Los Angeles Lakers: Be careful of buying in on Playoff Rondo

Rajon Rondo had a good game in the Los Angeles Lakers Game 2 win over the Houston Rockets.

After a terrible return showing that contributed to the Los Angeles Lakers losing Game 1 of the Western Conference Semifinals, Rajon Rondo seemingly righted the ship in the Game 2 victory. As some are touting: beware of Playoff Rondo.

Rondo played 29 minutes off the bench, scoring 10 points with nine assists, three rebounds and five steals. He played better defense than he did in Game 1 and led all Lakers with a +28 plus/minus.

This was a fantastic game from Rondo and it is hard to refute. It was made even better by the fact that Rondo’s minutes did not eat into Alex Caruso’s. Caruso has been the best perimeter defender on the Lakers in the NBA Playoffs.

While this is promising, we do advise from buying in on Playoff Rondo on the Los Angeles Lakers.

This was probably the absolute peak of what Rondo can contribute to the Los Angeles Lakers in the playoffs and as we know, role players do not contribute at their best in every single game. Just look at how bad he was in Game 1. It is unfair to expect more Game 2 performances while ignoring the Game 1 performance.

We discuss all this and more on the latest episode of the Lake Show Life Podcast.

If you are a listener of the show then you know we are both pretty high on Alex Caruso, and as a result, are kind of low on Rajon Rondo. Other talking points include:

Purple and Gold Players update:

Every series we pick our “Purple and Gold Players” to watch. The gold players are Laker role players that must thrive for the Lakers to win. The purple players are Rocket role players that the Lakers must limit from succeeding to succeed themselves.

Alex Caruso had a positive impact on the defensive end of the court while Kyle Kuzma was wildly efficient. Robert Covington played good defense and was okay offensively, while the Lakers capitalized on Jeff Green quite easily.

Preview of Game 3

We previewed Game 3 between the Los Angeles Lakers and Houston Rockets, highlighting how important the game is for the sake of momentum and how a loss for the Rockets could take them out of the series.

NBA Playoff roundup

We recap the rest of the NBA Playoffs, including who the Los Angeles Lakers might face in the NBA Finals if they can get past both the Houston Rockets and (most likely) Los Angeles Clippers.

As always, if you enjoyed the podcast be sure to subscribe/follow us wherever you get your podcasts and reviews are always appreciated. Go Lakers!