How Continuity Impacts the MVP Race, the Playoffs and the Lakers' Offseason

Hey everyone, this is Ross Jackson, one of the hosts of The Lockdown Podcast Network.

Thank you for being here, because your support means everything.

And if you're looking for another way to support the show that you love, while getting

something awesome in return, check out the Every Day or Club.

You get ad free episodes of your favorite lockdown show, access to a members-only group chat

for fans of your team, and you can even jump into the national chats and talk about

whatever's happening across the league.

Tap the Every Day or Club link in the show notes to learn more.

When it comes to the Lakers' continuity impacts everything from the MVP race to the playoffs,

even the off season will explain next.

You are Lockdown Lakers, your daily Los Angeles Lakers podcast, part of The Lockdown Podcast

Network, your team, every day.

Thanks everybody for joining Lockdown Lakers, I'm Brian Kiminetski with Andy Kiminetski,

plenty to cover.

In this episode today, a reminder will be back after Tuesday night's game against the

Cavs, excited to see the Lakers play a good competition again as they try to nail down

a top three seed in the West, but so Monday's show Andy was all about the MVP race and like

where Luca fits in and how that discussion is going and whether or not Luca's sort of

being treated fairly and all that other stuff.

One of the interesting nuggets that didn't make it into that show, I came from our friend

Isdak Franco, who has covered Luca in particular for a very long time, but writes fantastic stuff

about the Lakers and the NBA on his sub-stack, which I highly recommend everybody, everybody

subscribed to, but he had an interesting point about Luca's candidacy, which will make

now, but it really is relevant in other ways too and about continuity and how it fits

into the other candidates and Isdak's point was compared to Jalen Brown, to Wembee, to

Yokech, to Shay, nobody is playing with a bunch of strangers more than Luca on a roster

with fewer guys who have spent time together than Luca.

His point was that should give you maybe a more favorable idea of what Luca and the Lakers

are doing this year makes it a little bit more impressive, but it also kind of frames where

the franchise is and so it was a really interesting point that he was making both little

picture and as we're going to get into big picture.

Yeah, it's not surprising, Isdak's a really smart guy, he's been on the show before, we

have recommended his coverage to our viewers and to our listeners all the time, you definitely

should check him out.

As far as the framing for MVP and even if you go through his piece on this, he's not

looking to necessarily make the case for Luca over everybody else.

He said at the end of it, like ultimately I think there's great cases to be made for

really the top four guys, Luca, Wembee, SGA and Yokech, I think are the consensus top four

with Jalen Brown gaining some steam, but I would be surprised if he finished at the end

of the day ahead of those four.

The framing device of Contnuit I think is interesting and I hadn't thought of it that way specifically

in terms of framing what Luca is doing or the season, like if nothing else, it speaks

to his ability on the fly to make offense work in a lot of ways with a wide variety of

revolving characters in and out of the lineup.

It has not always been smooth, I mean we've talked about the grand majority of this season,

the offense was not functioning to nearly the degree that people expected beyond just

the...

But Luca can paper over a lot of problems just from his own offensive dominance.

I don't necessarily think the Spurs have a ton more continuity.

OK, see Denver and to whatever degree you consider Jalen Brown a key figure in this race.

Those three teams, the continuity is off the charts and it is a reason that all three

of those teams have been in the finals recently, have won championships recently and seem

to currently be in that mix over the last say five years.

It's because they keep working together and they have the luxury of getting better together

and the central figures have been together longer and there's no question of the five players

we've talked about.

Luca is the most disadvantaged, he's the one that's had to work the most with the least

in terms of just pure knowledge of each other.

He is, I think in a lot of ways the closest thing we've seen to staff in terms of just the

pure bending of a defense because Luca can do so much scoring, shooting and playmaking

from everywhere.

He really does become somebody that can completely change the geometry of how you look to defend

any team that is on.

Yeah, it's an, again, we're not looking to get into another MVP debate with your discussion.

We did that for Monday's short show, but it is, it's an interesting, if nothing else,

and smart way to talk about just all of the things Luca does and just how much he means

to this team.

So after I want to get into what this means, not just for the MVP candidacy because it's

another thing to think about, another way to frame the very difficult separating of these

players in terms of what's your preference in this and that, whatever.

The playoffs are coming up and this kind of continuity is relevant to that, especially

in ways that go beyond that top seven season long thing to just who's in the lineup for

you.

For example, with Denver, guys like Christian Brown and are back and he's not in that group,

but Aaron Gordon, not in that group of top seven minutes guys because they've been injured

for so much of the year.

Similarly, they'll be back in the playoffs.

So the calculus changes for what continuity looks like and what it means and how it impacts

a series.

Doesn't just impact the series though, it ought to impact what the Lakers, how they approach

the offseason as well.

