LeBron, Russ, Coach Ham x James Worthy React To Hachimura's Trade, Lakers vs Clippers | Jan 24, 2023

You know, the Lakers were minus 12 after the first quarter in three, six different Clipper players hit threes in the first quarter, they had seven, then in the second quarter, they went eight for 10 from three. And when you get to that half and you're looking, they're down by 20 feet, they were minus 24 just in that category. And by the way, they weren't playing that bad for seven for 20 at the time. So the Clippers just had that kind of a first half. Like you said, they only made four in the second half, but at that point, you know, it's a catch up. And, you know, Paul George, Kawhi Leonard, they played great. They combined for 52. Norman Powell was awesome. The size of the Clippers definitely hurt. They out rebounded Lakers by 15. Yeah. I mean, you know, when they are rolling with Kawhi and Paul George in the game, it's an extra dimension that they have out there because they have two guys that are almost unstoppable and require a lot of attention defensively. And then the supporting cast, you know, they're just waiting to knock down threes. Injuries have hurt a lot of teams. I think for them, they're not having Kawhi and Paul George consistently. And just like a lot of teams in the West, they played inconsistent basketball. But when they play the Lakers, they know the meaning of that game. And I give them a lot of credit. They always step up. All their guys do. And they just play better. That's about it. Yeah. I mean, you know, they sustain, you know, their injuries and they manage it well. I mean, I think they know who they have. They know what their goals are. And they manage the load management fairly well to maintain a six-spot position, knowing that they can move up, you know, as the season goes on. And, of course, their measure is the Lakers. So, any other team they get up for, but when the Lakers, they want to win. They haven't lost in I don't know how long. And they continue to dominate. Yeah. It was the last win. I mean, James, despite it all, you know, the Lakers were down 10 near the midpoint of that fourth quarter. They're right there. And you have that weird inbounds play. You know, Schroeder ends up bobbling the ball. Easy three-point play for Kawhi Leonard at the other end. Another couple turnovers. All of a sudden, the Lakers are down almost 20 again. So, they're right there, despite having 53 points on the bench between A.D., Austin Reeves, and Lonnie Walker, the fourth. Hopefully, those guys come back soon, a.k.a. maybe even tomorrow for A.D. Last time the Lakers beat them, you had your own tent outside. Yeah. With a TV, cigars, and we weren't even allowed to talk to each other or watch the game together. Yeah, it was crazy, right? Crazy times. COVID time, it was crazy. Worthy condo out there. I miss my tent. Good little setup. You miss that tent, don't you? I do. If that skunk didn't come by, you might still be out there. If the skunk didn't show up, I'd be out there right now. That's the truth. I would be. I think you enjoyed your time away from us. I love my little privacy, but you know, I like coming here and spending time with you guys. Back to the tent. Yeah, and as I mentioned before, Kawhi and Paul George combined for 52 points. When they're playing like this, they're a tough team to beat. This is what the Clipper front office envisioned when they made this happen a few years ago. And what team in the West can they lose to in a seven-game series? I mean, there's some pretty good teams in the West, but these guys are healthy. With the Clipper depth, I'd probably put them ahead of New Orleans, put them ahead of Dallas. 133-115. Paul George has 27. Kawhi, 25. Norman Powell, 22. LeBron, 46. Russ, 17. Thomas Bryant, 15. Let's hear from Darvin Ham. He's speaking with Mike Trudell in the media. Obviously, red hot from three early. How much of that did you feel like was kind of on defense and the way that things were going? And how much do you feel like that had to do with the lead that this time proved to be too much to climb out of? We probably had a couple of breakdowns, but for the most part, I kept telling my team not to be discouraged because I felt like we were getting some great contests. It was a high degree of difficulty when we came in at halftime and our analytical department talked about their QSQ, which is their overall shot quality. It was very difficult. We were forcing them into really tough shots, and they were just making them. So you tip your hat to them. Hell of a first half by them shooting the ball and their overall play. I was proud of our guys coming out, giving us a huge effort, bringing it in close. But against a great team like that, you've got to play damn near perfect to overcome that deficit. Games or runs, the NBA level is based on runs, and every team is going to make them. They made theirs. We made ours. Then they start going into another one. And with the game left to play, another game to play tonight, a quick turnaround, I didn't