There is a lot of talk around NBA teams and the work they have done till now in the offseason with the trades and how teams have improved on their roster from last season. Many experts believe that the Los Angeles Lakers should finish in a similar position like last season. However NBA analyst Brian Windhorst feels that there will be some improvement as he feels that the Lakers will sneak in the play-ins.
The Purple and Gold army has done very little work to improve on their roster after a massively disappointing last season where they did not even make it to the postseason. So the criticisms are very much on point. The changes that they have made are mere youngsters who will be replacing veterans so it will be interesting to see how those deals turn out to be. The youngsters hardly have any playoffs experience and it won’t be easy for them going into the next season. One would like to believe that with Anthony Davis and LeBron James in the roster the Lakers will look to win the NBA Championship but their offseason deals have not given that impression for sure.
The Lakers finished 11th last season in the Western Conference with a 33-49 record and were massive underperformers of the previous season. With Anthony Davis’ injury and Russell Westbrook’s dip in form, the Lakers only had LeBron James all by himself.
Recently ESPN shared their prediction of the Western Conference and it did not look great for the Lakers. ESPN predicted that the Lakers will finish ninth with a record of 42-40. Windhorst shared how having them finish as a play-in team is very generous considering their offseason activity to improve the roster from last season.
“I think that is kind of generous,” Windhorst said. “That’s believing that the Lakers are gonna get a mostly healthy season from Anthony Davis and LeBron James. The supporting cast they have assembled is really kind of haphazard. … They’re really gonna need LeBron and AD to carry them to a bunch of wins in a Western Conference that is gonna be highly, highly competitive.”
The Lakers depend a lot on Russell Westbrook’s trade and only after that we may see a few changes on their roster. But once again the Westbrook trade rumours have died down majorly as no team wants that huge contract. So the Lakers will once again go into a new season expecting Anthony Davis to hold it together and the entire season will be dependent on LeBron James and how he turns out in the upcoming season.
