Los Angeles Lakers: Analyzing the pick-and-roll defense vs. Orlando Magic

Did the Los Angeles Lakers improve defensively against the Orlando Magic?

The Dallas and Orlando scrimmages were night and day (literally and figuratively). The late Los Angeles Lakers announcer Chick Hearn would say it best: “Dallas can put this one in the refrigerator. The door’s closed, the lights are out, the eggs are cooling, the butter’s getting hard and the Jell-O is jiggling! And Orlando could not throw a grape into the ocean!”

This was all because of the Lakers’ defense! Their defense was awesome at first! Their effort and attention to detail were far superior this time around! Dallas had easy looks; Orlando had to move the ball around several times just to get a contested look.

Mavs legend Boban Marjanović hit a wide-open three! Orlando’s only noteworthy three-pointer was when Terrence Ross hit a half-court shot a second too late.

The Lakers’ defense enveloped Orlando in the first half. Orlando shot 11-50 (22%) and 2-22 (9%) from three in the first half. Kyle Kuzma made twice as many threes (4) as Orlando had total (2) in the first half.

The only reason why Orlando was not down 30 at the half was that they shot 23-27 from the free-throw line. This can be attributed to the Lakers being a tad too enthusiastic when contesting shots.

The Lakers did let go of the rope defensively in the second half. Give credit to Orlando. They crashed the glass a lot more to get lots of second-chance points and pushed the ball more aggressively to generate fast break points.

I am not overly concerned. The Lakers can clean up their defensive rebounding and transition defense, but how did they defend their previous bugaboo: the pick-and-roll?

How did the Los Angeles Lakers defend the pick-and-roll this time?

I expounded upon why Dallas picked apart the Lakers’ defense on the pick-and-roll (Luka is just that good, but the Lakers made mistakes). The effort improved greatly against Orlando. I saw very tangible improvements in how the Lakers pressured the ball. Special shout-out to J.R. Smith and Dion Waiters for committing to pressure the ball.

It takes a lot of hard work to play great on-ball defense. The Lakers did a much better job playing help defense too. They wisely rotated off Orlando’s least-threatening shooters to cut off the drive.

But the Lakers did make several adjustments.

Did We See a Glimpse of the Lakers New Pick-and-Roll Coverage?

“Terrific help defense by the Los Angeles Lakers. Not giving up anything easy in the paint area.” – said Orlando Magic color commentator Jeff Turner around the 3-minute mark in the first quarter.

On that play, Danny Green took a charge on the player rolling to the basket – and drew an offensive foul! The Lakers did something different on that play: Javale McGee jumped out to defend the ball-handler as the on-ball defender was going over the top.

The roll man was left open temporarily, but Danny Green wisely slid off his man to help on the roll. Green correctly predicted he would need to guard the roll man and he can afford to leave his man open.

That possession was the exact opposite of their standard pick-and-roll coverage. It looked like a defense engineered by Lakers’ assistant coach Jason Kidd, noted for implementing a hyper-aggressive defensive in Milwaukee. Kidd would have the big men (McGee in this case) jump out to either hedge or outright trap the ball-handler.

Should they change to Kidd’s Scheme?

No. Lakers Head Coach Frank Vogel’s drop back scheme works better for this team. Kidd’s trapping scheme works better with personnel who can guard multiple positions. The Lakers’ personnel is more traditional.

The drawbacks of Kidd’s scheme is far worse than Vogel’s: Kidd’s scheme either gives up an open layup or three, whereas Vogel’s would concede a pull-up jumper. Javale McGee and Dwight Howard are elite at protecting the paint… and not so elite guarding ball-handlers 25 feet away.

Keep them in the paint.

Conclusion:

The Lakers were not as sharp in the second half. I am not surprised Orlando came back to make it a ball game. After all, it is a scrimmage. But in the grand scheme of things the Lakers looked much better on defense. Their pick-and-roll defense improved from the first game, even if the Lakers went from facing the #1 offense to the fourth lowest-scoring team in the NBA.

On to the Washington Wizards on Monday!