Getty LeBron James, Lakers
For the Lakers, the introduction of new point guard Dennis Schroder into a LeBron James lineup did not get off to the smoothest possible start. In fact, it was quite ugly early on, as Schroder took the floor with James for the first 7:11 of Wednesday’s preseason game against Phoenix and the Lakers scored a mere 11 points and were outscored by nine. James was 0-for-4 shooting in that stretch, and Schroder was 0-for-2.
The two were paired again for the last 7:34 of the first half and things went smoother—the Lakers outscored the Suns, 19-12, in that stretch and James was 4-for-6 shooting.
But the Lakers are going into the 2020-21 season with a major question mark in terms of Schroder and James. Last year, of course, James handled point-guard duties and excelled, leading the league with 10.2 assists. Schroder has been brought in to alleviate some of that ballhandling pressure. Both guys need the ball in their hands to succeed.
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Can they thrive on the floor together?
Schroder, for his part, is willing to take a back seat to James, even if that means James does more ballhandling than expected.
“LeBron has been doing this for 17 years,” Schroder said. “End of the day, I’m not trying to take anything from him.”
Dennis Schroder on ball-handling duties with LeBron: “LeBron has been doing this for 17 years. End of the day, I’m not trying to take anything from him.”
Dennis Schroder: ‘We Are Trying to Find Our Way’
Coming into the season, it appears that Schroder will start at point guard, as he did on Wednesday. Earlier in the month, he had said he wanted to be the starter and coach Frank Vogel indicated he’d get that chance.
But Schroder would also have value as a boost off the bench, a guy capable of big-time scoring when James and Anthony Davis are resting. That dynamic will play out here in the early season and, Schroder said, we should not jump to all that many conclusions based on Wednesday’s game.
“It’s a preseason game still, we are trying to find our way,” Schroder said. “We played and practiced a bit, not too much. But we just try to figure stuff out, how we are playing on the offensive end and the defensive end. Just, like I said, try to get a feel for each other on the offensive end, what I like to do when I am going to the basket, if they want to cut or not. I mean, it is just feel. … Like I said, we are gonna get better at it.”
Dennis Schroder Best Suited for Bench Role?
One of the oddities of the Lakers’ offseason moves was that they targeted two players, Schroder and big man Montrezl Harrell, who perform best when working out of the pick-and-roll—and the Lakers are just not a pick-and-roll team. They ran pick-and-roll on 14.7% of their possessions last season, which ranked 25th in the NBA, according to NBA Stats.
That, in the end, might mean Schroder could be best used coming off the bench in tandem with Harrell, rather than in a starting unit that does not much employ his bread-and-butter play.
It’s all still up in the air, as Vogel made clear when asked if he had seen anything from the combinations he used that might determine his rotations going forward.
“Not really,” Vogel told reporters Wednesday, “we gotta watch the tape and continue to study it. I like a lot of different ways we can go, I am going to feel good about.”
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