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Going into Monday night Luka Doncic had been a member of the Los Angeles Lakers for nine days, but that stretch almost didn’t feel real given that L.A.’s newest star had been sidelined with a calf injury. Even after a press conference, a jersey unveiling, and seeing Anthony Davis suit up for the Mavericks, it still seemed almost like a collective fever dream we were all sharing.
There’s no way the Mavericks really sent Luka Doncic to the Lakers, right?
Well, if you had any lingering doubts about whether or not any of this was, in fact, real, they were erased on Monday. Now healed and settled in his new home, Doncic suited up in purple and gold, and while the stats weren’t gaudy, he and his new team managed to put on quite a show. The Lakers waltzed to a 132-113 victory over the lottery-bound Utah Jazz, and Doncic posted 14 points, four assists and five rebounds in the 23-minute effort. It was what we can assume will be the first of many, many victories for Doncic as a Laker.
It’s only been a single game, but Doncic and the Lakers just gave us our first glimpse into what the rest of their season will look like. Here are the immediate takeaways from Doncic’s debut and what it means for his new team.
LeBron James is loving life right now
Whenever two high-usage stars partner up, doubters tend to argue that “there’s only one ball.” Doncic and James are two of the greatest one-on-one shot-creators in NBA history, and both are used to monopolizing their offenses. That suggests that their partnership at least had the potential to be suboptimal, and perhaps diminish the two of them altogether. They can’t both dribble at the same time, and Austin Reaves, fresh off of a career-high 45 points against the Indiana Pacers on Saturday, probably needs the ball occasionally too, right?
Yea, turns out, putting two of the smartest players the sport has ever seen on the court together at the same time can yield pretty positive results. James and Doncic played roughly 19 minutes together. The Lakers won those minutes by 17 points. The two aren’t meaningfully interacting all that much on offense yet, but that’s likely to come with time. James was a willing and very successful screener for Doncic’s former teammate, Kyrie Irving, during their time together with the Cleveland Cavaliers. Eventually, the two seem nearly certain to develop a two-man game of their own.
Monday was much more about benefitting from the other’s presence on the court. James and Doncic both made sport of switch-hunting bigger Jazz defenders — most notably Walker Kessler — on the perimeter so they could attack them one on one. Switching is almost never an optimal strategy against star ball-handlers, but the Lakers forced Utah’s hand with some of their lineup decisions (more on those later). James and Doncic are used to facing defenses that are entirely keyed in on them, individually. Now, they get to play defenses whose attention is split.
James, in particular, looked eager and refreshed on that front. He has spent the better part of his Lakers tenure begging the team to find him the right ball-handling partner. That’s what led them down the Russell Westbrook rabbit hole. Now that they’ve finally done so with Doncic, James looked as spry and engaged defensively as he has all season. Now that he doesn’t have to run the Laker offense every single possession, he can devote more energy to other facets of his game. The Lakers are going to benefit tremendously.
The fit was initially clunky when James first partnered with an on-ball star of Doncic’s caliber — Dwyane Wade in 2010. But James is a different player today than he was back then. He was just a 32.9% 3-point shooter when he arrived in Miami, for instance. Over the last two seasons, he’s above 40% from deep. His experiences with Wade and Irving taught him all of the little tricks to playing off of the ball, optimal screening and cutting and misdirection technique. Now he gets to apply all of that knowledge with Doncic by his side. There are certainly other questions here, but the fit between the two principle figures here really shouldn’t be a matter of debate. They’re going to be great together.
The sneaky winner of the trade was Jaxson Hayes
The first play of this game? A lob from James to Hayes. The second play of this game? A lob from Doncic to Hayes. The third play of this game? An attempted lob from Doncic to Hayes. The first play of the second half? A lob from Doncic to Hayes. The third play of the second half? You guessed it, a lob from James to Hayes. Are you sending a trend here?
Doncic is the greatest lob passer in NBA history. James isn’t far behind. Hayes has plenty of faults as an NBA player. He doesn’t rebound well enough for his position. His defense is inconsistent. He’s never developed a diverse offensive game. But the one thing he does very well with his ultra-athletic seven-foot frame and even longer wing span is catch passes in the air and slam dunk them for easy points. This is part of why Hayes always wanted to play with Doncic.
“When he was in Dallas and I was in New Orleans my first few years, they kept trying to trade for me,” Hayes told ESPN’s Dave McMenamin. “New Orleans never allowed it. He was like, ‘Do you remember when we couldn’t trade for you?’ I was like, ‘Do you remember what I told you after every game I played against you?’ After every game I would be like, ‘If you ever need a big, I would love to play with you.’ Just because of the way he moves the ball.”
Well, now Hayes’ wish has come true, and Santa or the genie or whoever made that happen for him decided to throw in a second legendary passer just for the fun of it. This deal now represents a golden opportunity for Hayes. He’s currently playing on a minimum-salary deal. It wasn’t long ago that Anthony Davis was publicly campaigning for the Lakers to trade for another big man, essentially telling the world that he didn’t believe Hayes was capable of playing next to him.
Now Hayes, right before he returns to free agency, is the starting center on a team with two legendary playmakers setting him up. We’re about to see the absolute best version of him for the next few months. This is his chance to ensure that he won’t just be a Laker for those months, but for the next several years.
The Lakers are going to be a small-ball team
When Hayes is on the floor, the Lakers are going to be big. That’s not just about Hayes, it’s about the whole lineup. The shortest Laker starter on Monday was the 6-5 Austin Reaves. Doncic is a forward-sized point guard and both Rui Hachimura and James are power forward-sized. There will be opponents who really struggle with the sheer height and length the Lakers are capable of putting on the floor.
But when Hayes leaves the floor? The Lakers are leaning heavily into small-ball, or at least center-less-ball. It only took them around three minutes to remove Hayes and insert Dorian Finney-Smith in his place. Hachimura was the nominal center at that point, and there will be James-at-center units as well. The Lakers may dip into the buyout market, and two-way big men Trey Jemison and Christian Koloko are here, but for now, JJ Redick seems committed to sticking with his best players rather than forcing a big man onto the floor.
The exact lineup choices remain to be seen. The decision to use Hayes and Jarred Vanderbilt together, for example, seems a bit strange as they are the two non-shooters in the core Laker rotation. But there’s a clear logic here. Before the season, Redick said, if only jokingly, that he wanted the Lakers to hoist 50 3s per game. Obviously, that hasn’t happened. Only the Nuggets, Raptors and Clippers take fewer. But they took 42 of them against the Jazz on Monday, tied for the fourth-most of their season.
The Lakers can’t pretend they’re a team they aren’t anymore. They don’t have the personnel anymore to win games playing exclusively in the paint. But with three high-end shot-creators, they’re almost always going to be able to generate offense. They can use the non-center minutes to get Vanderbilt and other defensive-minded perimeter players on the floor and then try to make the most of what they can do offensively, especially as athletes and cutters. And, more than anything, they can finally start taking the shots that Redick wants them to take.
This may not be the long-term plan, but the trade deadline has passed and the Lakers have the players they have. This is what makes sense with their roster today, and if Monday was any indication, they’re prepared to make the most of it.
