How the Los Angeles Lakers can help Kyle Kuzma reach another level

The need to be decisive

Being decisive takes confidence, sharpness, and perhaps most of all, the ability to know how to adapt quickly.

There’s not a direct stat for measuring the correlation between a player’s decisiveness and their success, but I don’t think I’m saying much of anything that isn’t applicable to the bulk of players in the NBA. Good things happen when a player knows what they want to do and can adjust on the fly.

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For Kuzma, a lot of his brightest moments are nested in these flashes of decisiveness, and the moments in which he becomes unraveled are the times where things falter for him.

In essence, the next step for Kyle Kuzma is becoming a quick thinker, having a plan B and connecting the dots on what he should do when his decisiveness is met with an equal but opposite decision from the defender.

Another next step is making decisions himself. As mentioned, Kuzma has the pleasure of being teammates with James who has become one of the best non-traditional point guards in terms of passing. In many ways, LeBron James makes the decision for the players he’s passing to, a beautiful display of how James elevates those around him. Kuzma doesn’t need to think much, just act upon the good look that has fallen in his lap.

For instance, here, just catch and shoot:

I want to credit Kuzma because there are times that he is involved in the decision making process as a co-creator with LeBron more than the first example.

But let’s take a look at an example of where Kuzma has acted on a decision and it’s been met with a deterrent:

Here, he drives to the rim against Jamal Murray, who sticks with him. That is decision one, met with force.

He can recalibrate and make a second decision here to pass if he’d like. Monte Morris is ball watching leaving Kentavious Caldwell-Pope open for a corner three. Avery Bradley and Rajon Rondo are more difficult, but possible passing options even with the clock below 10 seconds. He sticks with his original decision to shoot and loses the ball in the act completely, ostensibly hesitating between the multitude of secondary decisions he’s been presented.

Here, Kuzma gets a good look at a three — decision one. He’s met with a strong Grizzlies closeout and takes on his second decision, a drive. With the strong closeout, this is a solid move, a signal of the growing decision-making skillset Kuzma possesses. Similar to the previous clip, there seems to be a bit of hesitancy in Kuzma’s shot, a lack of decisiveness in his secondary decision.

And while the floater is a fine decision here, KCP is in the corner wide open again.

There is a case to be made that the Los Angeles Lakers should work in more plays for Kuzma in his minutes without James to afford him the comfortability and learning experience to find his own shots.

When Kuzma subbed in for LeBron James in the first quarter of Sunday’s win over the Boston Celtics, he had a brilliant start to the game where he was able to create his own offense off the dribble. He closed the quarter for the Lakers with a confident and decisive driving floater.

Kuzma currently plays 15.0 of his 24.7 minutes per game with James. That’s probably a good rate, and finding offensive plays centered on Kuzma here and there as the Lakers have been in those 9-10 minutes without LeBron each night should be useful for his development.

Kuzma is a serviceable role player as it stands right now. He will be purposeful for the Los Angeles Lakers as they compete for a championship this season. Right now, though, he’s a complementary game piece in what LeBron is doing. For him to ascend, he’ll need to move more decisively and take it upon himself to watch film and grow sharper with his secondary and tertiary decision making in order to become an offensive weapon on his own.

I’m not sold on Kyle Kuzma, as you might be able to tell. I appreciate what he can do and the potential he has, but the hesitancy is something he’ll have to address soon if he wants to have a long and successful career.