Locked on Lakers

Turns out, when Magic Johnson said the Los Angeles Lakers would not leak anything to the media, he meant they wouldn’t announce anything, either. David Nwaba’s second 10-day contract ended Monday and most figured an announcement would come at some point but alas, here we are. So in terms of coverage of the move on the podcast, Harrison and I had to improvise. Should the Lakers keep Nwaba and the roster of the roster intact, or should they cut someone and churn their last roster spot open to keep flexibility over the final 12 games? Then, because the Lakers announced that Rob Pelinka and Magic Johnson took a trip across the country to learn about the new CBA, we had a chat about what that conversation might sound like.

The Los Angeles Lakers may have lost to the Cleveland Cavaliers Sunday, but the story of the game (and the weekend) was undoubtedly the superlative play of D’Angelo Russell. The Lakers young guard made his triumphant 40-point return to the team’s starting lineup alongside Jordan Clarkson, and it left hosts Harrison Faigen and Anthony Irwin with just one question: Why did it take so long? But first, Harrison and Anthony discussed the Lakers-Bucks fight, Draymond Green’s comments on Russell, as well as Harrison’s latest hot take. Then, the two talked about how Russell and Clarkson should be used and much more on the latest episode of Locked on Lakers.

The Los Angeles Lakers have been a bad team for a while, but only recently have seemed to totally collapse into a miserable one. What exactly has went wrong? To try and find answers, host Harrison Faigen was joined by Gary Kester (the Picasso of Lakers Twitter/Silver Screen and Roll writer) to attempt to figure out what exactly has gone wrong with the purple and gold. Later in the show, the two also discussed whether or not Kobe Bryant has the power to delete other people’s Twitter accounts and more on the latest episode of Locked on Lakers.

How long ago do those few great games from D’Angelo Russell feel? Somehow, he’s gone from reminding everyone why the Los Angeles Lakers took him second overall (even over Kristaps Porzingis) to randomly in head coach Luke Walton’s doghouse with zero logical explanation. Sure, Walton has presented his side of the story, but things don’t seem to add up. The move has led to ripple effects across the roster, including for Jordan Clarkson, whom the move was intended to showcase. The team looks despondent, they’ve been blown out in embarrassing fashion twice and an already depressing season has found yet another new low. So with Harrison out, who better to talk to than Ben Rosales, who’s been stuck indoors for the last two days because of the snowstorm from hell? We talk about the Russell situation and a great piece he and Jerry Khachoyan put together regarding draft prospects Lakers fans should be watching in the tournament.

Earlier in the week, the Los Angeles Lakers lost a close one to the Philadelphia 76ers. Yes, the term “lost” might be being used loosely here, but still. In a game featuring a couple young cores, the D’Angelo Russell & Co. came up short against some kid named TJ McConnell. Before the game, an old tweet of mine was pulled up in which I dared question “The Process”. Duhn duhnnn duuuuuuhnnn... Thing is: That strategy of rebuilding is thoroughly fascinating and in complete honesty, we should all be pulling for Ben Simmons, Joel Embiid and all young players forced into losing situations because losing is rewarded in the NBA. As frustrating as the Lakers’ rebuild has been, compared to the Sixers and at the very least, Russell, Brandon Ingram, etc. have been on the court more often than not. In order to talk this through, I brought Ben Epstein (Limited Upside, Vox Media) on the show to compare the two situations. The conversation was great. Before that conversation, I update everyone on the goings on around the Lakers. Timofey Mozgov has been shut down. Luol Deng is probably sure to follow. D’Angelo Russell didn’t start. And there’s a central theme to how all that was handled.

Unless you've been living under a rock for the last day or so, you probably have heard about Luke Walton starting Jordan Clarkson instead of D'Angelo Russell in last night's blowout loss to the Denver Nuggets. We bring Adam Mares (Locked on Nuggets, Denver Stiffs, Vice, Nylon Calculus) on to talk about what he saw from the arena in that loss, and it wasn't pretty. Also covered: Zubac, Ingram, Clarkson/Mudiay and developmental situations.

The Los Angeles Lakers won their first game in basically a month. On its face, most fans would (and should) enjoy watching the young core play well enough to win on the road against another up-and-coming Phones Suns team. And yet, those lottery implications fly in the face of any enjoyment many have watching Brandon Ingram end Alex Len. To start the show, Harrison and I react to the win, starting with what it might do to the tank. Then, once that discussion ran its course, we spoke about the aspects of the actual game that impressed us most. Then, earlier in the day, Harrison and I sat down with Josh Magette of the Los Angeles D-Fenders (22 minutes in to the show) to catch up on everything since our last conversation. As always, Josh gave plenty of insight, including why he wasn’t all that shocked when David Nwaba was called up. Oh, and he got to witness my Eurostumble. Enjoy that audio.

The Los Angeles Lakers remain the most relevant second-worst team in the history of the National Basketball Association because of course they would. With Harrison (DNP-CD) out, I enlisted Darius Soriano of Forum Blue & Gold to talk about all the goings on surrounding our Lakers. The Buss siblings continue to air dirty laundry publicly, so that gave plenty of talking points. How big a mistake has it been for Jim Buss to sit idly by while Jeanie Buss remains so well-connected in the media? Short answer: It hurt greatly. At the end of the day, though, the Lakers need to move forward. So Darius and I spoke about some of the issues they’ve dealt with, but with an eye on the future. The moves have been made. It’s time to see what they might produce. From there, the conversation shifted to the current Lakers and what we’ve seen from D’Angelo Russell in his newly-expanded role. What’s made him more successful of late? We wrap with a brief conversation about Jordan Clarkson and whether the Lakers might’ve squandered an otherwise exciting prospect.

