Lakers News: Drastic Lineup Changes Confusing Los Angeles

They're confusing us, too.

Your Los Angeles Lakers are struggling through their first few games with their new -- and strange starting five, a lineup that is insanely easy to scheme against and that doesn't appear to give head coach Darvin Ham nearly the level of defensive upside he thinks it does.

LA's best defender Anthony Davis revealed that Ham's pivot to a more switching-oriented defense, involving more dropping into the paint, has led to some botched actions, after the team's latest game, a 126-115 Christmas Day defeat to the Boston Celtics, per Jovan Buha of The Athletic. The Lakers have struggled to communicate during these swapped coverages.

Ham's preferred starting five has shifted three times now this season. The year began with D'Angelo Russell at the point, Austin Reaves at shooting guard, Taurean Prince at small forward, LeBron James at power forward, and Davis at center. When that group struggled early in the season, Ham demoted the better player, Austin Reaves, and promoted non-shooting small forward Cam Reddish into the starting five.

Russell predictably starting falling apart as the pressure mounted and LA went 1-5 in the matchups immediately following the Lakers' In-Season Tournament championship game. Two contests ago, a tinkering Ham made his third permanent (i.e. not mandated by injuries or illness) pivot to his first five. Instead of adding LA's third-best player back into the starting group to equip LA with more shooting and creating, Ham doubled down on non-shooters with defensive upside. Jarred Vanderbilt was moved to the starting power forward role, while James was slotted in as point guard. Los Angeles survived to get a critical 129-120 win over the Oklahoma City Thunder on Saturday, but fell to Boston on Monday. 

The first five couldn't do much on offense or defense together against Boston, getting off to a miserable 0-12 start against the Celtics.

As Buha notes, LA's revised first five (in limitedminutes) has been worse than any team in the league in offensive, defensive, and net ratings, with miserable field goal and true shooting percentages to boot:

Lakers' new starting lineup in 18 minutes:
- 105.0 offensive rating (worse than 30th-ranked Spurs)
- 125.0 defensive rating (worse than 30th-ranked Wizards)
- -20.0 net rating (worse than 30th-ranked Spurs)
- 40.0 eFG%
- 46.8 TS%

Minuscule sample size but it's been a disaster.

— Jovan Buha (@jovanbuha) December 26, 2023

This clearly needs to change, and soon. LA is 16-15 on the year overall (2-6 since the In-Season Tournament now), good for just ninth place in the league.