EL SEGUNDO, Calif. — As the Los Angeles Lakers huffed and puffed and maybe threw some four-letter words at coach JJ Redick on Thursday, the screen on the corner of the court reminded the team what this is all about.
Just like he told them before the season began and just like he said publicly at media day, the words on the screen read, “Championship Habits, Championship Communication, Championship Shape.”
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The last two words, something Redick said the Lakers needed to be in after the team lost in five games to the Minnesota Timberwolves during last year’s playoffs, has been the most noticeable priority shift in the earliest days of training camp. Luka Dončić, obviously, has slimmed down and is building off his EuroBasket run with the Slovenian national team, but up and down the roster, the Lakers have been encouraged by the team’s physical commitment.
“Terrific first three days,” Redick said on Thursday. “I can say we’re in better shape than we were three days ago. And feel like our group is talking more than we were three days ago. Something we talked about before practice, we’re trying to build something. We’re trying to get from point A to a very far distant point B, and this is gonna take time. But the daily commitment is what’s important. And the guys have been great all three days.”
The Lakers will play their first preseason game Friday in Palm Desert against the Phoenix Suns. LeBron James, Marcus Smart, Maxi Kleber and rookie Adou Theiro will not play. Kleber will miss only a few days after an MRI revealed a minor quad injury. The other three, most notably and likely, extendedly James, are ramping up for a return to full action.
The rest of the available players, Redick said, will play in shorter bursts with an emphasis on showing that they’ve taken the commitment to “championship shape” seriously.
“I think there’s three ways I kind of view, are we in shape, OK?” Redick said. “So the first would be, are we sprinting back defensively? Are we playing with pace offensively? And I would include our ability to crash and then get back on defense in that. And then are we being physical? So if those things are being done at a really high level, we’re in shape.”
With Dončić, the physical changes are clear. The mental ones for him and the team are going to be seen more over time.
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“We just talked about today. It’s not just physical shape, it’s mental shape too,” Dončić said. “So that kind of goes both ways. Both are very important. We’re doing practice. It was great. Everybody’s in great shape. Everybody’s running a lot so it’s been great so far.”
Everybody, it turned out, also means Redick — who took part in a set of timed sprints to end practice that left his players ticked off, but in a good way.
“I told JJ about a week or two ago, I said, ‘If we all hate you, but we all hate you collectively, that’s great,’” Gabe Vincent said. “So as long as we’re together in it, obviously no one wants to run at the end of a long practice, but we know the goal we have set for ourselves and we know what we’re trying to do moving forward. And we all embraced it. We all got the run in and we all got better for it.”
That might not end up showing up on the scoreboard Friday against the Suns or Sunday against the Golden State Warriors, and that’s not really the point. In the preseason, the process matters much more.
“It’s not wins and losses,” Redick said of his definition of success in the preseason. “I would say that, I think, I know it sounds probably cliché, but we’re trying to build a base of our offense and our defense and how sharp we can be with our base.”
(Photo of JJ Redick coaching his players: Adam Pantozzi /NBAE via Getty Images)
This news was originally published on this post .
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