Why LeBron James should be furious with Lakers, how bad is it in LA? | Hoops Tonight

Why LeBron James should be furious with Lakers, how bad is it in LA? | Hoops Tonight

What’s up everybody thanks as always for supporting the show it would mean a lot to me if you would take a second to scroll down and hit that subscribe button to the Hoops Tonight YouTube channel and then follow me on social media on Tik Tok Instagram and Twitter

So you guys don’t miss any of our content over the course of this season all right let’s talk some basketball do you think LeBron is frustrated is he outwardly frustrated or has it been quiet on the LeBron front what are you hearing about Lebron in his kind of mood

Post deadline uh he was a bit Moody last night uh his answers were short and it’s tough to to separate that from a close another close loss to Denver LA’s lost seven straight games to Denver now um it’s kind of becoming you know I was covering the the Clippers in the mid

2010s and uh those match like what once they beat the Warriors in in 2014 in the first round from that point on the Warriors became the Warriors and then it was like no matter what they they just had this strangle hold over the Clippers and it it you know mentally where it be

Close tough games and then all of a sudden Golden State would just execute in the fourth quarter and they they’ beat the Clippers and it it starting to kind of feel like that with this Lakers Nuggets matchup where yet again we see another game that goes down to crunch

Time and Denver just out executes them over the last few minutes um so I don’t know how much of it was that uh but you know I asked LeBron about uh Austin spoke first so Austin kind of mentioned that Denver kept running the same action that the Lakers were aware of they just

Couldn’t really stop it so I asked LeBron essentially um you know you guys there’s been a theme with you guys against Denver where you know what they’re running and yet you guys still can’t stop it like um you how do you kind of like learn from this experience

And and take the film from tonight especially those last few minutes and apply it moving forward and then he he kind of had this uh remark about uh well you know really good teams you know run the same stuff in crunch time and they know what they’re running and um you

Know and it was kind of I took it as a little bit of a shot at the Lakers crunchtime offense and um you know and he’s kind of tends to to take some of those sometimes and um he he just wasn’t in the best mood last night and uh you

Know we didn’t ask him about the trade deadline which uh maybe was a mistake on our part but we had already asked him about it you know several days in a row and and he was pretty clear that you know this is the team and and I’m riding

With my guys even if obviously on on social media he hasn’t necessarily been as supportive uh with his uh tweets and stuff so I think I think there is a level of frustration because to LeBron like he doesn’t care about a 2029 first round pick you know to to him that

That is a means to improve the roster and again we can debate whether a guy like how much of an upgrade is a royce O’Neal over a to tan Prince or even if it’s maybe flipping Gabe and you’re you’re giving the first and and maybe Brooklyn would have been more open to

That um like you know to to LeBron it’s like I want to maximize this season I want the RO like even if the roster is 1% better that’s what I want and that that is how he views things at all times so for him um you know he wanted the

Lakers to make a move and I I think them it’s tough for them to tell him we’re standing Pat and and we’re looking at the summer when he’s going to be 40 at the end of the year it’s going to be year 22 like there’s no assurances he’s

Going to be healthy next season there’s no assurances ad is going to be healthy next season so the Lakers are taking a calculated gamble here of um you know I I wrote about it at the end of my story like they’ve been pursuing a third star basically since the Inception of LeBron

And AD together 2019 it was Kawhi Leonard 2021 they went after several guys landed Russell Westbrook then quickly realized that was a disaster pivoted to trying to get Kyrie Irving in 2022 and again at the 2023 deadline and now in 2024 they’re going after another third star so uh they keep kind of

Kicking the can down the road in terms of The elusive third star that that’s going to be this this ball handler that could take the pressure off LeBron and help run the the offense in crunch time and and this and that but like so far that plan has not really worked and in

In the meantime they’ve made a lot of mistakes along the way with with Alex kuso and and uh you know various different things so uh to me I think LeBron is from frustrated um I don’t know to like what extent and how that’s going to affect him necessarily this

