The Los Angeles Lakers have had numerous discussions about what their lineup would look like once the NBA regular season got underway. During the preseason, head coach Darvin Ham has used a few different ones so that everyone could get some playing time with each other and build up chemistry.
The Lakers have used a different lineup every preseason game thus far. That is something head coach Darvin Ham has done on purpose as he looks for the right combinations.
“It’s different combinations of seeing different guys play together,” Ham said. “You have to prepare yourself. You got to get out in front of the fact that there’s going to be injuries. We don’t want them to happen. We don’t want them to happen to any of our guys, let alone our main guys. You just have to prepare yourself and be at the forefront of that by plugging in different lineups, different players and different positions so that when that day comes, you feel a little bit more prepared.”
Los Angeles is set to play their final preseason game tonight against the Sacramento Kings and another lineup change will be occurring. This is a big one as the Lakers are going to bring former MVP, Russell Westbrook, off the bench. Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN provided the update.
Having Westbrook as the leader of the second unit makes a lot of sense given the construction of the roster. Coming off the bench he would have the ball in his hands more, which is what he needs to succeed. In the starting lineup, LeBron James is the lead ball handler, even if he isn’t the starting point guard. As a result of that, Westbrook struggles to find his fit.
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He isn’t a strong off-the-ball player as he struggles with shooting jump shots. That made it easy for opponents to play defense against the Lakers as they would pack the paint and dare Los Angeles to shoot jumpers.
Coming off the bench is something Westbrook hasn’t done in a regular season game since November 28th, 2008 in his rookie season. It was something that he didn’t seem very open to earlier in the offseason, but his tone has changed in recent weeks after having some conversations with the coaching staff.
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Given how poorly things went last season, coming off the bench is likely best for Westbrook this season. The Lakers can put the ball in his hands and let him run the show, something that would not occur in the starting lineup alongside James and Anthony Davis.
If the results aren’t there that the team is hoping for, it would be much less detrimental having it occur playing with the second unit than with the starting five.
