Aloha

Rob has indicated that he would like to bring back as many guys as possible and that makes sense. He understands that we can not create reasonable cap space without gutting the team. Internal improvements is the biggest path to winning.

I think all of our young guys need to continue to grow. There are 4 I believe will be back for sure. Austin and Rui both had growth spurts last year. They both will need to continue that growth. Vando at 4.8 is a no brazier but he will need to get more consistent on offense. And lastly can Max break into the rotation? The team and the league are high on him and so am I. I have seen two different redrafts where he broke into the 1st round. I like his defense. Yes he made 19 year old rookie mistakes that hopefully he is correcting but he was generally locked in and he shot 41% from 3 which is a bonus. As important as those two areas are, is that he showed no fear. I saw him plays some g league games and he was always the best player in the game.

Another means of improvement will be trades. I suspect DLO will either be traded or will be back. I don’t see a better player that we could sign in free agency with our cap situation. He much to good of a trade asset to let walk for nothing.

Malik, Bamba and Harrison have a combined 30 mil in tradable contracts. Plus we have two tradable firsts. I believe that will be where we can find help. I’m sure trade talks are going on now. This years draft could tell us what we are going to do with the others. Malik could have real value. He didn’t play well for us but he has had a solid career and he could be of interest to a team like the Hornets who are desperate for shooting.

By the way, this will be a good draft for us. If you look at the mock drafts after the first 8 players, it seems there are wild swings. For instance I saw Jet Howard coming to us at 17 and I saw him going at 30. I’ve seen Lively go at 12, also to us at 17 and at 23. So there will be good players available.

One other interesting note, there will now be 3 two way contracts available. Maybe we can find another Alex or Austin with one of those.

For me the great thing about this year is the amount of options that we have. That hasn’t happened in a long time.

Aloha,

DLO has had a terrible series. If he had even so so games we might be still in this thing. I don’t know what has happened to his confidence but it isn’t there.

But the flip side is, we would not have made it this far without him. He averaged 17 and 6 assists in 30 minutes and shot 41% from 3 after the trade. We would not have even made the play in without him.

While he was somewhat inconsistent in the two previous series, he was instrumental in 7 of the 8 wins. We only won one without a good game from him. So yes, he has been terrible in this series but without his contributions we wouldn’t even be here.

Aloha,

10 seconds in the quarter. Let’s dribble it down LeBron and take a 3! You ARE NOT hitting your 3’s LeBron. Geez.

Aloha,

If one were to believe everything being written about this series, you would believe that the Lakers have been terrible and they have no chance. While there are plenty of reasons to be concerned, the Nuggets should be a little concerned as well.

Game one the Joker had a game for the ages. One of the best playoff performances I have ever seen. And Murray chipped in with 31 points himself. Yet they barely hung on to win at home.

The next game it took Murray going crazy in the 4th in a game they were out played for 3 quarters to pull out. Again at home. Considering that both AD and LeBron played poorly, this should be of concern for the Nuggets as well.

The Nuggets are by far better than our previous opponents but we were only 2 and 4 on the road coming into this series. While I don’t know if we can get by the Nuggets I’m not ready to say it’s over either. While the Nuggets pose challenges that our first two series didn’t we pose challenges for the Nuggets as well.

First the Nuggets have no rim protection. They have been vulnerable defensively all year to teams that attack the rim. This is what the Lakers do. We are one of the best teams at attacking the rim.

Our defense showed up in the 2nd half of game one and has been there ever since. They have not faced a team with a rim protector like AD. With his mobility he is much more of a challenge than Gorbet was.

I think a problem for the Lakers have been fatigue. Focus is a casualty of fatigue and we have lost 2 games do to losing focus. One can say both teams played the same amount of games but there are big differences. The Lakers have been in the playoffs since the trade deadline. While the Nuggets wrapped things up early and started resting guys in March. They lost 7 of their last 9 and one of the wins came when their bench beat the Kings bench. We had to fight like hell to get into the play in.

