5 takeaways from Lakers losing 4th straight to Grizzlies

The LA Lakers lost again; this time to the Memphis Grizzlies 106-93. This is the Lakers’ fourth straight loss and their seventh straight road loss of the season. Here are five takeaways from this game:

There! On the bench. Pau Gasol of all people is being made to come off the bench for the Lakers. As early as 2010, Gasol was instrumental in helping the Lakers win a championship. And today Earl Clark went 5-13 from the field as Gasol’s replacement. Pau played 30 minutes and shot 4-10 for 13 points with 8 rebounds and 2 blocks. Earl Clark (who?) scored 11 with 9 rebounds in 40 minutes of action. Its hard to put a finger on what ails the Lakers, but benching one of the most versatile big men doesn’t seem to be the answer. There was some symbolism here, as Rudy Gay tied Pau Gasol as the franchise leader in games played with 476.

“We’ve been the laughingstock of the NBA. So, let’s turn that embarrassment into one of the best stories in sports history and turn things around.”- Antwan Jamison. He’s right about the laughing stock. And benching Gasol only adds to the black humour.

Can the Lakers even trade Gasol if they want? He has a $19.3 million contract. Gasol said he was “not happy about” the switch but added that “right now I’m more worried about us as a team and us struggling.”

The Lakers are an All -Star team. That’s a good thing right? Not if you ask Mike D’Antoni. “We’ve got an All-Star team out there,” D’Antoni said. “Have you ever watched an All-Star Game? It’s God-awful because everybody gets the ball, they go 1-on-1 and then they play no defense. That’s our team. That’s us. We’re an All-Star team and we haven’t learned there’s a pecking order”. Talk about finding a dark cloud in a sheet of silver lining.

Nash played 34 minutes and had 8 assists. But he committed 6 turnovers and only shot 2-6 for 7 points. Both his field goals were three pointers. Steve may be coming off a bum leg, but he needs to be himself and take more shots if he is to space the floor for the Lakers’ big men.

The Grizzlies had six players in double figures. Led by Darrel Arthur off the bench, who scored 20. Mike Conley added 19, Rudy Gay and Zach Randolph and Tony Allen scored 12 a piece, and Jerryd Bayless had 10. As a team, the Grizzlies shot 49% from the field as opposed to the Lakers’ 42.5%. The Lakers only had four players in double figures. A telling stat, the Grizzlies attempted 96 field goals and the Lakers only shot 73 times. That’s a difference of 23 shots. One reason is the number of rebounds, as the Grizzlies had 52 in total to 27 of the Lakers. They had 16 offensive rebounds to 7 of the Lakers. When you dominate your opponent in these categories by such a huge margin, winning becomes easier.

Weirdly, Kobe Bryant shot 11-23 for 29 points with 3 assists and 3 rebounds but he was a +-, -13 for this game. Bryant ended up playing 38 minutes in this one. At his age, he may want to take it slow a little. But the Lakers don’t have anyone competent enough at the two guard spot who can back Kobe up. Lost amidst the glitter of the Lakers’ impressive starting line-up is that their bench is woefully thin. Dwight Howard missed the second half as he aggravated his sore shoulder in the first half. He has a torn labrum, and was actually listed as a probable for this game. He was 0-4 and had 2 points with 2 boards and one block before leaving with 2:21 remaining in the second quarter. One would think that would lead Gasol to play more minutes, but no. Is some of this Kobe’s fault? That he can’t get his big men involved?

“I’ve tried to go out of my way to get (Howard) the ball. Sometimes I end up looking like an idiot, because I get up in the air, I’ve got a shot, but I try to find him. But he thinks I’m going to shoot, so his back is turned. I’m trying to think about getting him the ball a lot — take care of him as much as I possibly can. It takes me out of rhythm a little bit, but I’m fine with that. If that’s going to help our team, I’m more than willing to do that.

“I’ve constantly tried to help him out, tried to talk to him,” Bryant continued. “Two o’clock in the morning, three o’clock in the morning. Texting him. Sharing reading materials. Anything to try and help him. “It’s on me to make shots, but I’m having to make tough shots, getting the ball 30 feet from the basket and [expletive] like that.”

The man is trying. Howard’s gotta be more assertive.

The Lakers had a team meeting with coach Mike D’Antoni. Kobe Bryant asked Dwight Howard if Howard had a problem in playing with him. Kobe acknowledged that he can be hard to play with, and defied one and all to stand up to him. Reports say that Howard was “despondent” and did not speak up. This comes in the wake of Howard complaining about taking only five shots in the Lakers’ game versus the Bulls earlier this week. Bryant was 7-22 in that game. “There’s nothing I can do,” Howard told reporters in Chicago. “Just continue to play. Not get frustrated. As hard as it is, I can’t get frustrated.” Howard later apologized about his comments, calling himself “immature”.

“Obviously our problems were the chemistry was not clicking,” D’Antoni said. “You try, ‘OK, I’ll push that guy, I’ll pull that guy,’ and you hope things overcome that and it didn’t. It didn’t. Now you get down to brass tactics and open your heart up and let everything be raw and see if we can solve some of the problems or the issues and just go forward.”

Grizzlies did trade F/C Marreese Speights, G Wayne Ellington, G Josh Selby, and a future first-round pick for F Jon Leuer with the Cavaliers. Even though the Grizzlies were short-handed, they were short three players after their trade with the Cavaliers, and they still made short work of the Lakers.

The Lakers have now lost to the Grizzles, Bulls, Heat and Raptors in their last four games. They play the Jazz, Hornets, Suns and Thunder in their next four games. Can we just count them out of the playoffs already?