Prediction number one: The Lakers will start the season 10-0
This current rendition of the Lakers features a wide range of players who all have a point to prove next season, after what happened to them last season.
- LeBron James suffered the longest injury of his career and he missed the playoffs for the first time since 2005.
- Anthony Davis tried to force a trade to the Lakers, but he was unsuccessful. The aftermath was ugly. His teammates openly hated him and he was put on a strict minute’s restriction. In the end AD only played 1,850 overall minutes last year, his lowest total since his rookie year.
- Kyle Kuzma suffered the indignity of being put on the trade block and he trudged through a sophomore slump.
- DeMarcus Cousins played in only 30 out-of-shape regular season games, because he was rehabbing his torn Achilles. Then, after he finally started to round into form for the playoffs, he tore his quad during the second game of the first round.
- JaVale McGee went from a dark horse Defensive Player of the Year candidate to losing his starting job to Ivica Zubac. Then after Zubac was traded to the Clippers, Luke Walton pulled him out of the rotation all together for close to a month.
- Troy Daniels only played a total of 760 minutes for the lowly Phoenix Suns.
- Last season the playoff bound Clippers tossed Avery Bradley into the trashcan known as Memphis, where he finished the season watching the Grizzlies tank roll from battle to battle.
Besides the fact that most of the players on the Purple and Gold are highly motivated, the other reason to think the Lakers will blast off next season is because every player’s role will be clearly defined before the first game starts.
Last year Luke Walton and LeBron James had to let Brandon Ingram get his reps on the court, and they had to give Lonzo Ball his opportunities to run the show as well, but next season LeBron’s going to be fully in charge. In fact, every Lakers opponent already knows what the Lakers are going to do next year on offense; run LeBron and AD pick and rolls while every other player spreads the floor. It doesn’t matter, nobody will be able to stop the Lakers on offense during 2019.
Next season’s schedule won’t be released until later this summer, so nobody knows what teams the Lakers will play during the first ten games of the season. Who cares.
This roster features eight new players who don’t know each other. That also doesn’t matter, because Frank Vogel will have them ready on defense and LeBron and Anthony Davis will run things on offense.
It safer to predict the Lakers will start off 8-2 or 7-3, but this group is going to come out with a giant chip on their collective shoulders, thus they are going to start the season by manhandling the first ten squads they meet.