Are The Lakers Going To Finish With One Of The 5 Worst Records?
It seems clear that Lakers’ fans are, for the most part, united in their desire that the Lakers lose enough games to finish with one of the 5 worst records in the NBA, increasing their chances of keeping their top 5 pick in the upcoming draft.
However, the rarely in-touch with reality Byron Scott was recently quoted as saying that he believes that it is 50/50 between fans who are pro vs. anti tank. Nonsense. There is no way that there is an even split among fans on this issue.
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This is because there is simply no logical argument for wanting the Lakers to win. It has been said that management would much rather build towards a culture of winning instead of making moves that would have increased the likelihood of keeping their pick.
But, that makes very little sense given that almost the entire team are going to be free agents this summer and that the Lakers are likely to bring in a couple of new players. So what exactly would be the point of building towards a culture of winning?
Despite Lakers fans almost unanimously hoping that the Lakers would trade some of their veteran players for basically whatever they could get at the deadline, and then buying out the vets that couldn’t be traded, neither of these things happened despite both making a lot of sense.
I mean, honestly, does it make any sense to have Carlos Boozer, Wayne Ellington, Wesley Johnson, Jeremy Lin, Jordan Hill etc. on this team right now? Wouldn’t it make more sense to bring up some D-League players and give them a shot to prove their worth for the remainder of this lost season?
So while last week might have been an outlier, most fans were certainly concerned when the Lakers won three out of four games, none of those wins were against world beaters, but they certainly weren’t chopped liver either.
Now, some order has been restored because soon after winning three games, the Lakers promptly lost three in a row. And they play the Memphis Grizzlies and Dallas Mavericks in their next two games, so that streak could easily stretch to 5.
The recent losing streak aside, I think an argument can be made that, although this Lakers’ roster is clearly bad, keeping the above mentioned veterans players is not helping the tanking cause.
This begs the question: Given the Lakers remaining schedule, should fans be concerned about the Lakers not finishing with one of the 5 worst records at the end of the season?
Probably not. The most likely scenario for this to happen would be the Denver Nuggets or Orlando Magic finishing with a worse record than the Lakers.
Although the Nuggets play in the Western Conference, and have been terrible as of late, the firing of their head coach Brian Shaw, should give Lakers fans some optimism. Fair or not, the Nuggets players clearly turned on Shaw this season and so his dismissal will likely result in better play from them. In fact, they have won two games in a row since Shaw was shown the door. Furthermore, the Nuggets simply have the talent that should keep them from finishing with a worse record than the Lakers.
The Magic certainly have a better chance of finishing worse than the Lakers but because they have some talent and play in the Eastern Conference it probably won’t happen. Plus, the Magic have lost some games lately that they absolutely should have won, so its not like they are getting blown out on the regular.
Other than the Magic and Nuggets, Lakers fans should also keep an eye on the Minnesota Timberwolves. They have finally gotten healthier with the return of Ricky Rubio and Kevin Martin, and don’t underestimate the emotional lift and leadership that Kevin Garnett brings in his return to the team that drafted him. Ultimately, the Wolves will probably finish with a worse record, given that they play in the Western Conference, have a brutal upcoming schedule, and currently have three less wins than the Lakers.
So, in the end, it seems LIKELY that the Lakers will finish with the 4th or 5th worst record by the end of the season, putting their fate in the hands of the ping pong ball Gods. But by not making any moves to increase this likelihood (i.e., trading/cutting veteran players) , the Lakers will keep their fans sweating it out until the bitter end of this season.
And I guess that is par for the course for this storied franchise, as the Lakers always seem to find a way to keep things interesting.