Los Angeles Lakers: 3 Lessons learned against Trail Blazers

Lesson Number one… Rajon Rondo played extremely well…Lonzo Ball?…well… 

Rajon Rondo won this game for the Los Angeles Lakers. Period. Point blank. Rondo scored 17 points, led the team in rebounds with ten and dished out six assists. Rondo shot an outstanding 8-10 from the field with a three pointer. Right now believe it or not, Rondo is your leading three-point shooter percentage wise on the team.

Yep…Rajon Rondo.

There is a reason why Rondo played so very well in this game. He was aggressive. I mean really aggressive. In every single highlight you see Rondo taking the ball to the basket. Layups. Floaters. The breaking down of the defense. He had it all. What’s more, he set up his teammates because after he started scoring, the Blazers had to start paying attention to him. He set up JaVale McGee, Ivica Zubac and Josh Hart. He even found time to talk trash to a couple of ladies on the floor…

To see Rondo acting like this shows me one thing…Swagger! Look in the corner of the screen. It says the fourth quarter doesn’t it? It shows that Rondo has the confidence that it takes to close out these games. Everybody wonders who starts the games. It doesn’t matter. It matters who plays in crunch time when the game is close.

As for Lonzo Ball…

Take a look folks. A Lonzo Ball highlight. Embrace it, enjoy it, that’s the last thing anyone remembers of Lonzo for the rest of the night.

Lonzo Ball was a triple threat…to his own team. He scored three points, grabbed three rebounds and dished out three assists. He was not aggressive and to be clear, he did not play well.

I did a piece a few days ago about these two…

Los Angeles Lakers: What needs to be done with Lonzo Ball, Rajon Rondo!

Rajon Rondo made his return for the Los Angeles Lakers on Saturday. With the return of Rajon leaves questions of what Lonzo's minutes should be!

This article was based on the fact that Lonzo Ball played hard and was aggressive. Since Rondo has returned, the player that I thought was ready to take the keys to the Lakers franchise has taken about three steps backward.

The fact that Ball as already admitted to not bringing the energy every night and not being engaged is a red flag here! The fact that he is not ready to go every night makes things worse with the already present substitution problems with Luke Walton.

A few more games like this and the questions of who should start will arise again.