LeBron James, JJ Redick, and Lakers players burning the midnight oil in preparation for new season
LeBron James and the Los Angeles Lakers are working hard to be at their best under head coach JJ Redick in the 2024-25 NBS season.
JJ Redick is working hard to instill his vision into LeBron James and Los Angeles Lakers players
The Los Angeles Lakers are heading into a new era, where the players will now look up to a head coach with no coaching experience. On top of that, they did not add any players in free agency to help with their goal of fighting for the NBA title. LeBron James, however, is not one to at least try and fight for the title. His former podcast mate and new head coach JJ Redick is currently working on how to improve the way they play.
Lakers beat writer for The Athletic, Jovan Buha, spoke with players after the training session on Tuesday (October 1). On how the team has to figure out their identity, James told Buha that the players want to be at their best irrespective of who they face.
Just setting the standard, setting the course of action and how we expect to play every single night — no matter who is playing. It’s not about who is playing, it’s about what we want to do every night. We want to play the same way every single night.
LeBron James said
JJ Redick, LeBron James and Max Christie shared that the Lakers all met last night in Beverly Hills to lay out their identity on both sides of the ball and the ground rules for the season. Redick said he didn’t want to waste the group’s time doing so in their first practice.
— Jovan Buha (@jovanbuha) October 1, 2024
LeBron James was referring to a meeting where the coaches sat down with the players to discuss their plans for the upcoming season. Surprisingly, the media did not get a whiff of it. Buha reported that the Los Angeles Lakers met in Beverly Hills. According to James, they met to figure out the expectations of each player for the new season and also worked out how the team could utilize their collective efforts to be successful.
While a team usually does this at their own facilities, head coach Redick did not want that meeting to impact a practice session. He needed all sessions to run at full strength if he and his staff were to help the Lakers play at their best.
JJ Redick to run nine-man rotation
After their first practice session, JJ Redick was asked which players have a chance to prove their worth off the bench. With the squad essentially the same, it is not hard to envision who will play off the bench.
There’s a lot of guys that are gonna compete for spots. I’ve always sort of envisioned a 9-man rotation in the regular season. There’s definitely some competition for that.
JJ Redick said
Here’s JJ Redick saying he envisions a 9-man rotation and discussing which guys are competing for rotation spots off the bench. He said he forgot someone when running off all the names (Dalton Knecht): pic.twitter.com/4kEqDXruvA
— Daniel Starkand (@DStarkand) October 1, 2024
Redick did not take Bronny James‘ name as it is clear that he wants the rookie to develop his game before his name gets called. It looks likely that Bronny’s fellow draftee Dalton Knecht will feature quite a bit in that rotation.
The Lakers selected Knecht to help with scoring when the starters rest. Redick is quietly working to get the team to buy into his methods and when they do, they will be able to fulfil their potential. The team is expected to contend for the title every year. How they fare in the 2024-25 season remains to be seen.
Joseph Varghese
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