I’ve been watching reruns of the 2023 Lakers Warriors series to see how they used Kevon Looney on the offense, and it reminded me how good Darvin Ham’s defensive tactics and adjustments were that series, and how weird it is that someone who did that good also had some of the dumbest, goofiest coaching ideas and moments ever.

Game 1 the Lakers top locked the Warriors to death and won. Game 2 the Warriors adjusted by putting AD in the P&R and starting JaMychael Green instead of Looney and won. Game 3 the Lakers adjusted by having AD ignore Green and putting Vando on Draymond to switch their screens and won. Game 4 the Warriors put GP2 in at center and won the first half, then the Lakers adjusted at halftime by putting AD on Wiggins (a worse screener) and won.

It was objectively a masterful defensive chess match, and he beat Steve Kerr, a legendary HOF coach, in that chess match.

He had the same kind of masterful defensive gameplan with the first NBA cup against the Pacers. The man could clearly run a high caliber defensive scheme.

It’s so weird to me that the same man who was able to coach like that also did crazy shit like play Taurean Prince 30+ minutes a night, start an all wing lineup with absolutely no spacing, completely refuse to start Vando even after that amazing Lakers Warriors game where we won in double OT thanks entirely to his work replacing Prince who was getting killed that game, starting a 3 guard lineup against that huge Nuggets lineup game 1, etc.

JJ is so much better as a coach than Ham was and it was a wild upgrade, but Ham did have his moments, to the point where it’s jarring how good those moments were despite how horrid his coaching job was overall.

With the recent talk of Kuzma being a potential stopgap at pf, it occurred to me why isn’t Jaime a target?
He’s going to be extension eligible soon, do the bucks want to pay him while they’re in cap hell with almost 40mil between dame and Gary Trent on their books both til 2030?
He’s about the same size as PJ and JK, better offball and playmaker than JK although less athletic. They all shoot about the same % from 3 and he’s not a terrible defender. He’s also only 25 which is younger than PJ.
Jaime and Sims for some 2nds and an expiring Hardy and DK. Who says no?

Don’t know the source….

Legitimate or posturing?

I could see Lakers putting this out there to let teams know they expect at LEAST two seconds to even consider moving Bronny….

What do u all think?

"Arthur Kaluma, Lakers

Of all the unsigned veteran players at summer league, Kaluma stood out the most. Scouts have been on the 24-year-old Kaluma since his sophomore year at Creighton. He has the size and athleticism teams crave at the small forward spot and has a killer shot fake. Unfortunately, his feel for the game and shooting touch have never caught up to his physical tools.

That may be changing: Kaluma was one of South Bay’s better players a year ago and had a dominant summer-league performance that earned him a two-way deal from the Lakers.

His 76.0 true shooting percentage across seven games (including two in the California Classic) is unsustainable, but it might not be that great an outlier: Kaluma had a 70.0 true shooting percentage for South Bay last season, including shooting 67.3 percent on 2s.

He shot well from the perimeter in Vegas and last season in the G League and generates enough layups with his size and athleticism to sustain himself even if he posts average figures in other categories."

https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/7461041/2026/07/22/nba-summer-league-standouts-dybantsa-wilson-vegas/

Since Vegas went to all thirty teams in 2018, only eleven teams have gone 4-0. 10 of 11 had an All-Summer League selection. The 2024 Warriors was the only exception, but this makes sense as Brandin Podziemski and Trayce Jackson-Davis played two games.

Lakers went 4-0 with Arthur Kaluma, Adou Thiero, and Chris Manon all playing four games, and Cam Carr playing 3 of the games. Zero selections.

All four of these lakers averaged double figures, led by Kaluma's 18.6 points per game, in Vegas. Kaluma was 60.9% from the field. And he shot 50% from range. Perhaps the question should be whether or not Kaluma was worth of First Team or Second Team, as opposed to whether or not he should have made the list.

Of course there are questions like: "Who cares about Summer League and the All-Summer League teams" and "Other guys had higher PPG". For me, it's about two things:

First it's about recognizing the Summer League Lakers' best player Arthur Kaluma, who had a career changing run that cause the Lakers to sign him to a two way. He might not have a lot of these type of opportunities at recognition. Given his two way play, that should be recognized. Those talking about other playing having a higher PPG reminds me of that Miles McBride quote: he talked about how the league "reward guys that don’t win" and pay guys for that.

Secondly, it's about the principle of the matter. It's the latest in the long line of these type of snubs.

I think we need to seriously be creative as an organization about what alternatives are out there besides Kuminga.

The longer this goes on the less confident I feel about his motivation and therefore fit within our team. He has a history of wanting more money and or role than what he should actually have, and the way these contract talks are going, either he's going to get significantly less money than he wants or we will significantly overpay for him.

While I love the upside and consider him the best 4 besides Lebron thats available, we're also unlikely to land guys like Peyton Watson or PJ so it seems the Lakers should pivot towards finding a quality backup center.

This would allow for insurance on Kessler, while ensuring we have a quality rotation of bigs (Kessler, Mamu, whoever) so that Looney doesn't have to take too much time. More importantly, we clamor about getting young guys reps. WE feel great about Luka, AR, and Kessler and their respective backups, if we let Jake start at the 4 since he's at least proven he can be serviceable, then we have plenty of 3s - 4s who can come in off the bench and fight for a backup if not starting spot by the deadline. If neither Williams, Thybulle, Carr (I know these two are more of a 1-3 but still), Adou, or AK doesn't work out for the last wing spot, then we make a push at the trade deadline for someone, or just wait it out until next offseason when we have access to an exception and test the free agent market then.

I don't think any reasonable fan or analyst expects us to be a championship level contender this year, I certainly don't. And if we add that missing 4 maybe we are, but sending out quite literally your last available assets for someone who has serious concerns makes me hesitant. All thats to say, if we were to pivot towards finding a quality backup big, who would you target that wouldn't cost more than maybe 2 - 3 players (ideally some combination of Vando, Knecht, and Hardy) and no more than 2 seconds (ideally 1)?

After we signed thybulle zo started to look a bit more into thybulle as a player, both advanced and tape. And I noticed some similarities to carr. To start they have a similar height and wingspan, both are good at blocking jumpshots. I think the thybulle signing, besides just good for our team and filling a role we need, is also a good signing for carr. I think carr can learn a lot from thybulle to develop into a similar great defender, while hopefully also develop a more standard poa defense and becoming good at staying in front of a guy.

Jake Laravia started 43 games for us, just shows how thin we were. No other playoff contender would’ve had him playing 43 games as a starter. His availability was great he played 82 games in the season. However he completely disappeared in the playoffs looked like a deer in headlights with so many mistakes. Definitely was a mental thing.

[Source](https://www.espn.co.uk/nba/player/stats/_/id/4592691/jake-laravia)