From Above Article:
The Los Angeles Lakers had a terrible bench unit in 2024-25. From a pure production standpoint, the group has actually gotten worse in 2025-26. Luckily for JJ Redick, LeBron James and Austin Reaves offer the perfect solution to the second-unit woes in Los Angeles.
Last season, James was tasked with quarterbacking the bench players all by his lonesome. It led to a statistical outlier for the Lakers superstar which his critics would not shut up about.
LeBron’s season debut for Los Angeles suggested Redick may still be looking towards his aging superstar to help elevate some of the support pieces of the second unit. However, this time around, the Lakers head coach appeared tuned in to the fact that James needed more help.
Reaves spent a lot of time sharing the court with James during the latter’s first outing of the season. That should be the combo that is tasked with lifting up the bench when the time calls for those substitutions.
LeBron James and Austin Reaves are the duo Lakers need to rely on
If any of the Lakers’ three stars are going to be left alone with the backups, it will be Luka Doncic. The superstar point guard is playing at an MVP level and can certainly be asked to backpack an offense all by himself.
Otherwise, turning to James and Reaves as a duo is the right move. It may be a small sample size, but the pairing quickly showcased their chemistry in the strong 140-126 victory over the Utah Jazz on Tuesday.
James and Reaves shared the court for 26 minutes in the win, the second most of any two-man combination for the Lakers. The results were pretty good for Los Angeles, with the duo posting a positive net rating of 5.4 in their time together on the floor.
Having both available and mixing them in with second unit guys led to a solid 40-point performance from the bench. Granted, some of those came in garbage time when the Lakers had the game locked up.
Even so, the results were much better than what the Lakers showcased last season or earlier in this campaign.
In 2024-25, Los Angeles produced the second fewest points per game off the bench with a disappointing mark of 26.2. In 2025-26, they are dead last in the NBA with only 25.3 points per game from their second unit to this point.
Redick getting the opportunity to leave either Doncic or a combination of James and Reaves should help balance the Lakers out. The stars in Los Angeles already have the formula in place to lead a revival of their depth scoring.
the smarter prediction is that Smart will play his way into the starting lineup either in camp or early in the season. And comparing Jordan Goodwin to Marcus Smart in any possible way was an incredibly disrespectful and stupid take.
Goodwin was better than Smart in almost every relevant category last season. Shot better from 2 and 3, grabbed more rebounds, and only had .1 fewer steals in 2.3 fewer minutes. You must be looking at the same stat page for Rui because you trade good players for names on the regs dude. Smart is all about hoping he can recapture something likely lost to time and injury. Goodwin was (and will be for Phoenix) all about being hungry and getting better. We’ll see how each fares in their roles next season. My thinking informs me that we let the better player go for a name. Hope I’m wrong but it doesn’t happen often.
I don’t much care what somebody did 4 years ago. Smart needs to play in his role, which won’t be as a starter shooting volume threes, and do it better than Goodwin. That’s the simple challenge I’m presenting. I hope Marcus is better than he’s shown he can be since 2019. I don’t have much confidence he will be, but I’m hoping to be wrong.
For once we agree. It is a disrespectful comparison. Goodwin deserves a shot. Smart has been washed since Boston got rid of him.