I think we need to play LeBron and AD less than the 40 minutes they have been playing, especially LeBron. Rui has been sensational. He played 28 and 30 minutes so far. To me it doesn’t matter if he starts or comes off the bench but give him 5 of lebron’s minutes. He’s young, play him 35 minutes at least.

Giving AD more rest is trickier but I think it can be done. Even if it means bringing in Thompson for a few minutes here and there. I’m not sure if Bamba is ready yet. If he is he could help here. I am not a big Bamba supporter and he would get slaughtered by the Joker. But if you put him in a deep drop while Rui or LeBron bang on the Joker he could roam like we have had AD doing at times. Again we are talking only a few minutes here.

In the end we need to just do a little better. LeBron doesn’t need to be great, just good. DLO doesn’t need to explode, just put up 17 or so like he’s done multiple times in the playoffs. Dennis needs to be a little more aggressive attacking the rim. AD doesn’t need 40. 28 to 30 is enough if a few guys are adding a few more points.

I will not be surprised if the Nuggets win it all. But I’m not counting the Lakers out yet. We have taken both games down to the wire and we haven’t even played that well yet. The Nuggets are not a good defensive team. If we play smarter on offense and our defense holds up, we can get back into this series.

Aloha,

This was a game we should have won. Yes LeBron played great defense but my goodness. 3 missed layups and a fumbled ball on a dunk. And he started the 4th taking three 3 pointers in 4 possessions. Missed them all. And to top it off, one last turnover.

It does say a lot about Rui and Austin on a night where LeBron and Davis couldn’t hit a shot that those 2 guys kept us in the game.

I thought we should have put Vando back in the 4th. He did a great job when he was on Murray.

Well we have 2 at home. We need to be better for 48 minutes.

Aloha,

Before the game if you had told me that the Warriors would have 20 offensive rebounds, take 28 more shot and we would miss 11 free throws to boot, I would have said it sounds like a blow out. And it was. We simply blew out the Warriors.

As it has been in these playoffs it was all about defense. And as usual it starts and ends with AD. There just isn’t another center in the league that can show on the perimeter and still drop back to protect the rim. This allows our perimeter defenders to get into Steph, Klay everyone really. We just made it uncomfortable for their shooters and they never found a rhythm. And if they ventured into the paint there was AD. Yes he blocks shots, yes he alters shots. But if there was a stat for a player that is so intimidating that the opponent doesn’t even attempt the shot, AD would be an all time leader.

I don’t know if anyone was disappointed that AD only scored 17, but I wasn’t because he was responsible for a lot more than that. The Warriors entire game plan was to prevent AD from scoring by consistently crowding him. But guess what that does? It allows LeBron to play one on one and boy did he.

Everyone had been wondering if we ever would see vintage playoff LeBron again. He had been good but not great. But this game was huge. We probably lose the series if it had gone back to SF. So LeBron put his head down and drove to the basket. And drove and drove and drove. He proved that you still can’t play him one on one. It also has been a while since we have seen him run like this. We have not needed this version of LeBron much in the playoffs. Good LeBron had been enough. We still might have won with good LeBron. But beast mode LeBron turned the game into a rout.

As for our role players they all stepped up again. The talk is always about finding the Lakers a third star. But we may have one in Austin. I can’t recall seeing a player develop this quickly over the course of a season. But Austin with his two way play and his seamless fit with LeBron and AD might be on the way to 3rd star status. And if he doesn’t quite get there. The combination of him and DLO in the back court is much better than any one player we could land.

I also like Dennis and defense until he got stupid. I know know it must be tempting to rub it in with a big mouth like Dray but you just have to be smarter than that.

We also got good minutes from Rui and Vando. I expect both to have bigger roles against the Nuggets because of their size.

Now comes the big test. The Grizzlies had some injuries and had not been good down the stretch. Even though they were the 2nd seed they had not looked like it for a while. The Warriors season was similar to ours with a lot of injuries and missing players. While they were the defending champions they had not looked the part all year. The Nuggets have been good all year.