want to run our guys in the ground as much as we can. The beautiful thing about this league is you get to do it all over again, so you don't have time to feel sorry for yourself. The Clippers are a hell of a ball club. I tip my hat to them once again. T. Lewis, that's my man, hell of a coach. But we have business to do tomorrow. We'll have to fill our cups back up and get ready to go to battle against a young, aggressive, athletic, energetic San Antonio ball club. Darvin, did you see the way the bench reacted right after those guys came out of the game? It looked like Russ and Dennis got into something. LeBron looked pretty disappointed. What did you see in the aftermath of those turnovers and that little quick run? I just think communication about how we can get better, what can we do better to not allow this type of thing to happen. We dug ourselves a big hole. It's frustrating because you can go back and look at the film, and I'm pretty positive like 85%, 90% of those shots were heavily contested. I made an executive decision to pull the plug. Knowing we have a game to play tomorrow, we have to give ourselves the best chance possible to win. A lot of times with so many games on your schedule, a home back-to-back, I don't know if it could be argued that you keep your guys in there trying to fight, but down 18, five minutes left, nah. Knowing we have another one to tee up tomorrow, I thought better of it. Again, we don't ever want to accept losing. We're not going to accept losing, but at the end of the day, you have to be smart about the way you go about your business. That was me making an executive decision. Our guys are highly competitive. They don't want to just throw in the towel that easily, but I thought better of it, and I pulled the plug. First off, do you know right now what the management is going to be for LeBron tomorrow? He has been questionable throughout the last couple weeks. We'll see. Once everyone wakes up in the morning, God willing, we'll see who's available and what we got going on. The fourth 40-point game LeBron has had since turning 38, how tough is it to see him put in the effort and then the team not getting within single digits at the end? Yeah, it's disappointing, but it's twofold. I'm happy for him, and we got to get better. We got to give some help in other areas. I think we're doing a better job of taking care of the ball, but we just got to continue to fight, continue to compete at a high level, continue to play together, and allow him some help. He's playing at an unbelievable level right now. It's amazing to be able to watch. But having said that, we want to win. We want to win games, and so everybody can do a little something better, myself and my staff included. But we can't think about, look over our shoulder and marinate and focus on lost opportunity. We have to look forward, and there's a lot of winnable games coming up on our schedule. Dennis Shuler scored seven points in the loss. He's standing by in the locker room with Allie. Dennis, Clippers come out shooting red hot, obviously 60% for the game. When they set the tone there with the three ball in the first half, how do you kind of assess the defense and the challenge from there? Yeah, I mean, they shot 50%, I think, for the whole night. So, I mean, it's tough to beat any team who make 23 threes. You know, there was guarded. Sometimes there was open. But the good thing about the NBA is we got a chance tomorrow to compete again for 48 minutes and get a W. You guys did make a run, cut it to 10 there. A lot of momentum on your side. And then, obviously, they were able to push it back up to 18. What did you like about the fight to get back in it? And then, obviously, what kind of transpired after, as they were able to make that run? Yeah, I mean, we showed it in Portland, you know, that when we play with physicality, intensity, that we, you know, come back from any deficit. But I think we got to start the game like that and do it for 48 minutes. I always keep saying that. Got to change some things there, but next chance tomorrow. You and Russ were talking pretty passionately after you guys got subbed out. Was that about the turnovers? Is that pretty normal between you and him? What's going on? I mean, at the end of the day, I was so frustrated about that play because I had a chance. It was a 50-50 war with PG and me. Then I think I fouled Kawhi and won. I don't care if somebody does a mistake. Nobody's perfect. I do so many mistakes in the game, so I don't care. It was nothing about him, and I told him that too, you know. End of the day, we just, you know, try to compete, try to get some Ws. And, you know, after that conversation, we was on the same page. So it's pretty much just a one-game thing and move on if that's what you're saying. I mean, he's my brother. Yeah, of course. I mean, I've been with him in OKC. I've been through a lot with him. So at the end of the day, he's my big brother. And you've got to have conversations like that sometimes, you know. And we're on the same page now and try to compete for tomorrow. Darvin took all of you guys out of the game. Is that understandable because you know you have another game tomorrow? Or would you guys prefer to stay in there and keep competing because that's what you guys do? He took you guys out. You were down, I think, 18. He decided, as he said, make an executive decision to take you out. Would your purpose have been to stay in the game or are you okay with it because tomorrow is another game? I mean, we don't want to let go. No game, first off. But I think we had a good push, you know. Pushed it down to minus 10, I think. And we had that turnover, you know. I mean, when coach makes a decision, we just go with it. Tomorrow is another game and we can start from scratch. 