In the moment, it was hard to tell if LeBron James was injured or just embarrassed as he headed toward the locker room in the closing minutes of the Los Angeles Lakers’ loss to the Sacramento Kings on Wednesday. James, it turned out, was injured; a balky ankle, which has hobbled James since the All-Star break, was the culprit. But the loss was also embarrassing, with the Lakers blowing a 19-point lead to defensively challenged Sacramento en route to a 10-point defeat.
If you’re looking for reasons to believe the Lakers can rejoin the ranks of Western Conference contenders, there aren’t many. Since the All-Star break, the Lakers have been a top-10 offensive team. That’s good. They are also 28th in defensive efficiency during that time. That’s very bad. Against Sacramento, De’Aaron Fox and Malik Monk scored 70 points combined.
“Frustration makes cowards of us all,” Lakers coach Darvin Ham said. “Just like fatigue. You try to get something back, you start going out on your own or you [get] preoccupied, which is something that you can’t control such as officiating. Instead of just figuring out how you can make plays, get stops. When we play like that, that physicality, that needs to be our identity. That right there we’ve shown when we play like that, things turn out great for us.”
