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JaVale McGee was the center last year for the Los Angeles Lakers

Seems simple enough, JaVale McGee was the starting center last year. For about 10 games into the season last year, McGee was the early favorite for NBA’s Most Improved Player award. It seemed that he was the only one in the starting lineup that was interested in playing consistent defense.

When he sat down before Tyson Chandler signed, opposing teams had layup lines going to the basket.

Sure, JaVale McGee was benched by Luke Walton in favor of Ivica Zubac until the trade deadline. But let’s take a close look at a couple of reasons why it happened.

The first reason was because JaVale caught pneumonia at the turn of 2019. That illness had him in the hospital for about a week. Looking back, he made a huge mistake playing in the Charlotte Hornets game with what was believed was flu-like symptoms at the time.

By the time McGee returned to the lineup, his condition was not up to par (Hello! we’re talking pneumonia here!) and the perimeter mistakes McGee was covering up was not a luxury anymore.

Then there was that Luke Walton thing. See JaVale got a little tired of being posterized because of bad defense by teammates.

https://twitter.com/NBA/status/1111110832962879494

After Donovan Mitchell kept catching JaVale on the same high pick and roll play, McGee called out Walton’s defensive schemes. After the media took his quotes to Walton, McGee saw the pine.

After Zubac was traded, McGee returned to the starting lineup and finished the season strong. When the Lakers shut down Brandon Ingram, Kyle Kuzma and LeBron James, McGee anchored the young players and dominated the opposing big men.

Then there was the Brooklyn game.

JaVale scored a career-high with 33 points and 20 rebounds (12 on the offensive end). He also rim protected well enough to block six shots. He joined Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Shaquille O’Neal as the only Lakers centers to have that type of stat line.