{"id":35270,"date":"2022-08-04T12:42:46","date_gmt":"2022-08-04T12:42:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/lakers-notes-westbrook-closing-lineup-nunn-lebron\/"},"modified":"2022-08-04T12:42:46","modified_gmt":"2022-08-04T12:42:46","slug":"lakers-notes-westbrook-closing-lineup-nunn-lebron","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/lakers-notes-westbrook-closing-lineup-nunn-lebron\/","title":{"rendered":"Lakers Notes: Westbrook, Closing Lineup, Nunn, LeBron"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>\n<p>While former <strong>Lakers<\/strong> head coach <strong>Frank Vogel<\/strong> benched <strong>Russell Westbrook<\/strong> late in games a small handful of times last season, new coach <strong>Darwin Raw<\/strong> will have more power to do so this season, assuming Westbrook remains on the roster and Ham decides there are better fits in crunch time, says Jovan Buha of The Athletic.<\/p>\n<p>Buha expects Westbrook to get opportunities to close out games, but notes that it will depend on his shooting, decision-making, and defense.<\/p>\n<p><strong>LeBron James<\/strong> and <strong>Anthony Davis<\/strong> are, of course, locks to be part of the Lakers&#8217; \u201cclosing\u201d five, and Buha views <strong>Austin Reaves<\/strong> as the next-best bet to join that group because he can be a secondary ball-handler.  Buha predicts that <strong>Juan Toscano-Anderson<\/strong> and <strong>Troy Brown<\/strong> will fill out the closing five in instances when Westbrook is on the bench.<\/p>\n<p>Here&#8217;s more on the Lakers:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>although <strong>Kendrick Nunn<\/strong> recently said he feels 100% healthy after missing the entire 2021\/22 season due to a knee injury, he has yet to resume playing five-on-five, which will be the \u201cnext big hurdle\u201d in his recovery process, Buha writes.  The expectation for now is that Nunn will be ready to go for training camp.<\/li>\n<li>Buha believes that the Lakers are done adding veteran free agents this offseason, and that any additional roster changes would come via trade.  He notes that the team could also be active on the buyout market after the 2023 trade deadline.<\/li>\n<li><strong>LeBron James<\/strong> will become eligible on Thursday to sign a contract extension with the Lakers, but Chris Mannix of SI.com doesn&#8217;t believe James will be in any rush to sign that deal, since he can maintain leverage and keep pressure on the team by taking his time.  He could sign that extension at any time up until June 30, 2023.<\/li>\n<\/ul><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>While former Lakers head coach Frank Vogel benched Russell Westbrook late in games a small handful of times last season, new coach Darwin Raw will have more power to do so this season, assuming Westbrook remains on the roster and Ham decides there are better fits in crunch time, says Jovan Buha of The Athletic. &hellip;<\/p>\n<p class=\"read-more\"> <a class=\"\" href=\"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/lakers-notes-westbrook-closing-lineup-nunn-lebron\/\"> <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Lakers Notes: Westbrook, Closing Lineup, Nunn, LeBron<\/span> Read More &raquo;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":420,"url":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/lakers-news-latest-reports-on-russell-westbrook-malik-monk-and-free-agent-targets-bleach-report\/","url_meta":{"origin":35270,"position":0},"title":"Lakers News: Latest Reports on Russell Westbrook, Malik Monk and Free Agent Targets |  Bleach Report","date":"June 30, 2022","format":false,"excerpt":"0 of 3Andrew D. Bernstein\/NBAE via Getty ImagesA colossally disappointing 2021-22 NBA season by the Los Angeles Lakers will finally be put to bed when free agency opens Thursday night.That's when the Lakers will start taking tangible steps away from the frustrating, injury-filled season and hopefully toward a return to\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Sports&quot;","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":37495,"url":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/lakers-notes-james-westbrook-trade-options-randle-horton-tucker-walker\/","url_meta":{"origin":35270,"position":1},"title":"Lakers Notes: James, Westbrook, Trade Options, Randle, Horton-Tucker, Walker","date":"August 6, 2022","format":false,"excerpt":"LeBron James became eligible for a two-year extension on Thursday. While the Lakers and James have until June 30 \u2014 when James would become an unrestricted free agent \u2014 to reach an agreement, ESPN's Dave McMenamin indicated on NBA Today that there's mutual interest in getting an extension done (video\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Sports&quot;","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":22919,"url":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/lakers-podcasts-should-they-send-out-multiple-picks-to-trade-westbrook\/","url_meta":{"origin":35270,"position":2},"title":"Lakers Podcasts: Should they send out multiple picks to trade Westbrook?","date":"July 23, 2022","format":false,"excerpt":"As it stands right now, the Lakers are reportedly adamantly against moving both of the first-round picks at their disposal in any Russell Westbrook trade. This stance has been a major roadblock which they've continued to slam up against as they've trade to resuscitate their title hopes at the end\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Sports&quot;","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":18463,"url":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/lakers-rumors-irving-trade-targets-westbrook\/","url_meta":{"origin":35270,"position":3},"title":"Lakers Rumors: Irving, Trade Targets, Westbrook","date":"July 18, 2022","format":false,"excerpt":"It remains to be seen whether or not the Lakers will be able to work out a trade with the nets for Kyrie Irvingbut Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN believes LA has at least one more major roster move up its sleeve this offseason, as he stated on Monday during the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Sports&quot;","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cdn.hoopsrumors.com\/files\/2022\/04\/Russell-Westbrook-1-900x609.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35270"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35270"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35270\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35270"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35270"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35270"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}