JJ Redick Feeling ‘Positive’ After Practice & Film Session

The Los Angeles Lakers have hit a rough patch of their season, dropping three straight games for the first time with all coming in blowout fashion.

Their most recent loss was to the Houston Rockets on Christmas Day and afterwards, head coach JJ Redick was highly critical of the team’s effort and care-factor.

Redick let it be known that Saturday’s practice and film session would be an uncomfortable one for the players as he looks to get them back to playing winning basketball.

After that practice, Redick revealed that the players responded well as they look to turn a new leaf.

“Recalibration and reconnection,” Redick said about the focus of the practice. “I think too, today, for myself, I’m always gonna look in the mirror first. I think it’s easy as a player or coach to say well it’s this guy’s fault, or we’re not doing this because of X, Y and Z. We had a great meeting as a staff this morning, came in super early and met with the players. It was very positive. And it was also listening. For our staff and myself to listen to the players and what they need.”

When asked if the practice was as uncomfortable as he was expecting, Redick did not sugarcoat things.

“The truth is uncomfortable. You have to put everything out there. That’s all it is,” he said.

The most important thing for Redick is making sure players know what is asked of them, and he believes they do after their discussion.

“I think they are and I think the group is aware. The group feels it, they’re on the court together, they’re in the huddles together. There wasn’t anything that needed to be addressed that wasn’t addressed,” Redick said. “There’s times as a coach, you can’t address everything every day in front of the group, that’s just not how this works. Me, my staff and I, we do a good job of if there’s something that needs to be addressed in the moment, it gets addressed. I don’t feel like we live in a passive-aggressive environment. But something you need to have a bigger setting and again, it was as much listening for us as it was anything else.”

As far as what specifically he wants to see changed, Redick pointed to three things.

“I really believe in just getting back to basics and understanding the needs of the team and the needs of each guy for creating more clarity. I know I played, and what can seem very simple up there is not very simple once you get in real time in live action. It’s not gonna happen in a day, but we gotta get back to building our defensive fundamentals… That was priority No. 1 for me. Then, role clarity. Since we’ve gotten Bron back, we haven’t been as organized offensively, too many random possessions. So that’s on me. It’s those three things. Defensive clarity, role clarity and offensive organization.”

The Lakers will be back on the court on Sunday night against the Sacramento Kings, which will be a good test to see if they can build on Saturday’s practice and get their season back on track.

JJ Redick critical of Lakers’ culture

Vibes were high for the Lakers to start the season but after their recent struggles in which effort has been called into question, Redick admitted that their culture isn’t where it should be.

“You know, we had it,” Redick said when asked about the team’s culture. “I always say this about culture, I always say this about the team being a good team, being a functioning organism – it can change like that. We don’t have it right now.”