Jarred Vanderbilt reveals worrying trend about Lakers’ defense

LOS ANGELES – It’s no secret that as good as the Los Angeles Lakers have been offensively, they have not been very good defensively. The Lakers’ struggles on defense came to a head last Wednesday during their 132-119 loss to the San Antonio Spurs in the NBA Cup Quarterfinals. As the Lakers’ defense continues to falter, there is one player on the roster in Jarred Vanderbilt who can help alleviate those issues.

Jarred Vanderbilt has been largely out of the Lakers’ rotation since LeBron James returned to the lineup in mid-November, and coincidently, the team’s defense has sputtered. Vanderbilt isn’t a solve-all solution to the defensive end, but he is able to provide consistently in that regard.

Following Lakers’ practice on Saturday, Vanderbilt re-affirmed his belief that he could help the team in terms of their lack of physicality and defensive issues.

“I’m pretty eager,” Vanderbilt said. “Obviously I think a lot of the stuff we lack, I think I can help provide on that end.”

Over the Lakers’ past 10 games, they’ve given up an average of 120.1 points per game. They have gone a respectable 7-3 in that stretch, but the poor defense has been trending downward even during the team’s recent seven-game win streak.

The overall concern regarding that recent stretch of games was that the Lakers are simply outscoring teams with their explosive offense, rather than getting the defensive stops necessary to put teams away.

“Obviously it’s been a trending thing even when we were winning. . .the defense still wasn’t there. We were just outscoring everybody,” Vanderbilt said. “Obviously during a loss, it’s an appropriate time to address certain things so it won’t keep lingering and get worse.”

And that’s exactly what the Lakers did. Following the Spurs loss, the team has had two days of practice where the coaching staff has made it a point to highlight the defensive miscues with film sessions.

While some of the Lakers’ defensive issues might be chalked up to personnel issues, the film sessions highlighted areas that don’t require massive changes. It’s simple things the Lakers are able to control.

“They showed us our last 10 games and how we fared against the rest of the league,” Vanderbilt said. “I think the main emphasis was we haven’t been aggressive, haven’t been playing physical, haven’t been getting back on defense. It was a lot of stuff we can control.”

One of the options on the table in trying to solve the Lakers’ defense is putting Vanderbilt back in the rotation, something head coach JJ Redick suggested was a possibility, as per Dave McMenamin of ESPN.

As of now, the Lakers are 17-7 and have fallen to fifth place in the Western Conference standings, a race that’s turning out to be highly contested as the season progresses.