So we'll talk continuity when we get back.

Walk-on Lakers is brought to you by five hour energy drink.

Welcome to the five hour energy flavor draft.

We're looking at every aspect of the draft to let you know which flavors are the best,

which ones could be sleepers, the board set.

Flavor is ready and only one can be the top overall pick.

Five hour energy has a wide variety of flavors, something for everyone with that zero sugar

boost that everyone wants.

Flavor on draft number one overall, peach mango, it's got a great peach taste right on

that first sip.

Mango adds some tropical depth and sweetness.

It's a really nice blend and balance and it's just going to make you feel like you are

sitting somewhere exotic on a beach and everybody loves that flavor.

Even if, even that tranquil image can get you hyped up because again, there's the boost,

you're going to feel good.

I am open though, watermelon, blue raspberry, a sleepers, but peach mango, that is my first

overall pick.

Find your new favorite flavor of five hour energy shots available online, five hour energy

or Amazon.

Locked on Lakers also brought to you by indeed workplace chaos, deadlines stacking up your

inbox is overflowing.

The one position you have to fill is still sitting open.

So when the pressure is on and you need to write higher, this is a job for sponsored

jobs.

Indeed sponsored jobs helps you reach the people who actually fit what you're looking for

or whether that's skills, experience, location, so you're not just hoping to write candidates

stumbles across your post and here's a stat that says that all the minute we'll be talking

about this.

Companies like yours have made 27 hires on indeed according to indeed dot com indeed data

worldwide, I should say.

So if you're hiring spend less time searching and more time interviewing candidates who

check all your boxes with indeed sponsored jobs, when you need the right person to cut

through the chaos again, it's a job for indeed sponsored jobs listeners of locked on Lakers,

we'll get a $75 job sponsored job credit to help your job get the premium status it deserves

at indeed dot com slash podcast.

Just go to indeed dot com slash podcast right now support locked on Lakers by saying you

heard about indeed right here on this show indeed dot com slash podcast terms and conditions

apply need to hire this is a job for indeed sponsored jobs.

And finally locked on Lakers is brought to you by turbo tax tax time.

But for a lot of us the old way of doing taxes is a lot trying to book an appointment.

That's not the most convenient thing in the world sitting in a waiting room in a stack of

papers, emailing back and forth, wondering they really get your situation.

But this year you are getting a major upgrade into a turbo tax now has in person locations

nationwide.

You may face to face with a real tax expert and your documents get uploaded straight

to your turbo tax app on the spot just like that you're done your turbo tax expert works

to get you every dollar you deserve while you get real time notifications as you go about

your day.

It's the relief of walking in and meeting a real person walking out knowing your taxes

being handled right head turbo tax dot com slash local finest or near you and to book

your appointment.

Okay, so in the context, you know, it is talk was writing, you know, MVP is a season long

award.

So who plays the most minutes, who are your top seven top eight minutes, you know, minutes

guys for the season is relevant because it's, it's a good framing for who's been around

for most of the season.

When you get to the playoffs, continuity looks different.

You know, Jalen Williams, for example, hasn't isn't among the top seven and minutes havers

for the Oklahoma City Thunder, but it certainly matters when he's back and the continuity that

they've developed, you know, over a title winning season and beyond becomes more relevant

in that stretch.

And so, you know, we mentioned Aaron Gordon, we mentioned, you know, Christian Brown and

guys like that with the the nuggets who are back and don't have anything to do with

Yokech's MVP candidacy and things like that, but we'll have an impact on the playoffs.

The Lakers go into the post season, assuming everybody is healthy, definitely on the short

end of the stick when it comes to time together, series together, all these, all of these

other things.

They do have at least, you know, two supercomputers and LeBron and Luca and a pretty intelligent

player as well and Austin Reeves, guys who can tear it out, but it's not like the other

teams are filled with dummies.

So the question becomes like, how much do other teams have an advantage over the Lakers

in the playoffs when it's all said and done?

I think it's big.

I mean, I'm not saying it's insurmountable like that it's that it's an advantage that

the Lakers can't overcome.

I mean, they've beaten Denver this year, two out of three games, despite lacking continuity.

They've beaten a lot of teams this season that have had more time together, but you know,

for example, when you mentioned Christian Brown and Aaron Gordon not being in the top seven

for minutes this year for Denver, I'll be honest, I don't care because they've had so much

time with, right, group, assuming they're healthy to me, that's a relevant, like Jason

Wright.

It's irrelevant.

It's relevant for the MVP conversation.

It's irrelevant for the playoffs.

It doesn't matter when it comes to the playoffs because these guys have that time together.

So, you know, that, you know, Jalen Williams wasn't there for Oklahoma City, isn't it

important?

