Darvin Ham made a lot of perplexing decisions as head coach of the Los Angeles Lakers. The one that stood out the longer the 2023-24 season went on was his refusal to simply put his five best players on the court together at the same time. The Lakers went 21-22 in their first 43 games last season. In their 44th outing, a Jan. 21 win over the Portland Trail Blazers, he finally put LeBron James, Anthony Davis, D'Angelo Russell, Austin Reaves and Rui Hachimura in the starting lineup together. That unit went 18-6 as starters, and it outscored opponents by 5.5 points per 100 possessions. Had Ham landed on that lineup earlier, the Lakers may not have been relegated to the Play-In Tournament and a first-round series against the defending champion Denver Nuggets.
Now, JJ Redick is determined not to repeat the mistake. During an appearance on ESPN's Lowe Post podcast with Zach Lowe, he revealed that he will indeed be starting James, Davis, Reaves, Russell and Hachimura together when the 2024-25 season begins. Getting the starting lineup right will be critical for the Lakers because their schedule is unforgiving at the beginning of the season. The Lakers open against five expected playoff teams: the Timberwolves, the Suns twice, the Kings and the Cavaliers.
The lineup Redick has landed on comes with obvious appeal. Starting Reaves and Russell together maximizes the ball-handling surrounding James. In the past, this might not have been a concern, but James will turn 40 this season, and keeping him healthy and energized all season is going to require sacrifices. In the process, Redick hopes to maximize James in other ways.
"LeBron is one of the smartest players and I think using him as a screener and finding ways to get him the ball in specific spots on the floor where he can be a facilitator and scorer, that's what I mean by being off the ball," Redick said.
The downside of the Reaves-Russell pairing comes on defense. Neither is capable of defending top opposing weapons on the perimeter. The version of this lineup that the Lakers ran in 2023, with Jarred Vanderbilt in Hachimura's place, accounted for that. But Hachimura is not a perimeter defender either. The Lakers are putting more of a burden on Davis defensively than ever by using this group, but are also setting themselves up to win on offense by pairing James and Davis with three dynamic shooters and individual creators.
No team uses the same lineup for 82 games. Injuries happen. Trades happen. A season happens, and there might be matchups in which it makes sense for the Lakers to adjust or there might be stretches in which it appears another player makes more sense as a starter. But this was the common-sense approach that the Lakers so often lacked last season. James, Davis, Hachimura, Reaves and Russell are the five best players on the team. Unless you have five perfectly complementary skill sets to deploy together, starting your most talented group is usually going to be among your best options.
