The Los Angeles Lakers are heading in the wrong direction in the Western Conference standings. They lost again on Wednesday night, this time to the Miami Heat, 112-98 as things have been a struggle without NBA star Anthony Davis in the lineup.
Since being ruled out with his foot injury, the Lakers have played seven games, losing five of them. On the season they are 3-7 without him, which is going to make the next few weeks very difficult to navigate. LeBron James continues to play at a high level but it is all for naught as the team is finding no success.
Against one of his former teams on Wednesday, James scored 27 points, going an efficient 10-of-18 from the field with two 3-pointers and a perfect 5-for-5 from the charity stripe. He added nine rebounds and six assists but it wasn’t enough to get the Lakers over the hump against a Heat team beginning to turn a corner.
The Lakers are certainly hopeful that they can turn a corner sooner than later, but the chances of that occurring, especially with Davis out of the lineup, are slim to none. James was not bashful when asked about how he will motivate himself mentally to continue his playing career and that winning is the key.
“I’m a winner, and I want to win,” James said. “And I want to win and give myself a chance to win and still compete for championships. That has always been my passion. That has always been my goal since I entered the league as an 18-year-old kid out of Akron, Ohio.
“And I know it takes steps to get there, but once you get there and know how to get there, playing basketball at this level just to be playing basketball is not in my DNA. It’s not in my DNA anymore. So we’ll see what happens and see how fresh my mind stays over the next couple years.”
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Part of the blame for being on a losing team has to fall on James. He signed an extension with the Lakers knowing the condition of the roster as they were bad last season and looked even worse heading into the 2022-23 campaign. In that regard, some of this is his fault, but the organization may not be holding up its end of the bargain either.
Rob Pelinka said that he would do what was necessary to get a winner around James again, but thus far, he has not held up his end of the bargain. He has been hesitant to include the two future first-round picks the Lakers have at their disposal in trade packages as the players currently available may not help push them toward becoming a contender.
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Sooner or later, he is going to have to make a move as this team is going nowhere. With their first-round picks owed elsewhere, Los Angeles won’t even have the benefit of a high draft pick should they continue sliding down the standings.
