Los Angeles Lakers: 3 takeaways from first 23 games of season

How have the Los Angeles Lakers fared through the first 23 games of the 2018-19 season?

December is here and we are just over three weeks away from the heavily anticipated Christmas Day matchup between the Los Angeles Lakers and Golden State Warriors.

It seems just as good a time as any to dissect how the Lakers have looked so far. It can be summed up in one short statement: good, not great. I’ll go in detail about this shortly but first, let’s quickly take a look at how far we’ve come in the last few years.

As of right now, through the first 23 games, the Lakers have a 14-9 record which is good for 5th in the Western Conference. The last time the Lakers had a winning record through the first 23 games of the season, Lebron James was on the Miami Heat still searching for his first NBA title. Luke Walton was still playing on the Lakers. Drake had just released his platinum album Take Care, and Lonzo Ball hadn’t even started high school yet.

With that being said, it’s great to have a winning record again. I want it to last and I think some things need to be addressed for that to happen. This is the things I think need to be addressed immediately.

This is the most painful issue for me to talk about because I spent all summer preparing for a breakout year for the Slender Man, Brandon Ingram. I thought this was going to be the year we remembered Ingram going from “has potential” to “we have a superstar.” That hasn’t really panned out.

Ingram is the first player and takeaway that we will take a look at from the first 23 games.