Los Angeles Lakers: Examining Zach LaVine’s potential fit with the team

Cons of Zach LaVine on the Los Angeles Lakers:

1. He is an awful defender

For all his offensive firepower, Zach LaVine is not considered a superstar for two reasons.

1. He has never led a team to a winning record.
2. His defense is horrendously, horrendously bad.

Firstly, let’s look at LaVine’s advanced defensive statistics for the 2019-20 season.

• Defensive rating: 110
• Defensive box-score plus-minus: -0.8
• Defensive win-shares: 2.2

While these numbers certainly bad, these all actually represent the best defensive numbers of LaVine’s career and aren’t quite as putrid as I was expecting.

To paint a more complete picture of LaVine’s impact on team defense, let’s look at the Chicago Bulls’ team +/- with LaVine on and off the court.

• On-court (34.8 mpg): -3.2 ppg.
• Off-court (16.1 mpg): -0.1 ppg.

You’d expect the team to struggle without their best offensive player, yet the Bulls have actually been better in the limited minutes that LaVine has spent on the bench.

Looking at the advanced on/off-court statistics, the Bulls have the following offensive and defensive ratings with and without LaVine.

• On-court: Offensive rating of 106.8, Defensive rating of 111.2
• Off-court: Offensive rating of101.1, Defensive rating of101.2

As expected, LaVine has a significant impact on the offensive end, but the Bulls are significantly better on the defensive end when he sits. However, the Bulls are a unique situation, because the three major recipients of court-time when LaVine sits (Tomas Satoransky, Kris Dunn and Shaquille Harrison) all happen to profile as anywhere ranging from above-average to elite defensive players.

So, would Zach LaVine’s presence on the Los Angeles Lakers be addition by subtraction, courtesy of his bad defense?

According to BBall index player profiles, LaVine is actually above average when it comes to his real adjusted turnover rate (67th percentile), passing lane defense (67th percentile), defensive miles per 75 possessions (76th percentile), deflections per 75 possessions (55th percentile), steals per 75 possessions (77th percentile), and three-point contests per 75 possessions (53rd percentile).

However, he’s a poor defensive rebounder for someone with his athletic profile, is towards the bottom of the league at deterring shots (10th percentile from the perimeter, 20th percentile at the rim), and doesn’t hustle for loose balls (18th percentile for loose ball recovery rate).

The result: a Defensive Player Impact +/-  of -2.6, leaving LaVine in the 1st percentile of the entire league. Other defensive metrics aren’t as harsh, with RAPTOR placing him in the 29th percentile league-wide and Defensive RPM placing him in the 40th percentile, but no matter how you look at it, LaVine is a bad defender.

If the Lakers were to make a deal for LaVine, especially one that involves trading away one of their best defensive wings in Danny Green, they need to find ways to mitigate the horrible defense.

2. He may be a two-year rental

The other con to a trade to acquire Zach LaVine is the likelihood that he’s a two-year rental.

According to Spotrac, his contract pays him $19.5 million per year, through to the 2021-22 season. That means he’ll be entering unrestricted free agency at the tender age of 27.

LaVine is worth the risk on the surface due to his youth and offensive fit, but if he continues to produce strong numbers, it’s almost certain that he’ll try and command a max contract. Could he one day be a max-level player? Sure. He’s still very young and his athletic profile shows a lot of room for improvement on the defensive end of the ball. Is he even close to a max-level player right now though? Absolutely not.

Assuming LaVine continues to struggle on the defensive end and assuming the Lakers are subsequently smart enough to not make him a max-player, that begs the question: is LaVine worth a two-year rental if there are no championships won during that span?

While the Lakers are unlikely to have a high pick over that period, any deal for LaVine almost certainly involves trading away a first-round pick at a minimum and would likely involve adding an additional pick as compensation.

Coupled with an aging LeBron (almost 38 years old at the start of the 2022-23 season), a LaVine trade could leave the Lakers struggling to surround Anthony Davis (assuming he re-signs) with young talent, short of striking gold in free agency.

Is Zach LaVine worth risking trading for? Or do the negatives outweigh the positives? I personally think that it’s worth exploring a deal, provided that the compensation isn’t too steep in terms of draft picks included.

Provided that the Los Angeles Lakers continue to have all-world rim protection, I believe that the incredible offensive fit outweighs the horrible defense. Plus who knows, being a third-option on offense for the first time in years could allow LaVine to expend more energy on the defensive end.

Agree or disagree? Regardless, please leave your thoughts in the comments section below.