They will present a lot of challenges but we present challenges for them as well. If we can get past the Nuggets. With the Bucks gone, no one in the East scares me.

Wow. Who would have thought…

Aloha,

I believe home court is more important in basketball than any other sport. In this series you can feel the home crowd feeding energy to the players. We have managed to win twice in the playoffs on the road. Both 1st games when we were pumped coming out to start the series. We have not matched the home court energy in our 4 losses. Fortunately no one has matched our energy at home with the exception of game 4 against the Warriors. We need to continue to feed off that energy, especially in the first quarter. We can’t allow the Warriors to find a groove early.

Aloha,

Well that was ugly. I didn’t believe we would win this game. The Warriors are great at home and their backs were against the wall. It was the way we lost that was disturbing. You just can not be out hustled in a close out game and expect to win. And you can’t be this sloppy and expect to win. While we would have stretches where we played well, those stretches we bookend by unforgivable play.

We opened the game sloppy and ended the first half sloppy. Each team had the same amount of turnovers yet it seems all of ours resulted in an uncontested fast break scores. I think the game was lost there. We just were not getting back on defense.

Even with the poor play, we were still within striking distance when AD got clocked in the head. The good news is that it wasn’t a concussion and he will play Friday.

I don’t think we can win again in SF, so we have to come out Friday and play with the same energy that the Warriors played with yesterday. If we cut down on the hustle points I think we can win this game. One of the big head scratchers of this season is how poorly the Warriors have played on the road. But this isn’t an immature team with their backs to the wall like the Grizzlies. The Warriors are champions for a reason and will continue to to play hard. When you look back at this game we were not out talented. The reasons we lost are correctable. We just need to match that energy and cut down on our unforced turnovers. Energy, not talent will decide this series.

Aloha,

Sometimes the fans are right and the coach is wrong. With every missed 3 from Beasley the voices of the fans calling for Lonnie grew louder. Yet it wasn’t until game 3 that the coaching staff listened. And it’s a good thing they did because Lonnie may have saved the series in game 4.

We have seen this Lonnie before on multiple occasions. Then he had those back to back injuries and disappeared from the rotation. I’m still mystified by that.

While the scoring is what everyone is talking about, I thought his defense was exceptional as well. He was in Klay’s shirt the entire 4th quarter and Klay only managed one make. I am hoping we can figure out a way to keep the kid. He’s only 24. But with each performance like this one, it becomes less likely we will be able to afford him.

Everyone likes to talk about Lebron’s age. But you rarely hear anything about Steph’s age. He is 35 and he was clearly gassed down the stretch.

Speaking of LeBron, the Lakers went to point guard LeBron in the 4th. And it turned the tide. While the Warriors had success with their tiny line up, that left LeBron on tiny guards and while he might be old, he’s still the strongest man on the court and the Warriors had no answer.

Lebrons defense has also been impressive. He has not defended like this for 2 years.

Welcome back Austin. It was great seeing him score again. He hasn’t been effective the last few games and even in this game he got off to a slow start. But he found his groove again and I’m hoping that carries over to the next game.

AD only had 4 points in the 2nd half. But unlike some of his other games, that wasn’t his fault. For some reason the Lakers ran nothing for him. They were not even looking for him. If the Warriors go tiny again, the Lakers must feed AD more. Fortunately unlike game 2, it didn’t affect his rebounding and defense. They pulled him out in pick and roll and he was unable to defend the paint as much as usual but the flip side was the Warriors were not getting many clean looks from 3 either. AD’s defensive stand against Curry late in the game was epic. There is no other center in the league that can guard Curry straight up.

I love the depth of this team supporting LeBron and AD. One game it maybe DLO having a big game, the next it might be Austin, or Dennis or Rui or last night, Lonnie. That has happened this entire playoff run. And we are still learning how to play together. We have a collective 3rd scorer which is great because the opponent never knows where that scoring is going to come from.