The Los Angeles Lakers lost again. Even less surprising, somehow, was who they lost to: The Dallas Mavericks, whom they turn into some combination of the Harlem Globetrotters and Golden State Warriors. So, instead of jumping right into analysis of a game we frankly already forgot about, Harrison and I introduced Rob Pelinka to Mitch Kupchak. It’s crazy how much Pelinka sounds like a mainstay of both “The West Wing” and “Parks and Recreation”. We did wonder about the dynamic between the Lakers and the media — especially when it comes to leaks about moves before they happened. It really isn’t that hard to foresee leaks increasing greatly given the connections Magic Johnson and Pelinka have. From there, we jumped into whatever it might be about the Mavericks that gives the Lakers such fits. BREAKING: The Lakers aren’t a good team. Julius Randle messed around and got a triple double, so at least there was that.

So we finally got to enjoy something close to a slow news day for the Los Angeles Lakers, but that does leave a pretty gaping hole in stuff to talk about. Combine that with the downer that was yesterday’s show and we figured we’d liven the mood with what kinds of crazy hypotheticals it would take to for the Lakers to win their remaining 19 games. For this exercise, Harrison and I are going to pretend the top-three pick isn’t still on the line, giving us the freedom to see how these games could play out if life was still as simple and innocent as it once was, back before tanking was something Lakers fans could laugh at other fan bases for. Once we got through those games, we touched on some actual updates about a couple guys being dinged up as the team heads to Dallas to take on the Mavericks, who have completely owned the Lakers for some weird reason this year.

The Los Angeles Lakers are coming off of probably one of the ugliest weekends in the franchise’s history — both on and off the court. First, the weekend was kicked off on Friday evening by a shellacking at the hands of the Boston Celtics, followed by the usual quotes about competition. The game was so ugly, it led me to question whether the kids are making enough progress to still feel confident in the rebuild. Harrison and I discuss. Then, we saw reports of turmoil at the very top of the organization as Jim and Johnny Buss attempted maybe the most hilariously-poorly-organized coup in the history of coups. The effort was so bad, I got to make another of my analogies, featuring an old western shootout. The weekend concluded in a loss to the New Orleans Pelicans that was obviously closer than the Boston game, but wasn’t the kind of night you’ll be telling grandchildren about. Again, we wonder whether the organization is going in the right direction.

Fun show today, and it’s pretty rare we feel comfortable over-selling something like this. Larry Nance, Jr. stopped by at the top of the show to talk about his favorite subject: Dunking on Ivica Zubac. With friends like these, who needs enemies? He sat down with Harrison to talk about that, losing to children in knockout, how his life has changed since becoming a Laker (kids look up to him) and his expectations for the rest of the season. Then, I spoke with Jay King of MassLive.com and “Locked on Celtics” about where the Lakers-Celtics rivalry currently stands. Boston is obviously a better team right now, but they have a couple serious questions to answer of their own. Danny Ainge chose to pass on acquiring Jimmy Butler or Paul George in part due to how good that LeBron James guy is, and I was able to look back in Lakers history to find a similar train of thought the Lakers went with back when that Michael Jordan guy was doing his thing. We compared young cores, spoke about building around Al Horford and Isaiah Thomas and whether the Lakers can match a deal with the Pacers for Paul George.

With an off day before the Los Angeles Lakers play against the Boston Celtics and all the personnel moves having already taken place since the trade deadline, the news was fairly scarce. So what better time than this to sit down and negotiate a deal with a surrogate from the Indiana Pacers and hopefully bring Paul George back home? Harrison could not make it, but fortunately Ben Gibson, Editor in Chief for 8points9seconds.com was able to stop by to put this show together. His and my task: figure out a deal that makes sense for both sides. As we tried to get that done, we spoke about similarities between George’s situation and that of Kobe Bryant, back when he actually demanded a trade. George’s favorite basketball player growing up was Kobe, so what better way to honor him than leverage potentially leaving into a better situation in which to win basketball game! I kid. I kid. This was a fun show and we were actually able to come to a deal, with the disclaimer being that the Pacers probably wouldn’t only trade their superstar so long as they thought they would lose him in free agency. Take a listen and let us know what you think of the trade.

The kids are alright. Julius Randle and D'Angelo Russell dominated the game statistically against the Charlotte Hornets and will get their due credit, but Brandon Ingram deserves praise, too. Anthony and Harrison explain why. Then they discuss what Lou Williams' departure has done to the rest of the team. Jordan Clarkson was pretty honest on this matter. We had some technical issues, so pardon the lack of the intro and outro. We're back at it again tomorrow.

There is never an off day for the Los Angeles Lakers, even when the team isn’t playing. A busy Monday saw the team waive Jose Calderon and (reportedly) decide to call-up D-Fenders guard David Nwaba on a 10-day contract. Before getting to that, however, hosts Harrison Faigen and Anthony Irwin addressed the latest rumor about Paul George and the Lakers. Then they discussed their favorite Calderon memories, Harrison gave his thoughts on Nwaba after covering him with the D-Fenders and finally dropped his latest hot take on the latest episode of Locked on Lakers.