Los Angeles Lakers: LeBron James passes Kobe Bryant in loss to Philadelphia 76ers, 4 lessons!
By Ronald Agers
Anthony Davis played a whale of a game. It’s a shame most of his teammates left him hanging on defense.
Anthony Davis is close to getting back in stride from his back injury. Well, at least the Lakers think so. They played him a team-high 39 minutes. AD put in the work in those minutes too.
Playing through the injuries that he is dealing with, Davis shot 13-of-22 from the field scoring 31 points grabbing seven rebounds, collecting two assists, two steals and a block. Look it’s no secret that anyone can throw lobs anywhere in the area code and he will catch it for a slam dunk.
https://twitter.com/Lakers/status/1221265255302488064
But what gets lost in this game was the outstanding defense he played throughout with his rotations. In the Boston game, that’s probably where he was most rusty based on his numerous mistakes in the paint. There were times throughout the game AD was contesting multiple shots on single possessions by the 76ers.
Sadly AD is just one defender and outside of Alex Caruso and KCP, the rest of the team did little defensively. Like this play right here. Watch how the Sixers drew AD from the paint with Tobias Harris while the rest of the defense parted like Red Sea for Ben Simmons to score with ease.
https://twitter.com/espn/status/1221280827755069440
Ben Simmons hit all of his shots in the paint. That would be 12 of them. When the Sixers eliminated the Dwight Howard dynamic by forcing him to the line to miss all of his free throws, they constantly drew AD out to perimeter so Simmons and Harris could do damage.
Pay special attention to LeBron James’ defense. He didn’t move an inch on his rotation. Kind of reminiscent of last year. That’s not all Lake Show Life saw.