This game was more like I had expected. The biggest surprise for me in this series was the 2 blow outs. We maybe up 3 – 1 but it’s going to be a challenge to win this series. Even though they lost Kerr found a way to minimize AD’s rim protection through pick and roll. I’m sure that he will roll with it in game 5. And I can say with confidence that the Warriors will not shoot 29% at home from 3. I will be interested in seeing what adjustments Coach Ham makes. He has responded each time all through the playoffs. Hopefully he will have the answer in game 5. As hard as it was to win yesterday, game 5 will be even harder on the Warriors home court.

Aloha,

The Dubs blew us out in game 2 so it was only fair that we returned the favor. I was surprised when the Warriors blew us out and frankly I was surprised that we did the same. But it was clear why it happened.

It always begins and ends with AD. We rarely lose when he dominates the game. AD had commented that the last game, he just missed shots he normally makes. And that is true. As a matter of fact he only made 2 more baskets than the game before. But he aggressively attacked the rim and went 11 for 12 from the line. He was 1 for 1 the game before. The Warriors are small and they have no answer for AD when he attacks.

And we saw it on the defensive end as well. The Warriors got off to a good start when AD was staying in his deep drops. Once he began to come up and show on the guards, the game turned around. The one thing that AD can do that most bigs can’t is show on a guard and still drop back and protect the rim. His 4 blocks hardly tell the story. He altered so many more than that and discouraged others from even attempting the shot. If AD can bring this every game the series is over.

LeBron is LeBron again for the 2nd game in a row. There just seems to be more spring in his step and he was super efficient in choosing his spots. I also loved that he only took 4 threes, canning 2. He scored 21 but he didn’t need to score more. And his 8 assists were as important than the points. We have seen LeBron bring it on offense all year but what has impressed me more has been his defense. He has been intense on that side of the ball, rarely taking a play off. He had been our weak link on defense this year. If he defends like this, we are in good shape.

I had commented earlier if we didn’t get good guard play, it didn’t matter how many points AD scored. Well we got good guard play. You could say that it was our guards that opened things up for AD and Lebron. DLO torched them in the first half. I think this opened everything up. And it wasn’t just DLO. Dennis was 3 for 6 from 3 and Lonnie was 2 for 4. We won the 3 point battle 15 to 13 but more importantly on 13 less attempts. 47% from 3 will get it done. And that opened everything up inside. We can’t constantly out shoot the Warriors from 3. But if we can continue to hit a decent percentage the Warriors can’t beat us.

Let’s give coach Ham his flowers. Three big adjustments turned the tide. I already mentioned AD coming out from his deep drops but just as important was putting Vando on Draymond and having AD guard the other Green. The Warriors run everything through Dray and we disrupted their offensive flow. What made this work was our guards defended their butts off. I’m not surprised when Dennis and Austin do it but DLO looked like a defensive stopper last night.

The last move That Coach Ham made was something everyone here had been asking for. He inserted Lonnie into the rotation. I believe I could even hear Buba shouting with joy all the way here in Hawaii. That really changed the offensive dynamic. Now the Dubs had another scorer to worry about on the perimeter. Lonnie was 2 for 4 from 3 but he is much more than that. He is a 3 level scorer with a mid range and he can get to the rim. His reverse layup was a thing of beauty. We know he can score but he also played large on the defensive side of the ball. Not only was he able to hang with the Dubs guards but he had 2 steals and a block as well. I’m hoping that this is the rotation for the rest of the series.

We all know we will have to win on the defensive end. We can’t consistently out gun the Warriors. We also need very good games from LeBron and AD. But we have a real luxury knowing that on any given night we can get big offensive games from DLO, Austin, Dennis, Rui and Lonnie. We don’t need them to all go off but knowing any one of them can, puts more pressure on a Warriors team that isn’t a great defensive team.

Monday is another big game. Like with Memphis, I don’t want to be forced to win another game up north. The Warriors don’t lose many home games. We just need to take care of our home court.