Lakers' plan for center position may backfire

The Brow has always been reluctant to play too much at the center position, dating back to his time in New Orleans. Despite his size and world-class rim protection, Davis has preferred to play at the 4, which is why the Pelicans regularly paired him with centers like Robin Lopez, Omer Asik and DeMarcus Cousins.

That changed last season. According to Basketball-Reference, Davis played 100 percent of his minutes at center last season, compared to 74 percent of his minutes in 2021-22 and just 10 percent of his minutes in 2020-21, when the Lakers had Montrezl Harrell, Marc Gasol and Andre Drummond to play the 5. In their title-winning 2019-20 season, Davis played 40 percent of his minutes at center, but the Lakers started a different center in 18 of their 21 playoff games.

So while Davis is more comfortable at power forward, and plays solid defense there, he doesn't shoot like a power forward. In the past three seasons, Davis has made 58 three-pointers in 274 attempts, a 21 percent rate. His 0.3 threes per game put him 57th among power forwards last season.

Alongside LeBron James, who shot 32.1 percent from distance last year, that's going to lead to spacing issues. It's hard to have a good offense in 2023 with two non-shooters on the floor. Perhaps that's why they added career 37.6 percent three-point shooter Christian Wood, but he's not really a rim protector who will spare AD on defense.

The Lakers added a number of poor shooters this summer: Gabe Vincent (33.4 percent), Cam Reddish (31.3 percent) and Jaxson Hayes (10.3 percent), while bringing back Jarred Vanderbilt (32.2 percent) and Rui Hachimura (31.9 percent). Los Angeles should have a great defense, but with Davis playing forward, the offense could have trouble finding spacing.

However, this approach seems designed to let Davis avoid playing center in the regular season, with the Lakers trusting on their depth and defense to get them to the playoffs. Once they're there, a fresher Davis can play most of his minutes at center, James can play the 4 and the Lakers' shooting issues will be less pronounced.

Until then, the Davis-at-forward experiment could lead to some rough shooting nights for the Lake Show. The Lakers will take it if it keeps The Brow healthy.