17 points, five assists for Russ in the loss. He's speaking with Mike in the media. Darvin has said that when, you know, with the kind of halftime deficit you have to play damn near perfect basketball to come out of that, you guys head cut deeply into the lead in the fourth. What did you think the Clippers did to push away in the end? Just made some timely shot threes, you know, when we were making a run. Russ, kind of two questions about the same thing. Where did you and Dennis get crossed up on that inbounds play? And we kind of saw you guys kind of arguing about it on the bench after, presumably about that. What was the discussion about trying to get that right moving forward? What do you mean crossed up? What do you mean how we were crossed up? You were trying to get the ball inbounds. How was that a cross up? I mean, I assume you weren't trying. There wasn't a turnover. It wasn't the goal of the play. I'm wondering what the goal of the play was. It was a cross up then. You said it was a cross up, so it was a cross up. I'm asking you. No, you said it. You said there was a cross up on that play. Did you guys get crossed up on that play? No. What went wrong? It was a five-man play. It wasn't between me and Dennis. Okay. What went wrong on the inbounds play? Did you feel that? It was a turnover. Did you feel that that swung momentum at all? No. You and Rui have a special bond. You had a special bond with us. I'm sure he's very excited to be back to play with you. How does he fit to this team? First of all, Rui is just a great human, great person. We connected a lot in D.C. I'm happy he's a part and back with him. Rui is a hell of a talent and can fit in anywhere. I'm just happy that he's here and get a chance to play alongside him again. Hi, Russell. First of all, congrats on making the 24,000 points mark. Tonight you used impressive dribbling skills to successfully fake out your opponents multiple times. In the second quarter, you made a jump shot where your body was turned 180 degrees away from the basket. It was just an amazing shot. You're always making these spectacular moves within a split second. Do you anticipate doing them or is it just a second nature to you? Do you just not even have to think about it? The way you explain it, you need to be around more often. I just try to go out and do the best way I can. I try to find ways to make some shots and make the right play. Russ, I just want to follow up on Rui. What do you like about his game? Where do you see him fitting in on offense, on defense? What can you tell us about him? He's a guy that I don't give a lot of credit, but he's a hell of a scorer. Great hands. Can shoot the ball really well. Can guard any position on the floor. A big body. I've seen him do great things and I'm just excited to be able to see him do it here. Give him the opportunity. He can be successful here. Russ, there's a pretty good chance you guys get AD back tomorrow. What ways did you guys play without him do you think are important to carry over? As you guys get more holes, but specifically getting him back. Just keeping our pace up. LeBron, you talked a few times this season about trusting your work and your shots. It hasn't been the best three-point shooting season. Tonight, you set your own high. Also, the match here, catching the Clippers, the last team you checked scored 40 against. Assuming, though, that you're just focused more on the game, how do you contextualize all of that as you fall down behind again by half? I don't know. I don't really get caught up in percentages and things like that. If I'm not shooting the ball well, because I put too much work in my craft. I know it will even out at some point. I put a lot of work into it. I was able to make a few shots tonight to try to help us stay in the game. The Clippers, they are really good. Exceptionally good when they're shooting the three-ball. Tonight, they did that. They made 19 threes. Shot 50% from the three-point line. My balking them was early when they got that lead. They got a lot of great contributions from not only the Stars, but Reggie and Norman came in and gave them a big boost as well. LeBron, what are the commonalities you can point to to the losses you guys have had ten in a row since Ty Lue became the head coach of the Clippers? I don't know. They've