Los Angeles Lakers: 6 Lessons in preseason loss to Brooklyn

Here are six lessons for the Los Angeles Lakers in their loss to the Brooklyn Nets.

The Los Angeles Lakers brought a ton of drama to the NBA last year with the Anthony Davis trade, Luke Walton‘s job status, roster construction and Magic Johnson‘s shocking resignation. Well this time, the Lakers was on the outside watching the drama unfold as there were questions on if this game would even be played after the now infamous Daryl Morey tweet that was read around the basketball world.

Despite cancellations of numerous NBA Cares events which were goodwill efforts from the Brooklyn Nets and the Lakers, the questions were finally answered that kept many in the dark about the future of the weekend matchups between the two teams. The frustrations on both sides started to mount as ESPN’s Rachel Nichols eloquently describes here.

With all of this going on, the question going on all week from players on both sides to fans were the same. Was there actually going to be a game to be played? That question was reported Wednesday evening by The Athletic’s Shams Charania.

What you probably heard after that announcement was a collective sigh of relief and frantic button pushing of alarm clocks for a 4:30 am start on the West Coast. But that didn’t end the drama, there was another important question to be answered.

Was the game going to be televised so NBA fans in America could actually see it? With meetings behind the scenes that only few will ever know about, the game was televised and Lakers fans in America got to see it. Not without a few “conditions”.

A few hours before the game started those conditions were announced. There would be no media availability of any kind for either team. That was probably the aftermath of the players concerns of being put in a position to ask questions that they were not ready or willing to ask for.  What showed that tensions haven’t subsided was NBA commissioner Adam Silver’s pregame news conference getting canceled.

With the canceling of two NBA Cares events, an NBA 2K League logo unveiling and a fan appreciation event in the days leading up to the game, just getting the product on the floor is enough for now.

The Los Angeles Lakers, fresh off beating the 5-time Western Conference champion, Golden State Warriors like a drum on Saturday night, lost to the Brooklyn Nets 114-111. The game was tight at the end, but one blown defensive assignment and a Kentavious Caldwell-Pope missed potential tying 3-pointer sealed the loss.

This game had its fair share of questions during the game that was confusing for the Lakers as well. Whether it was the long flight over to China or the distractions on the days when the team was there, the Lakers did not have the same energy displayed in the first preseason game. Turnovers, missed perimeter defensive assignments (More on that later!) and the Nets competing on the boards, hurt the Lakers chances of winning a game that they should have won.

Frank Vogel continued to play with his brand new chemistry set, rolling out the starting lineup of Rajon Rondo, Kentavious Caldwell-Pope and Dwight Howard to play with the dynamic duo of LeBron James and Anthony Davis. Avery Bradley, Danny Green and JaVale McGee, who set the tone on the defensive end started on the bench and it brought mixed results.

While using these exhibition games to experiment with this group makes sense, it should be noted that this lineup lacked the defensive force than the previous one that the Golden State Warriors struggled with in the first game of the preseason.

There are no guarantees that the Nets and Lakers will play on Saturday, hopefully they will considering that there was a capacity crowd in Mercedez-Benz Arena and the Nets owner, Joe Tsai will want to see his recently bought billion dollar team on stage once again.

But for now, let’s talk Lake Show Life Lessons.