One of the main sources of frustration for the Los Angeles Lakers last season was the constant changing of lineups and rotations. Players would go in and out of the rotation seemingly at random sometimes and one of the players most affected by this was Max Christie.
Coming into the season, Christie looked like he was ready to break out after a strong Summer League performance. At times, Christie was given consistent minutes and performed well, but he would then not see court time or very minimal minutes.
Despite those inconsistencies, however, Christie still viewed his second season as a success overall, telling Jovan Buha of The Athletic that he felt he improved a lot overall and controlled what he could control:
“I guess, if you wanna look at the numbers I think I had a pretty good season overall. I think I improved my 3-point percentage and then if you look at the two years combined, I think overall from a numbers standpoint it was solid. Yea you can say I didn’t play as much as I would’ve liked, I didn’t play as much as I thought I could’ve, but at the end of the day that’s out of my control and I’ve harped on this for the past two years, you’ve heard me say it so many times. But I thought I did a really good job all year of just controlling what I can control which was my attitude, my work ethic, being a great teammate and then even when I did get out there just trying to play as hard as I can and help the team.
“I think when I did get opportunities to play I played really well for the most part. Like you said, early game in Cleveland in November and then in New York. I just thought I stacked a lot of good games together when I was able to play and so that’s all I can control really. I did a lot of work behind the scenes, I wanted to do a lot of extra work, I still tried to help out the team even from, trying to ask to be on the scout team to try and get as many reps as I can instead of kinda just sitting and watching. I was just trying to do everything I could just to kinda get reps. Overall, I think it was a really good season for me, it was a huge growth season for me. I hit a lot of adversity in terms of not playing and whatnot, but still I think I got better even though I wasn’t getting a lot of live game minutes and so to me, that’s a successful season.”
As he said, all Christie can control is the work he puts in and the attitude he has and he handled all of that extremely well. Overall, Christie appeared in 67 games for the Lakers and averaged 4.2 points and 2.1 rebounds, but he is hoping for even greater things next season.
Armed with a new four-year deal along with a new head coach in JJ Redick running things, the pieces are in place for Christie to take a big leap in his third season.
Lakers’ Max Christie opens up on expectations under JJ Redick this season
In order to make sure that leap happens next year, Max Christie has been hard at work all offseason long and he has already been in touch with new Lakers coach JJ Redick, who has even been helping him in workouts as well.
Christie said that he and Redick are on the same page in terms of how he will be used this season and he expects to be a good part of the offense, defense and overall rotation.
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