Even though they defeated the Brooklyn Nets on Sunday to stop a five-game losing streak, the Los Angeles Lakers are still in bad shape.
With a 3-10 record, they rank 29th in offensive rating and 28th in points per game while their defense has slipped to 18th in efficiency.
They have a manageable schedule coming up for the rest of November, but it will take a marked improvement in their play to get them to .500 any time soon.
It may also take a significant trade to give them a real shot at returning to the NBA playoffs.
Although a few trade rumors have floated around lately, the Lakers are being patient. One reason may be that they haven’t been fully healthy.
Guard Dennis Schroder and center Thomas Bryant have not yet played in the regular season. With their returns looming, it looks as if the team wants to see what they provide before deciding what to do in terms of a potential trade.
Via Lakers Daily:
“The Los Angeles Lakers are expecting Dennis Schroder and Thomas Bryant to be back in the lineup for their next game on Friday, and it looks like the team will wait for those two to return before making “judgements that could lead to changes.”
“‘The Lakers have indeed looked at free agents for a potential in-season roster boost — first Moe Harkless and more recently Joe Wieskamp and Tony Snell — but the sense I got after spending the past week in L.A. is their preference is to wait for the returns of Dennis Schröder and Thomas Bryant before making judgments that could lead to changes,’ Marc Stein wrote on his Substack. ‘The Lakers have high hopes that Schröder in particular can give the offense a boost after both he and Bryant sustained thumb injuries during the preseason that required surgery.'”
Schroder and Bryant should help the Lakers and perhaps even make them look like a playoff-caliber team, but that wouldn’t be good enough for a team that features LeBron James, Anthony Davis and Russell Westbrook.
This is a franchise that defines success by winning world championships, and a loss in the first or second round of the playoffs would do virtually nothing to improve how people feel about the James-Davis era in L.A.
