With an undefeated streak at home and a rough road trip immediately after, which version of the Lakers are the real ones?
It was the best of times and it was the worst of times. It was a three-game home winning streak, it was three losses in four games on the road, the beginning of a new coaching regime and more of the same.
Seven games into the season, the only consistency has been inconsistency in Los Angeles.
The Lakers had a picture-perfect start to their season. JJ Redick arrived in L.A. as the second coming of Pat Riley and he looked the part, talked the talk and got results early.
L.A. won its season opener, something it hadn’t done since 2016, beating a Minnesota Timberwolves team that finished last season in the Western Conference Finals.
They followed that performance up with two more wins, and suddenly, for perhaps the first time in sports history, the fans were right. It was truly all the coaches’ fault, and making that change led to more winning.
Well, a week later, that home stand is a distant memory and a road trip east has reminded fans that hope is the quintessential human delusion.
The Lakers were obliterated by the Cleveland Cavaliers, losing 134-110, but one can chalk that game up to the Cavs being an excellent team that has won their first five games.
A loss to the Pistons, a team that won just 14 games last year, is a different story. It was unserious basketball by the purple and gold on Monday night as they were outplayed in all aspects.
Being the third loss in four games, the first extended time away from Los Angeles showed a completely different Lakers squad than the one that went undefeated against all opponents inside Cyrpto.com Arena to start the year.
After the defeat, Anthony Davis didn’t mince words on the Jekyll and Hyde vibes coming from the Lakers.
“We’re just two different teams right now,” Davis said. “One game, we’re this team who showcases to be one of the better teams in the league. Then the next, we’re this team who, I don’t even know who we are. We just got to be better. It’s on the starters to start the game, obviously. But we just got to be better as players to come out and execute the game plan and do what we’re supposed to do on both ends of the floor.
“Some halves we get it, some halves we don’t. Some quarters we do, some quarters we don’t. We have to put a full 48 together. But we can’t continue to do this if we expect to do anything this season.”
Even in victories, we’ve seen the Lakers play ebb and flow dramatically. In their win against the Suns, they trailed by as many as 22 before coming back. Against the Raptors, they got the win, playing their best half of the season to start, but allowed Toronto to get back into the game with an awful third and fourth quarter.
If you think the Lakers are a play-in team, yet again, losses like the ones against the Pistons and Cavs are your evidence. If you think they are a contender in the West, then you use the victories versus the Timberwolves and Suns as proof. Both are compelling cases. The question is, what’s the final verdict?
This Jekyll and Hyde, hot and cold, up and down start should be expected. These are growing pains which AD himself acknowledged would be part of the process this summer.
Do you think progress is a straight line? A bar that just goes higher and higher as the dates pass? Wrong. Progress isn’t linear. It dips and dives and gradually, painfully, reaches its summit.
We are seven games into the season. The Lakers beat teams they were expected to lose to and lost in contests they should’ve won. These things happen.
Now, they aren’t a perfect team by any stretch of the imagination. The bench has been unable to score and are dead last in points per game at 18.9. This issue could be ongoing, especially if Max Christie proves he’s not ready for an increased workload.
However, we’ve seen more good than bad.
Redick has pulled out some great after-time-out plays that were run to perfection, Rui Hachimura has been a much better rebounder, and they are beginning with a starting lineup that had success last season and is currently leading the league in points, averaging 97.3 a game.
Photo by Juan Ocampo/NBAE via Getty Images
They’ve won four of seven, have utilized a system that maximizes AD and still have a guy in LeBron James who will eventually show up to these games.
They have an exciting prospect in Dalton Knecht and when Jarred Vanderbilt eventually returns, he’ll be able to clean up many of the Lakers’ defensive miscues. Add in Redick’s maniacal desire to be great and the team’s acceptance of that ideology and it’s not difficult to envision this team reaching its full potential.
So, if you are skeptical and want to sell your Lakers stock to me before the first full month of basketball is even played, I will happily buy it.
Yes, this team is flawed. They are relying on 30-plus-point performances from AD to secure wins and their transition defense, which LeBron called horrible last year, is bad once again.
These issues won’t be going away any time soon and might be things they’ll have to trade their way out of if, by December, they can’t be at least average at defense and find scoring from somewhere other than their superstar big.
Still, every team has blemishes, minus the one that dresses in green that hails from Boston.
Good things take time and asking fans for some patience is an exercise in futility. However, that is what’s needed to see this team get to where they want to go.
The evidence shows they are closer to that destination than these bumps they’ve taken in the Midwest might have you believe.
You can follow Edwin on Twitter at @ECreates88.