Important third scorer
Once again, the Los Angeles Lakers take a long hard look at themselves this off-season.
Taking a long hard look at yourself is so much easier when you have just won a championship which the Los Angeles Lakers most certainly did.
It would be remarkably easy for the Lakers to pay the players who were on the team last season and just run things back.
That would be the easy option. Just because it’s the easy option doesn’t make it the right one.
While the purple and gold won the championship last season, you can’t gloss over the areas that they most certainly need to improve upon.
For better or for worse, the Los Angeles Lakers were poor at scoring the ball outside of the likes of Anthony Davis and LeBron James.
Going into the season, a lot was expected of numerous role players on the Lakers roster.
Kyle Kuzma was expected to be a 6th man of the year candidate who would average close to 20PPG.
That didn’t happen.
Danny Green was expected to be the Lakers’ 3-point assassin who would be a good scoring boost to the Lakers’ starting lineup.
That didn’t happen.
DeMarcus Cousins was expected to be the Lakers center who would come in and do what he does and get buckets.
Unfortunately, a season-ending injury stopped that from happening.
While a decent amount of players showed up and made themselves known in the playoffs most notably KCP, on a single game to game basis, the consistency all season just wasn’t there on the Lakers for a 3rd scorer.
If the season is to begin this early, the Lakers will need someone to take on the scoring load for when LeBron or Anthony Davis simply are just coasting because they need rest.
With Schröder on the team, the offensive workload is lightened.
Schröder’s 18.9PPG last season would be more than welcome on this Lakers roster.
They still might require additional consistent scoring early on in the season if LeBron and AD are to work their way back into fitness but it will be a huge help.