Summer uh but I think based on his comments over the last few days his actions over the last few days and really kind of going back a week and a half here um it’s clear he wanted them to do something I think at some point he realized they weren’t going to do

Something or weren’t going to do something significant and he’s been a little uh upset about it the it’s funny because the one year that they failed to get a star they were forced to sign a bunch of two-way role players and then they promptly kicked everyone’s ass and won the championship

But apparently no one was paying attention when that happened uh I I had my eye on LeBron last night because I was sitting there thinking like like he’s got to be super annoyed I thought his early game lack of aggression was like a clear sign that he was just kind

Of a little bit in a funk he did get competitively engaged and I thought he actually had an okay game definitely not the best that LeBron has been able to offer this season but I thought he was all right what he have like 25 8 and

Seven or something like that but I was actually yeah I know it’s it’s it’s it’s ridiculous but I I was actually last night when we finished with our live show I sat down and I uh watched the postgame press conference and I heard your question and I 100% picked up on

That where he was like you know they’re really good teams you it’s just like this like this like clear because it was funny cuz during the game I was literally thinking I was like I think I was like I was literally thinking I was like it’s on the table that he goes into

This presser and goes like Denver’s just way better than us you know I I literally thought it was on the table that he would go and say that almost as like a clear shot at the front office for not providing them with the horses and for the record like and I said this

On my show last night put yourself in LeBron’s shoes like he probably went into this training camp thinking this is my last great chance to win a title we just retained everybody from our Western Conference Finals run where young we’re athletic like we don’t have the specific

Need yet fixed because we couldn’t get Bruce Brown we lost him to the Indiana Pacers this summer but we’ll fix that at the deadline this group should be able to carry us through regular season games we’ll we’ll deal with it in February and then we’ll make a run at this thing and

It has been I I would imagine that he’s had conversations behind the scenes with like his family and friends like I cannot believe how this season is gone I and and I wouldn’t blame him for feeling that way because not only has it not amounted to regular season success uh

But like specific players within the uh the Western Conference Finals run if not getting gotten as much burn or opportunity as they did last year the skill guards haven’t played as well which has been a big part of why they’ve struggled so much and they didn’t do

Anything at the deadline and so of course he’s annoyed like how shitty would it be if they got it right just in time for him to turn 40 years old like I mentioned earlier and so I do sympathize with him and again I said this earlier

But it it’s the reality to me like the Lakers had a clear need that they identified in may they had two opportunities to fix it and they never did and that’s their job that’s their job and and again to me I think one of the biggest core philosophies of the

Laker front office that has to shift is the idea that star power is what wins when you already have LeBron James and Anthony Davis on the roster there is a diminishing return there it’s like you want to know why they don’t want to include Austin Reeves in any trades it’s

Because Austin Reeves when he’s your third best player the the Gap isn’t as big between him and some of the other guards around the league now if he’s your best player yeah you you you need somebody with a little bit more athleticism and pop and Firepower but in

That tertiary role like it like a guy like Austin’s fine what you need is the two-way athletes at the two and three and they just never were able to get on front of that uh out in front of That

Jason Timpf is joined by The Athletic’s Jovan Buha to discuss LeBron James’ growing frustration with the Los Angeles Lakers’ inability to surround him with a team capable of competing for the NBA Finals. How bad is the situation getting in Los Angeles?

Watch the full episode here: https://youtu.be/HDMuU3pPAgc

Follow Jason Timpf on social:
Tweets by _JasonLT
https://www.instagram.com/jtimpf15/

Shop the hottest gear in all of sports podcasting: https://thevolume.com/shop-all-new

Follow us on social media:
https://www.instagram.com/thevolumesports
Tweets by TheVolumeSports
https://www.facebook.com/TheVolumeSports

@thevolumesports

Learn more about the Volume:
https://www.thevolume.com

#nba #lakers #lebronjames #lebron #losangeleslakers #lalakers #anthonydavis #austinreaves #dangelorussell #lakersnation #lakersnews #lakerstoday #lakersbasketball #nbaplayoffs #nbafinals #basketball #sports