radio: Spectrum SportsNet/710 AM