The Lakers’ season will remain a failure, even if Frank Vogel’s men have mostly been unlucky … After this completely failed title defense, Kyle Kuzma tried to find the reasons behind the poor results. And his arguments are quite convincing.
After their title won in the bubble, moreover, the Lakers were still favorites at the start of the season. LeBron James and Anthony Davis showed their complementarity, and the many signatures made by Rob Pelinka strongly resembled improvements in certain key positions.
Wesley Matthews is normally a safe bet in his role of trigger, Marc Gasol is a talented defender and an organizer, when Dennis Schroder and Montrezl Harrell had to bring this touch of madness in attack … If we add to that the signing of Andre Drummond in mid-year, the Purple and Gold were to shine in the playoffs!
The problem is, injuries got involved! And faced with the Suns in good health, and above all very organized and sure of their strength, the Lakers had to bow in the first round… In an interview with Lakers Daily, Kyle Kuzma gave the reasons for this failure according to him. His speech makes sense.
I think this short offseason has been a big factor in our poor form. We’ve all felt it at one point or another during the season. Over the year we have had muscle injuries, we have taken preventable blows … Like every season, but there a little more all the same. Have we had 71 days to prepare? Knowing that after the title everyone wanted to rest.
We had the impression of playing only one season. There wasn’t really any downtime in the year… We went from the interruption of the season, to the bubble for 3 months, then we only had a month and a half to get back in shape. . This is not the ordinary program. The time has been long since the start of the 2019 season …
It’s hard to prove Kyle Kuzma wrong on this point. Indeed, organisms have suffered enormously in California because of the repeated chain of efforts. Is the lack of recovery at the origin of the injury of Anthony Davis in the playoffs? Maybe ! One thing is certain in any case, the Lakers could not defend their title 100%.
Kyle Kuzma regrets the lack of rest this offseason for his team, and rightly so. It is no coincidence that the last two finalists had to come out in the first round this season!