been better than us. LeBron, you guys just made the trade yesterday for Rui. What are your impressions of him and how do you see him fitting in here skill set-wise? I'm looking forward to it. The game is played in between the four lines. We'll see what happens once we can get him acclimated and get him on the floor. LeBron, you guys were making some headway against him in the fourth quarter. A couple turnovers, quick 8-0 run. You were on the bench. You looked pretty frustrated. What was going through your mind in that moment as you processed that? I guess big picture, knowing that you guys have played well in these moments and stuff like that. How did that sit with you tonight? We just don't have room for error. I said that last week. LeBron, in the big picture, AD might return tomorrow, I guess, pending some warm-ups. You guys, I think, are about .500, maybe one game over .500 without him. Do you feel like the team managed that pretty well or managed that even better than you expected? I don't understand. Basically, without AD, you guys have managed to hang on and be around .500. Is that what you expected? I didn't expect anything besides to go out and compete. I wasn't like, okay, AD's out. What can we do? Just go out and play the game and see what happens. LeBron, Rob was speaking pregame about trade deadline. He was saying if there's an opportunity to get all the way at the end and win a championship, there's no resource we'll hold on to if we feel like that's there. At the same time, the completely unwise thing to do would be to shoot a bullet early and not have it later. How does that analysis philosophy sit with you pertaining to the trade deadline? How does it sit with you? He said it to you guys. He was talking to you. He wasn't talking to us. Rob's going to do his job. That's his job. My job is to be on the floor and make sure my guys in the locker room are ready to go. LeBron, you've obviously been on an insane scoring tear as of recently. Ty Lue said before the game that now that you've obviously closed within 200 points of Kareem, he said back in the day when he coached you that overtaking that record was something that you even thought about back then. I'm curious, how long has this been something that you thought that you could do? Don't let Ty Lue gas you up like that. Ty Lue's lying. I never thought that I could catch Kareem in scoring. It's never been something that was on my mind. He's lying there, but he's not a liar, but he's lying there for sure. I also think that he went to the roof in Oracle Arena in that locker room and took that money too that we were trying to go back and get when we went back for game seven. It wasn't there when we went back. I think he took that money and told us somebody else went up there and grabbed it. I don't know. As it gets closer and closer, I think I'll start to feel it more and more. When I was asked earlier, I haven't really tried to put myself in that moment. I've gotten to this place by not even thinking about it or not even being in that moment, just trying to play the game the right way. Even with tonight, as well as I shot the ball, I was still trying to distribute to my guys to make sure they felt in some type of rhythm. I always have. I've played the game throughout my career. I don't know. We'll see when we get there. We'll see when we get there. We'll see. Will it hit me? Just over the last couple of years since we won the championship, just a lot of accomplishments have been happening. It was an effort. It's been very difficult to even digest some of my own accomplishments because I want to celebrate on losses. Appreciate it. Thank you. LeBron continues to amaze. It's another 40-point game since turning 38 years old. He had 46, a career-high 9 threes, and now James and Brez 177 points away. That adds out to be about six games if he continues at a 29-point average. Who knows? Sometimes he goes for 50. All I know is it's coming. Yeah. Brez has pointed out, I think he's made you change your arrival date maybe several times. It's amazing. As his mind is set on winning another championship, he's accomplishing this personal thing, which I know is going to be special for him. You see the graphic there. He finally got that 40 game against the Clips. Now all 30. He's done it, too. Like you said, James, initially a couple of months ago, the projection was after the All-Star break, February 23rd. Now we're talking February 7th. That's in play if he sits out tomorrow against San Antonio, plays five games. That sixth game, if he averages just under 30 points a game, we'll be here against OKC. There's a two-game window, Geet. The 7th and the 9th. OKC and then the game I picked, Milwaukee. I think it's going to be one of those two games. I want to make a note. He's the only guy to ever score 40 against all 30. Kobe did it against 29, but it was impossible to do it against the Lakers because he's always in a Laker uniform. Great point. Pretty cool, right? 30 teams. LeBron, 40. All right, Thomas Bryan with 15 points in the starting lineup.