Los Angeles Lakers: 5 Lessons on Talen Horton-Tucker night vs Clippers

Kentavious Caldwell-Pope will be starting and not Dennis Schroder!

Yes, you heard it here first. Sure Dennis Schroder wants to start, but so what? Before some reader has some “intelligent” comment, let’s look at the facts, shall we?

• KCP was the starter last year. Even when he was stinking up the Staples Center.
• The Los Angeles Lakers just resigned him to a three year $40 million extension.
• He played great in the NBA Finals. (He scored 15, 16 and 17 points in crucial Finals wins!)
• He shoots better from the 3 point line than Schroder for his career. 

We could do Klutch Sports theory too, but let’s just move on to this game. Kentavious Caldwell-Pope continued his hot shooting from the NBA Finals dropping 16 points (5-8 shooting, 4 shots from behind the line!), and filling up the box score with 5 rebounds, 3 assists and 3 steals in 24 minutes. He only had one turnover.

KCP is going to have a party cutting backdoor to the basket catching Gasol’s passes. They connected numerous times in the first half. In other words, the offense ran much better with Schroder out of the lineup comparing these past two games.

To anyone that thinks Schroder’s play from last year is enough to warrant minutes, or any Laker not named LeBron James or Anthony Davis for that matter is waiting for playing time, just read the caption and then listen to the coach.

Talen Horton-Tucker may have changed the game.

The man is not lying.

The Lakers have a few days off until Wednesday when they travel to Phoenix to play two games against the Phoenix Suns featuring LeBron’s old buddy, the newly acquired Chris Paul. Lake Show Life will be on top of it with complete coverage. Keep it locked.