The Los Angeles Lakers are a team in transition as they look to bounce back from four straight years of missing the playoffs. The team was fortunate to be able to draft Lonzo Ball out of UCLA with the second overall pick in the draft, who they believe will help overhaul their offense.
Ball’s natural passing ability is on another level and should help his new teammates find open shots with more frequency and help to improve the overall efficiency of the Lakers offense.
Head coach Luke Walton will need to ensure that his system takes full advantage of Ball’s talents and provides him with plenty of room to operate. Ball was a guest on the LN Podcast this week and spoke about his relationship with Walton and the style that the team hopes to play next season:
“It’s early but you can already tell that he wants to play really fast. Every time he’s in there watching us play he’s always telling me to push the ball. He’s very supportive but at the same time, whenever I start messing up or I do something wrong he’s going to tell me about it. He’ll do whatever he can to help the team get to where it needs to be.”
It’s encouraging to hear that Walton intends to push the pace as often as possible. As we saw in the Las Vegas Summer League, Ball has an amazing ability to find open players down the court, which allows the Lakers to attack quickly while the defense is still on their heels.
Teams will do what they can to slow down the Los Angeles attack, but Ball has proven that his passing can be contagious, and with the right personnel on the floor, the Lakers will hope to have the ball pinging around the court until they find a shot that they like.
Check out Lonzo’s appearance on the podcast here:
