Good morning. Let’s basketball.

The Los Angeles Lakers, 24 months removed from winning the NBA championship, lost again. They are 0-4. Despite having LeBron James and Anthony Davis fully healthy, they have one of the worst NBA offenses I have ever seen. And I watched just about every game of the 2008-2013 Sacramento Kings.

The wrinkle on Wednesday: Russell Westbrook, the scapegoat for the Lakers woes, did not dress due to hamstring issues. It feels more like an attempt from the Lakers to divest from the Westbrook experience while continuing to work trade lines; I thought it was interesting and frankly noble for Westbrook to remain courtside, which makes me skeptical of my theory that he’s done playing in a Lakers uniform.

The key thing here is that Westbrook, who is a terrible fit with the Lakers’ terrible offense, was off the court completely, and the Lakers still shot like s—t. L.A. was 8/30 from deep. They shot 15/49 — 31% — on shots outside of the restricted area. The Lakers offense is not not a Westbrook problem, but it’s not just a Westbrook problem. The team is built to score basically unilaterally on AD and LeBron in the paint, with an occasional shot from one of the guards or wings going in.

The Lakers offense is a Westbrook problem, it’s a LeBron problem, it’s an Anthony Davis problem. But most of all: it is a Rob Pelinka problem. And the Lakers gave him a long extension this summer, two years removed from turning a championship team into a team that would be in the Wembanyama sweepstakes if they hadn’t traded swap options for their first-round pick for Davis.

This offense is so trash that I actually thought Wednesday night that it could use Talen Horton-Tucker! Kentavious Caldwell-Pope, a key member of the title team who went to Washington in the Westbrook deal and has since moved to Denver, hit as many threes in 25 minutes (three) for the Nuggets as every single Lakers guard combined in a collective 105 minutes played.

If you ranked all 30 or so players on the Lakers and Nuggets roster from best to worst, how many Nuggets would you get before you got to the third best Laker? WHO EVEN IS THE THIRD BEST LAKER? Nikola Jokic is No. 1, then LeBron, then probably AD, and then you have (in some order) Jamal Murray, Aaron Gordon, Michael Porter Jr., BRUCE BROWN, KCP, Bones Hyland. Would you take Lonnie Walker or Kendrick Nunn over Jeff Green right now? If Christian Braun were on L.A.’s roster you’d probably have posters agitating for him to start.

The roster is a nightmare. The offense is almost comically bad. The team is 0-4, wasting a few perfectly good defensive games — the defense still goes — and maybe wasting the end of LeBron’s career.

And you know what? LeBron’s offense hasn’t been very good either. Against Denver, LeBron was 8/21 with eight turnovers. He was 3/12 outside of the restricted area.

Westbrook’s instantly infamous shot in the endgame from the match against the Blazers the other night is the worst shot I’ve seen this season. But you know which shot is probably No. 2 right now? From the same game:

Pull up shoot @NElGHT_

LEBRON FROM THE LOGO

8:18 PM ∙ Oct 23, 2022

---

1,749Likes235Retweets

The Lakers have missed the playoffs in two of LeBron’s four full seasons in Los Angeles. But the Lakers were in the playoff race until at least midway through the season in those cases, and they fell out when injuries ravaged the roster. LeBron and AD are here, they are on the court … and the Lakers might not see the top eight of the West standings all season. This is different. This is a red alert. This cannot continue without something happening in L.A.

Scores

Magic 92, Cavaliers 103 — Paolo Banchero has been truly amazing. The Magic are truly awful still, but they definitely have one in Banchero.

Hey Jarrett Allen, what exactly do you have in your bag? Oh, is that addressed to a Mr. Bol Bol?

SportsCenter @SportsCenter

Jarrett Allen on Bol Bol's head😤

12:48 AM ∙ Oct 27, 2022

---

2,377Likes268Retweets

The Cavaliers (3-1) are surviving Darius Garland’s absence. Worth noting that even with Garland and Ricky Rubio out, Isaac Okoro only received 11 minutes of action. I thought he’d be the fifth starter! Caris LeVert and Dean Wade are in there instead.

Hawks 118, Pistons 113

Hornets 131, Knicks 134 (OT) — Not a particularly compelling overtime, but this summary clip of extra time is proof that Mike Breen can make any basketball game sound great.

Jalen Brunson: 27 points, 13 assists, 7 rebounds, zero on-court smiles.

Sixers 109, Raptors 119

Nets 99, Bucks 110 — Good lord Giannis Antetokounmpo is so outrageously wonderful at this sport. And he plays every possession like it’s the most important possession of his career. He hit Ben Simmons with the “too small” taunt at the end of the game. Ben Simmons, who is objectively not too small against the players he’s assigned to guard EXCEPT Giannis!

Best player in the world, and it’s not particularly close.

Pacers 109, Bulls 124

Spurs 122, Timberwolves 134 — Jaylen Nowell, hello.

Minnesota Timberwolves @Timberwolves

THE REPLAYS ARE EVEN BETTER 🤌

2:03 AM ∙ Oct 27, 2022

---

314Likes33Retweets

And it wasn’t just the dunk: he was electric off the bench, with 23 points in 22 minutes, 9/13 shooting including 3/5 from three. And the Wolves NEED bench production.

Rockets 101, Jazz 109 — Another great performance from Lauri Markkanen: 24-9 on 10/15 shooting. He’s doing all this, the Jazz are 4-1 … and he’s only shooting 24% from three. He was a 36% shooter prior to the season. So he’s still leaving points on the table!

At what point do the Jazz — more specifically the Jazz front office and Jazz fans — become uncomfortable with these wins? We’re soon to enter the transition between “cute start” to “we’re out of the running for a bottom-3 record.”

Lakers 99, Nuggets 110

Heat 119, Blazers 98 — Heat defense put the Blazers guards in cuffs, relatively speaking. They only got 25 FGAs between them.

Schedule

No TNT as the NBA avoids competing with the NFL. All times Eastern.

Mavericks at Nets, 7:30, NBA TV
Clippers at Thunder, 8
Heat at Warriors, 10, NBA TV
Grizzlies at Kings, 10

Be excellent to each other.