“He needs help, I’m telling you that I would not have 4 championships if Kobe didn’t give me 28 (points)” – Shaquille O’Neal says LeBron James needs help from his teammates
The LA Lakers and LeBron James had big hopes this season after making many moves in the offseason to get back to the NBA Finals. However, the season has not gone as planned, and Lakers legend and NBA TNT host Shaquille O’Neal is calling for James’ teammates to step up.
After the Lakers were eliminated in the first round of the playoffs last season, the Lakers did a total revamp of their roster after winning the NBA Finals in 2020. They traded their depth for Russell Westbrook, swapping away crucial pieces and allowing other vital components like Alex Caruso to walk.
The Lakers signed older players and some spark-plug shooters to surround LeBron James as they try for another championship.
LeBron last 4 games:
30 PPG
10 RPG
5 APG
56 FG%
The Lakers are 0-4 in that span. https://t.co/nGTydDsv2w
The Lakers sit in sixth place in the Western Conference standings, but they have a 16-17 record. Russell Westbrook has been up and down, struggling to find his role alongside James. Anthony Davis seems to have lost a step, with his averages down since the Lakers' title season, before spraining an MCL earlier this month.
Other critical signings like Malik Monk and Carmelo Anthony have not stepped up, and Kendrick Nunn and Trevor Ariza have combined for just 36 minutes in two games.
Shaquille O’Neal took to his podcast "The Big Podcast with Shaq" to discuss how the team around James has just not stepped up.
O'Neal said:
“Everybody got so hyped up in the summer. AD’s coming back. We got Russell Westbrook. We got Carmelo. But these ain’t stepping up … He (LeBron) needs help. I'm telling you that I would not have four championships if Kobe don’t give me 28 (points a night). I mean, everybody got to step up.”
O’Neal is precisely correct. In LeBron James’ 19th season, he can no longer carry a team to the Finals as he has done before. Even when he did that, his team didn’t always win the title.
If the Lakers want to add another championship to the long list they already have, the entire Lakers roster will need to step up to make it to where many people believed they could reach.
How far can LeBron James and the Lakers go as of right now?
Despite the Lakers being in the current playoff picture, they have not played like a playoff team so far this season. They are not among the upper echelon of teams in the Western Conference, behind the Phoenix Suns, the Golden State Warriors and the Utah Jazz. It would be a tough road for LeBron James to reach the NBA Finals if the NBA playoffs started today.
Because of the team's age, many people expected the Lakers to start slowly, because many veterans wait until the playoffs get closer to begin playing their hardest. However, the Lakers have a losing record a day before Christmas Day, nearly a third of the way through the season.
LeBron after the Lakers 28-Point loss: "We have no chemistry with any lineup from the simple fact that we literally haven't logged enough minutes...What is our starting lineup besides me, Russ & AD? Or AD & Russ? Or me & Russ?"
https://t.co/ioJ5gOcqQQ
The Lakers should try to make a move (or moves) around the trade deadline to add talent around LeBron James, but they don’t have a lot of assets to trade. Most of the roster won't be worth too many other teams in a trade, and they don’t have a lot of draft capital.
Talen Horton-Tucker is the best asset for the Lakers, but they just signed him to an extension in the offseason, making that possibility less likely. They could try to trade Russell Westbrook, but they just traded for him, plus he has a massive contract.
With very few moves for the Lakers to make, this might be the roster LeBron James has for the season. The Lakers may flip a switch come playoff time, which would change a lot, and the team could rely on James and hopefully a healthy Davis.