Lakers News: Scott Wants Nick Young To Improve Defensively
After a successful first year in Los Angeles, many expected Nick Young to play a pivotal role for the purple and gold this past season. Young was coming off one of his best seasons, thriving under Mike D’Antoni’s uptempo offense. The former USC guard, posted career highs in both points and assists with 17.9 and 1.5 respectively.
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Along with being the Lakers’ leading scorer, Young’s off court personality helped the fans deal with enduring one of the worst season’s in franchise history. His humor and alter ego “Swaggy P” kept the season entertaining and lively for the fans.
However, Young had a hard time connecting with the old school mentality of new head coach Byron Scott. Scott, a “defensive specialist,” wanted his player’s to embrace a defense first mentality, while straying away from three point shot. Both of these traits are not exactly part of Young’s arsenal.
Byron Scott recently appeared on TWC Sportsnet to discuss the upcoming season. He said he recently talked to Young about what needs to improve next season.
"“Nick and I had conversations so it’s no secret what I’ve told him that he needs to do. If you want to look at one thing offensively you have to do, it’s move without the basketball. Learn to catch and shoot. Learn to take two, three dribbles. Pull-up and shoot. Two, three dribbles. Get to the basket. No more of this nine dribbles and everyone kinda watch, because that’s a home run or its a strikeout. You got to get better at moving without the basketball. That’s number one on offense.”"
Young struggled mightily trying to find his role in Scott’s Princeton offense. Before seeing his season end at the hands of a knee injury, Young managed just 13 points on a career worst 36 percent shooting.
Although he struggled, Young still led the Laker’s bench in scoring and showed flashes of why the Lakers gave him a three year contract. However, he sometimes would try to do too much, stalling the Laker offense and leading to off-balance prayer shots.
For everything that Young needs to fix on offense, Scott is much more concerned with his defense.
"“I said number two defensively. Nick is a pretty good defender when he has guys that challenge him. He takes the challenge. He’ll guard pretty much one-on-one, but when the ball is off that guy’s hands, he has to be a better help defender, a better weak-side defender. Those are just two areas him and I talked about, and we did that during the season in Phoenix. It’s no secret the things that I told him to do to improve on. I told him ‘If you don’t, it might be hard for me to put you out there.’"
The Laker are expected to be big players in free agency come July and there have been rumors that Young’s name is being shopped around. While its highly unlikely Young gets traded due to his poor play last season and the length of his contract, there is always a chance that Mitch and Scott find a player they feel will fill Young’s role more adequately.
Should Young remain on the roster come training camp, he will be given the opportunity to show he deserves a spot in the rotation. However, nobody can project what the Lakers roster will look like come October. For now, all Young can do is get in the gym and like the rest of us, see what moves the Lakers make this offseason.