Los Angeles Lakers rotations and silver linings after the melee

We discuss the fallout for the Los Angeles Lakers from the brawl with the Houston Rockets on Saturday night.

After the 124-115 loss to the Houston Rockets in LeBron James’ home debut with the Los Angeles Lakers, Lance Stephenson reflected on the scrum that marred the game.

Stephenson offered some words, saying, “I felt like the other team was trying to provoke us. I think they were picking on . That’s why I tried to grab him as quickly as possible and tell him, ‘Hey, don’t fall for the trick.’ I guess we fell for it.”

I’m not going to fall for it. Plenty of ink has been and will continue to be spilled about the fight that broke out and ended in the ejection of Rajon Rondo, Brandon Ingram, and Chris Paul. I don’t intend to add to it, other than to note that the whole thing was stupid, especially coming from two of the oldest guys on the floor.

Ain’t nobody got time for that, and Twitter contained all the best reactions anyway.

WHERE WAS STATE FARM ?!
— vince (@vincestaples) October 21, 2018

What concerns me is where the Lakers will go from here. They will be missing two players from the five that have started the first two games of the season.

Ingram is, by all accounts, our second best player after LeBron, and he will be suspended for the next four games for his part in that mess. Rondo will miss three games, which is less than I expected when I heard the league may be taking his history into account when deciding his suspension.

These losses severely limit Luke Walton’s rotational possibilities and will make the difficult schedule to open the season even more perilous.

There are a couple of silver linings here, though. First, it will force Walton’s hand in starting Lonzo Ball, who has been coming off the bench in relief of Rondo so far.

I know Rondo has a legendary basketball IQ and reads the game better than anyone on the team not named LeBron, but Lonzo is supposed to be the future of the franchise and proved last season that he deserves the chance to help steer the ship.

On top of that, he looked good against Houston, shooting 4-for-8 from three, 5-for-10 overall, with six rebounds and four assists in 26 minutes. He looked much more confident than he did last season and pulled up for open shots decisively and with a more compact shooting motion than we have been used to seeing.

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I know Rondo plays the wily veteran better than most, but in virtually every other area, Lonzo is the superior player. Hopefully, this will allow him to grab the starting spot and keep it.

Both Kyle Kuzma and Josh Hart should pick up more minutes with the upcoming suspensions, and that may be good for us long-term as well. I truly believe Josh Hart should be starting in place of Kentavious Caldwell-Pope, and the absence of Rondo and Ingram should free up lots of time for him to prove that he deserves a starting role.

As for Kuzma, every extra chance to get him on the court is a good one. His upside is ridiculous, and the more time he gets, the quicker he will make that climb.

The fact that Kuzma has been our only back-up 5 so far makes him filling in for Ingram more difficult, and I can only hope the Lakers brass will take this opportunity to seriously consider bringing in a more appropriate player to fill that role.

The lack of two starters also means that we will undoubtedly be seeing more from guys like Michael Beasley and Ivica Zubac, both of whom have been limited, at best, in their preseason appearances and neither of whom inspires much confidence. In any case, we will need to fill out our twelve-man roster to get through the next few games, and that should be an interesting if precarious proposition.

Overall, I’m frustrated by this whole scenario, but I still took a number of positives from the game. For one, the team played with more pride, at least up until the fight broke out, and we looked more solid all around.

Our outside shooting was much improved, and we got decent production from most of our key players. The defensive rotations are still weeks away from being ironed out, but it was generally a stronger defensive performance from the team.

The biggest problem was the fact that we were playing a better team with superior talent, and that they had James Harden and we didn’t. While LeBron didn’t have his best game ever, I fully expect him to have plenty in the tank to ramp up the energy when it counts and keep us contending throughout the season.

The Rockets were one game away from the NBA Finals last year, and with a slightly cleaner performance, the Lakers could have knocked them off. Los Angeles came up short this time, but I’m confident we’re on the right path to make it tougher on them next time. At least once the full squad is available again.