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With the NBA Restart on the horizon, we are going to take stock of who is on the Los Angeles Lakers, what they did, or didn’t do this season, and what to look for as the Lakers look to march towards their 17th championship banner in the most unprecedented circumstances in NBA history.
Anthony Davis and LeBron James
The Los Angeles Lakers will be back on the court tonight and with that, we are wrapping up our NBA Restart Refresh by grouping the two best players on the Lakers together. While Anthony Davis is quick to dub LeBron as the leader of the team, everyone, including LeBron, knows that they would not be in the position they are without all they did to bring Davis to L.A. last summer. In almost every way, how far the Lakers go is intertwined with the play of their two stars.
Davis has been L.A.’s leading scorer the whole season and he has feasted on an abundance of dunks. According to research from HoopsHype’s Bryan Kalbrosky, LeBron and Davis have connected on 34 lobs this season, not to mention all the dunks Davis gets when he’s cutting to the basket while receiving a regular pass.
Davis has been the biggest reason why LeBron James leads the NBA in assists for the first time in his career, something that seemed clear as early as their first preseason game. Assists to Davis have accounted for 172 of LeBron’s 636 assists, meaning that Davis has accounted for over 27% of his assists this season.
Davis came into the season with a resume that rivaled any of LeBron’s running mates in terms of his combination of scoring volume and scoring efficiency and the duo has come to form the most feared duo in the NBA. But Davis’ efficiency isn’t the only story in how the two are intertwined.
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Davis deserves major credit for bringing a defensive mindset to the Lakers and particularly to LeBron himself. Over his last few years in Cleveland his first year in L.A., LeBron’s lack of effort on the defensive end was a constant criticism, but not so this year. LeBron’s defense has been more than satisfactory and he’s even had times where he’s looked like a downright stopper, as the 4th quarter of L.A.’s win against the Bucks back in March, where James stood tall in the challenge of guarding Giannis Antetokounmpo.
So far in the regular season, when Davis and James play at the highest level they can, nobody has been a true match for them. For them to win now that the season is restarted, they have to hope that the same remains true.
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