Los Angeles Lakers: Grading each starter after 1 month of play
By Jason Elbaum
Coming off of a hard-fought 115-109 loss to the Philadelphia 76ers, the Los Angeles Lakers are through about one month of their season and have a record of 6-9. Let’s critique what we’ve seen from the Lakers’ starting five thus far.
The Los Angeles Lakers entered the 2017-18 NBA season with wide eyes as they trotted their young core out for another 82 games. This year’s edition of the Lakers received more young additions in the form of point guard Lonzo Ball out of UCLA and forward Kyle Kuzma out of Utah, who were both selected by the Lakers in the first round of this year’s NBA Draft.
With what should be an epic NBA offseason this upcoming summer, where superstars like LeBron James, DeMarcus Cousins and Chris Paul are expected to hit the market, the Lakers find themselves in position to attract one of these players to L.A. with their young talent and flexible salary situation.
It is definitely exciting to think about the possibilities of the future, but for now, Laker fans have had the opportunity to enjoy a quality of basketball that they frankly have not seen since Kobe Bryant dropped 60 in his final game.
The team is truly sharing the basketball, as evidenced by the fact that they have seven different players averaging double-digit scoring. If they tighten it up on the defensive end, a playoff run is not out of the question. Let’s give some grades to the players who have started for the Lakers this year.