Locked On Lakers - Daily Podcast On The Los Angeles Lakers

It's enjoyable to poke fun at Magic Johnson's social media presence, and even some of the stuff he says in normal spoken word interviews. But appearing on Shannon Sharpe's podcast, Magic had some surprisingly straightforward and reasonable advice for Russell Westbrook. "First off, take accountability. If you don’t play well, admit it. Stop trying to fight the media and the fans and go out and perform," he said, using his own Finals failure (Tragic Johnson, anyone?) in '84 as a template...

Three games in, and the mood is already getting dark...

He's not the only issue, but Russell Westbrook was once again the focus of attention

The Lakers have a Russell Westbrook problem. It was evident on Sunday in a home loss to Portland dropping the team to 0-3 as they stare down two upcoming games against Denver and a third in Minnesota. 0-6 is a real possibility. Westbrook, Sunday, wasn't uniformly bad, but was on the floor as the Lakers blew a late lead, and contributed to it with some goofy choices, including a terrible decison to pull up for an early-clock jumper with 28 seconds left in an effort to get a 2-for-1...

The shooting woes continue for the Lakers, who were worse from 3 on Thursday than Tuesday...

On the one hand, the Lakers lost Thursday's home opener to the Clippers, 103-97, dropping to 0-2 on the season. On the other, they played a much, much stronger game than the one put forth on Tuesday against Golden State. Then again, the Lakers still didn't get nearly enough help for Anthony Davis and LeBron James from the supporting cast...

Who guards Kawhi? Who guards Paul George? Which team has the bigger matchup problems?

It was an inauspicious beginning to the 2022-23 season for the Lakers Tuesday night, and things don't get any easier in Thursday's home opener against the Clippers. If the Warriors are considered the consensus best team in the West, the LAC are certainly second, and because it's the first game are as healthy as they're going to be...

Last season, the Lakers often lost thanks to defensive breakdowns, turnovers, bad outside shooting, a lack of support from the role guys and horrible third quarters. Wednesday in the season opener against Golden State at Chase, they lost thanks to defensive breakdowns, bad outside shooting, a lack of support from the role guys and a horrible third quarter. It was, to say the least, not a game that left Lakers fans feeling great about where this team can go...

If this felt like Game 83 of last season, there were reasons. But don't give up hope!