Yes and No: 3 things to like (and not) about the Lakers through three preseason games

Whether it’s Anthony Davis playing power forward or Max Christie and Dalton Knecht showing how they can contribute this year, there’s a lot to like and dislike through the Lakers first three preseason games.

Despite starting their preseason with back-to-back losses and then needing a 20-0 run from the deepest depths of their bench to get JJ Redick his first-ever head coaching win over Glenn Rivers’ Bucks, the vibes around the Lakers have been immaculate.

Cries of commitment to organization and attention to detail have come from both the players and the coaching staff, speaking to an alignment of purpose and shared focus that, if not standing in the face of what was present last season, feels like a shift in direction under this new regime.

In light of this positivity, however, there are still things to improve on and to get better at. After the team’s loss to the Timberwolves to open the preseason, Redick noted his team was “destroyed” in the possession battle, surrendering offensive rebounds and committing too many turnovers. The loss to the Suns was mostly the byproduct of not enough urgency and attentiveness on either side of the ball by the end of the bench players.

So, there are both some good and some bad to dissect. And with that, here are three things I’ve liked and disliked through the Lakers’ three preseason games so far.

Two Big Lineup

One of my bigger questions about Redick’s philosophies as a coach was whether he had any real desire to play two-big lineups with Anthony Davis played next to Jaxson Hayes. AD and Hayes played all of 89 minutes together last season, with the Lakers posting a +2.4 net rating in those minutes. It’s not a big enough sample to write home about, but the fact that those groups were successful overall was enough for me to want to see more.

But would Redick feel the same way? Well, after AD sat out the preseason opener vs. the Wolves, we got our answer when both he and Hayes were available against the Suns — and it was yes.

Near the end of the first quarter, Redick went to a group with AD and Hayes playing together, later even playing both guys with LeBron. And then, in the Lakers’ next game against the Bucks, Redick went to that group again at the same part of the game, showing it was not just a one-game experiment.

After the Suns game, Redick was asked specifically about that group and mentioned one of the positives of that group was how they played together defensively.

There are several advantages to AD at power forward, but one of them is him playing more on the perimeter, which better allows him to contest shots on the wing and then race the floor to try to get an easy bucket on the other end. Davis did just that when matched up against Royce O’Neale, challenging a jumper and then running through his closeout to establish deep position in the paint on the other end, where, after getting a long pass from D’Angelo Russell, he got an easy basket right at the rim.

And then against the Bucks, Redick showed additional creativity and flexibility defensively with this lineup, deploying a 3-2 zone defensive alignment with AD at the top while LeBron and Hayes manned the backline. This formation allowed AD to not only use his length and size at the top of the floor, but to swoop down from the top of the key to help on the glass.

One of the challenges of playing zone is the negative effect it can have on defensive rebounding, but one way to mitigate that is to give AD a clean runway from the top of the floor rather than have him boxing out and rotating under the hoop against the movement many zone offenses offer.

Whether or not playing zone lasts as a schematic choice for this group isn’t as much a concern as whether this group continues to play together at all. And, early on at least, it looks as though Redick is committed to giving these groups a little bit of run together to show that last season’s positive numbers, even in their small sample, can be built upon.

Young Wings

Depending on young players for too much can be fraught, particularly in the NBA. As a flow sport, basketball games can often be won or lost on the micro-decisions of a single player, with any small choice that doesn’t quite work in that moment handing the other team an advantage they can turn into a winning chance.

Do that enough over the course of a game and, suddenly, the opposition has taken more bites at the apple than you and, with that, given themselves a better opportunity to get the victory.

That said, if a team can successfully craft the right-sized role for a young player and then have that young player’s skill set overlap with and fit into that role consistently, you can not only get away with relying on that young player to produce, but you can reap the benefits that can often come from inserting young talent into your lineup — namely athleticism, exuberance, and just enough naivete to be dangerous.

Through three preseason games, the Lakers' young wing duo of Max Christie and Dalton Knecht have not been perfect by any means. From some stretches of iffy shot selection to times when they struggled to be steadying forces of stability in lineups that desperately needed it, both showed the typical ups and downs that come with asking young players to do too much or, simply, to be able to play up to an experience level they just don’t have yet at their disposal on an every play basis.

But both have also shown they have exactly what this Lakers team needs more of, too: a certain competitive drive combined with a commitment to doing the little things their coach is asking of them to earn the roles they both hope to have.

For Max, that has meant picking up full court defensively, competing on the backboards and taking — and making — the open 3-pointers created for him by his teammates. Dalton, meanwhile, has been competing defensively, crashing the offensive glass from the corners, and staying aggressive offensively within the flow of the team’s offense.

Again, these asks have ups and downs, but the commitment to doing these things as consistently as possible has been there. And when those things come with lively legs and good positional size from both players, it’s pretty easy to see how both can end up having a positive impact in whatever minutes they do earn this season.

Quick Trigger

I’m all for the Lakers taking more 3-pointers as a general principle within their offense. Too often in the last few seasons, the Lakers have fought a math problem by trading two-pointers for opponent’s threes and trying to make up for those losing margins in other areas of the game to try to win the game.

Easing some of that burden by taking — and making — more threes is important and I’m mostly happy Redick is making it a point of emphasis that the team shoot “six to seven” more threes per game this season than they did last season...and not the 50 threes per game he joked about.

This sort of volume would not put them up where the highest volume 3-point shooting teams are, but it would place them closer to the top third of the league, giving them both a bit more variance and, if they can shoot the ball well, a bit more margin for error to be great offensively.

That said, even if I can agree with the sentiment of shooting more threes, the process in which those threes are generated is still important to me. Said another way, I do not want the Lakers taking any old 3-pointer just because the goal is to get more of those shots up.

There should still be a thoughtfulness and understanding that not all threes are created equal. And if the team is going to take more of them, they should be putting in the necessary work to create the types of good threes that are more likely to go in.

While I know it’s early and still a work in progress, I must say that I’m not all the way sold the Lakers will put in that work. A few too many times for my liking, the Lakers have settled for taking the types of quick, early-clock threes that feel like they’re bailing out the defense by letting it fly.

They are taking the type of no-pass or one-pass threes that feel like they can be had at any point in a possession — especially later in the clock — rather than working their offense to get the types of looks that come from moving the ball, creating an advantage and/or getting their opponent into rotation.

Again, I get it’s just been three games. I also get that the Lakers are admittedly running very basic sets within their larger scheme in order to build out their foundation on that side of the ball. This sort of offense is not always conducive to getting the best shot that can come from working your actions into the second, third, and fourth options.

That said, this will be something I’m keeping an eye on. Because as much as I’d like for the Lakers to take more threes, I’d also like for them be of better quality than the ones they’ve been hunting so far.

You can follow Darius on Twitter at @forumbluegold.