It only matters.

Yeah, with Jalen Williams, for example, it only matters if he gets enough time between

when he's returned and the end of the regular season, just to feel comfortable and like back

in a rhythm, but the continuity is already established.

It's all built in.

Absolutely.

Right.

So, the Lakers are going to be dealing with an uphill disadvantage compared to pretty much

all of these other teams other than San Antonio, between the relatively little time they've

spent together, compared to certainly these other teams and the playoff and experience

that is its own side thing they're going to have to deal with.

The Lakers are the most disadvantaged.

It helps that LeBron and Austin, I think, have a lot of reps together and LeBron, Austin

and Rui have a lot of reps together, Jackson Hayes.

It's now in his third season with the Lakers, like every bit that you can look at or fine

in terms of those reps together can matter a lot.

That's also why it's so important that they not only landed on a formula that works,

but they, a big piece of the formula was clarity.

It was really important that everybody understands exactly what they're going to be doing, but

they're going to be figuring out a lot more information in real time than I think, okay,

see will, Denver will, that's just the reality of it.

The good news for the Lakers is if you're going to have to be led by a guy who has spent

less time around, your other players has only played one series, and in that series

only played four games, three and a half, if you really think about how sick Luke probably

still was after game three, but LeBron is that guy.

If you have to think of a player who you feel comfortable plugging into a playoff series,

get the guys who he has never played in the playoffs with, Marcus Smart is another guy

who feel very comfortable with in that regard.

That will certainly help, I think, these are all really difficult things to quantify and

difficult things to figure out exactly how they impact a series, but in a tight playoff

series, these little shades of advantage or disadvantage can end up making a difference

where one possession, one miscommunication, one something or other can be the difference

between winning a game and losing one.

The last thing I would say just in terms of having to overcome the lack of continuity

compared to most of these other teams, one big advantage they will have is Luca is as

good or better as any of the best players on these teams we've discussed at just taking

over a game.

I don't think there's anybody in the field that is better than Luca at taking over a

game.

It may not always be taken over the exact same way, but I don't think there's anybody

better than Luca.

And again, we talked about what Luca has papered over in terms of just his overall talent,

that's another part of it.

Yeah, and it's for a team that has thrived on late game execution, that will be tested

against, in these playoff moments, against teams that have more reps together as a group

in these types of situations, so that's something to look forward to.

The other thing we don't get super deep into it yet because we've still got a lot of

season and hopefully a lot of post season to talk about, but it will also ought to impact

the way the Lakers look at the off season.

There is a belief, or at least was, especially before the Lakers started rolling that it

was going to be pretty much their internal over the roster completely in the off season.

And flip this thing up upside down, start with almost a brand new batch of guys with almost

nobody under contract going in next year, nobody they have to have under contract.

How they approach this off season in terms of adding the players that need to be added

to really create a long-term foundation around Luca, while also bringing back a team where

not everybody is wearing name tags for the first six months of the season, introduce

each other three months of the season, it's an interesting balance and how they look

at that, what should we bring back to maintain a little continuity, what is available to what's

worth really turning things over, and then more importantly, the new players that we bring

in, are they brought in on one year deals, are they brought in on three year deals, are

they brought in on four year deals, like all of this stuff is really interesting to watch.

Yeah, I've said many times I still believe they need to start building towards sustainability

and future forward and they need to be thinking about dedicating resources in years towards

players that are, if they're worth bringing in at a certain price point, they're worth

committing to, at a certain price point in years as well.

I do think it matters, they clearly want to team up Luca and Austin and assuming that

ends up the case moving forward, you start getting into multiple years of Luca and Austin

together and when you really start drilling down on, we mentioned OKC Denver and Boston

as these teams with continuity, it's not just the roster, it's their top two players have

played together for a long time.

Jamal Murray and Nikola Yokech have incredible chemistry.

Shay Gilgis Alexander and Jalen Williams play extremely well off each other.

It took Jalen Brown and Jason Tatum, it took them I think a couple years as young players

with some degree of overlap to figure it out, but the time was worth it and they now play

extremely well off each other too.

It's extremely important that the continuity includes your top two players, that they

get those reps together and if nothing else, that seems to be the Lakers' plan short of

something very unexpected and in terms of just sheer continuity and I think the way to build

continuity, that is a good thing.

Yeah, 100% agree.

So we'll see what happens both, obviously the postseason first, but it's just one of these

things to kind of store away in the memory bank as once the season's over and you head

into the off season, what exactly is you're trying to build and how.

So plenty more to come on Tuesday, Lakers playing at home against the Cavaliers, a marquee

match up for sure without of a Mitchell and James Harden and Evan Mobley and a company

in town, it should be a really good one with back after the game to break it all down.

We'll see you then.