Even LeBron James’ historic night could only pause the Lakers’ dysfunction
Lakers #Lakers
For all intents and purposes, LeBron James and the Lakers did what they wanted to get done in Tuesday’s game against the Oklahoma City Thunder. At 38 years old, James became the NBA’s all-time leading scorer, surpassing Kareem Abdul-Jabbar’s mark of 38,387 points, in the final moments of the third quarter.
However, once the pomp and circumstance of the accomplishment came to an end, the focus quickly shifted to the fact that the 133-130 loss was simply more of the same for the Lakers, with dysfunction and frustration galore.
It started as early as the end of the first half, when Russell Westbrook took a bit of a saunter to get to the bench after he was subbed out. The team nearly got a delay of game called as it held up free throws from Thunder guard Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, and Westbrook even got the attention of the Lakers broadcasters, as one said, “He took his sweet time to get back on the bench, that’s for sure.”
ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski later reported that Lakers coach Darvin Ham got into it with Westbrook in the locker room at halftime about the player’s lethargy. It’s worth noting that the two later reportedly “dapped up prior to leaving.”
Then there was the moment of glory itself. As LeBron got the ball for the final time as the second-highest scorer in NBA history, video from someone in the stands showed a rather disinterested Anthony Davis sitting down on the bench while the rest of the Lakers were on their feet preparing to celebrate. As fans and teammates roared in jubilation once James scored his record-setting bucket, Davis remained in his seat.
Davis perhaps was the second-most talked-about player after Tuesday’s game, only behind the guy who broke what many believed was an unbreakable record. Not only was there this scene of found footage, but there were also some questions regarding how Davis acted when the nicer cameras were on him as well.
James was naturally mic’d up for this game and told Davis that he loved him, but the big man did not seem to respond at all to the statement. To Davis’ credit, the clip does cut off before any sort of prolonged response could come out, but the immediate lack of reaction is noteworthy.
Davis could have been frustrated with his play, as he easily had one of his worst nights of the season following consecutive 30-point games, hardly showing up with 13 points and eight rebounds. Regardless, whatever was eating at Davis remained through the postgame press conference, where he looked rather annoyed and said what the team needs to do: “Win games. Simple.”
Ham was also notably disappointed with Tuesday’s result. He criticized the Lakers for their playing style, saying, “A lot of the times, the attention was all about trying to get Bron the record as opposed to just playing natural basketball.”
Once James got close enough to Kareem’s record, the night was always going to be about LeBron. One could even argue that this was obvious as early as the preseason. The fact that Ham is acting as if that isn’t the case a full 55 games into his head coaching tenure is kind of hilarious and perhaps a sign of some dissonance from the coaching side of things, which — along with dysfunctional player relationships — leads to quite the bad combination.
In other words, it was just another Tuesday for the Lakers.