The last remaining member of the Lakers’ much-hyped young core, Kyle Kuzma has had himself quite the offseason heading into his third year in the NBA. Putting in work with a number of high profile names already and with USA Basketball camp just around the corner, Kuzma seems to have decided to get some work in with arguably USA Basketball’s most decorated champion.
Kuzma has already had workouts with the Utah Jazz’s Donovan Mitchell, renowned shooting coach Lethal Shooter, and was in touch with Laker champion Ron Artest – aka Metta World Peace. While most NBA players see a jump in their third season, it seems Kuzma isn’t taking any chances and is going overtime with his offseason work to ensure he is able to play a big role on a Lakers team that hopes to contend for a title.
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Lakers’ Kyle Kuzma Posts Instagram Pictures From Workout With Carmelo Anthony
While Carmelo has come under fire from fans in recent years due to his struggles in a limited role or coming off the bench, he is unquestionably one of USA Basketball’s greatest players of all time. With three Olympic gold medals as well as a bronze in 2004, Melo has been a staple of the USA Basketball for nearly two decades at this point. He isn’t expected to be at camp this summer but still has a vast wealth of knowledge regarding the international game and for a newcomer like Kyle Kuzma, that knowledge should come in extremely handy.
Kuzma would go on to call Melo an “idol” of his in the Instagram post – which received a number of comments reaffirming Kuz’s statement from a number of fellow NBA players. It is clear from the interaction that there is a level of respect among fellow players for Melo’s ability to seemingly score at will, however, that doesn’t seem to be shared by NBA front office executives. Having not played any real minutes at the NBA level since his failed experiment in Oklahoma City, Melo has bounced around from team to team over the past two years and currently sits unsigned with what seems to be minimal interest from any team.
Can Carmelo Anthony Actually Help the Lakers?
This is undoubtedly a loaded question but the short answer at this point is that he most likely wouldn’t offer much of an on-court boost at this point in his career. Carmelo has and always will be a volume scorer who needs the ball in his hands often in order to get into his scoring rhythm. While this works when Melo is playing the role of the first option on the offense, at this stage in his career his talents are much more suited to a sixth man or rotational piece. This creates an awkward situation where he isn’t offered the freedom to do what he does best and as a result, comes across looking worse than he really is.
While in a vacuum the idea of having one of the league’s greatest scorers of all time coming off the bench as a spot-up shooting weapon sounds great, forcing a 15 year NBA vet to radically change his game on the fly is an incredibly tough challenge. As the Thunder found out the hard way, a tiger simply cannot change his stripes and Carmelo Anthony is and always will be a ball-dominant bucket-getter.
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