Quentin Grimes Likes That Lakers Have Each Other’s Backs

The Los Angeles Lakers have one preseason game left before they debut their brand new roster in a game that actually counts on Wednesday, Oct. 21. There, they hope to debut Walker Kessler, Quentin Grimes, Sandro Mamukelashvili, Ziaire Williams, Matisse Thybulle, Collin Sexton and all of their major offseason acquisitions.

In the meantime, the Lakers have been working to build chemistry despite being a brand new team, not yet having their full roster available for a preseason game and only having practices together without the adversity of a regular season. Still, Grimes sees the team as together, and one of the reasons for that is the attitude they have towards each other in those practices and preseason games.

“One of the things is that everybody’s got each other’s backs,” Grimes said after Thursday’s practice. “Everybody’s got each other’s backs in the practices, games, in the locker room and just with a lot of time together. Team dinners, everybody talks about the Slovenia trip, but I feel like we’ve got a lot of guys where we’ve got each other’s backs, and that’s gonna be big during an 82-game season.”

Grimes was then asked what the Lakers are doing specifically to build chemistry as a new group.

“It’s a process,” he said. “I mean, we signed the most new guys in free agency or something like that. But you gotta just learn guys’ tendencies, what guys like to do, where they like to get the ball on the court and where they like to get shots. Also, just getting that connection with Luka (Doncic) and (Austin Reaves), guys we’ve never played with before. So it’s just gonna take some time, but we’ve done a really good job in training camp and preseason games. We’ve got one more game, it’s a dress rehearsal, gotta get ready for the main thing.”

The Lakers do seem to have shockingly good chemistry for a unit that’s never played a meaningful game together. It’s a somewhat similar vibe to the start of the championship 2019-20 season, where the roster simply seemed to get along on a human level so well that it translated to on-court chemistry.

This team is obviously very different from that one, but perhaps their off-court friendship can bleed into a quicker-than-normal success in meshing on the court.

Quentin Grimes mentioned JJ Redick as selling point for signing with Lakers

The Lakers had to convince many players to sign contracts with them just to even have such a new-look roster, and it’s possible that head coach JJ Redick may have been influential — just in his success as a head coach thus far — in getting players to do so. Grimes, specifically, mentioned Redick as a reason he signed with the Lakers.

“He was the main selling point. I saw the [offensive] freedom he gave guys the last two years. Being a part of that offense will be a great opportunity for me to take my game to the next level and hopefully take my team to the next level as well.”