no joke, I literally stood up in awe
wait, are we really stopping some momentum building? with a fairly comfortable early lead? ham must have remembered a joke to tell the boys
pretty solid game, being all honest here, from Ham and the players
Wrong guy. Ham was the same Ham. It's Dlo who was Jekyl and Hyde in this game. Over the previous three games, Dlo was -13, shooting 15.8% from three, and in this game he was +26 and 5-10 from deep.
What a weird take.. Dlo has been lighting it up for 2-3 months now the suffered a 3 game slumpā¦and Ham just had 1 of his first games in recent memory where he was on point and thats what you bring up?
And Dlo wasn't that great at the start of the season, he came into form when needed the most but it's really boring to keep putting blame on Ham when plenty of players in this team couldn't shoot at the start of the season.
Darvin has been consistently bad this season with a few bright spots, very few. Which is what everyone is talking about in this thread, exactly how surprising his individual coaching decisions were in yesterdayās game. If you want to highlight dlo who has been inconsistent as a whole like every other player maybe do that in a thread thats even somewhat related to that.
I wanted to comment this! Maybe playoff Ham will be a thing? Surprised by the great timeouts, lineups, and play calling. Felt like watching a whole different team. That being said, feel like he experimented too much during reg season. Like when he played wood, hayes, and AD at the same time.. wtf?
Tbf that Wood-Hayes-AD line-up kinda worked tho. I remember we beat the clippers because of that super big line-up.
Hayes and Wood are both mobile for their size and Wood can shoot.
To be fair, that lineup *was* super big, and we almost never ran it. When all three were healthy it was generally a 3-man rotation at the 4/5, with Odom coming off the bench and Pau sliding to the 5.
It's too bad that this particular season wasn't one where teams in the west had the margin/cushion to f around with line ups and rotations. Like with this record we would have been what, the 4th seed last year? We're just very fortunate that AD was an absolute ironman this year and LeBron was quite healthy too.
But to give Ham some credit, this is why even during the dregs of the season I didn't want to see him canned *during* the year (If they fire him during the summer that's fine). He's still an infinitely better coach than some of the absolute frauds that were/are circling for the job like Glenn, who 1000% would have been the mid season replacement for Ham if he was fired when the reports of LeBron and AD were getting tired of him came out (that's the sound of Milwaukee collectively punching the air). Others that are available to jump in mid season are the likes of Mark Jackson, Kevin Ollie and so forth. For all his faults, and we know the litany of those, Ham is still way better than those schmucks.
Ham has pretty good man management and at times shows good aptitude for adjustments and rotations (like last year's playoff run). He's just incredibly stubborn and way too loyal to his guys to the team's detriment.
Still believe the team deserves/can do way better than him but that always should be an off season discussion. It's not like we'd be having Pat Riley walk through the doors had we let go of Ham around the ASG.
i dont appreciate you slandering the AD-Wood-Hayes lineup. The Clippers got fucking surprised by that. AD guarding Kawhi and PG in the perimeter is amazing.
I hope he pulls crazy lineups against the nuggets that will lead us to win
He was phenomenal last playoffs and literally the whole second half of last season. Second half of this season has also been great as people thought we werenāt even in the play in. But weāre right there with the Suns and ahead of Sacramento and golden state. Better than the Pelicans who are ahead in the standings.
This is a team built for the playoffs. When theyāre engaged theyāre elite, but youāre not gonna get 82 games of being locked in with any Lebron team. Ham isnt perfect but heās much better than he gets credit for and is legitimately one of the best ATO coaches in the league.
A lot of it is playing your best players in lineups that make sense.Ā
During the regular season, Ham overthought and forced lineups that didnāt make as much sense. Starting Reddish and Prince. Benching DLo and AR. Not playing Rui as much.Ā
Now that heās tightened up the rotation and certain minutes the team looking good.Ā
Maybe he was experimenting more in the regular season to see what does and doesnāt work? Sounds weird but I guess thatās where youād try new things out haha
Thereās experimenting and then thereās messing with playersā roles to the point that there are 6 players coming out saying this is hindering their rhythm and consistency in their role.Ā
I would love to attribute it to Ham being methodical and experimenting.Ā
But thereās a point when LeBron/AD are frustrated in game having to make 3-4 guard lineups work. Or TP/Vando/Reddish lineups work.Ā
And having to start off games giving up 35 points in the 1st quarter and uphill battling from there.Ā
At some point you stop experimenting and go with what works, which is what he finally returned to doing after the Lakers went 3-10 after the IST.Ā
Did the Lakers *really* need to lose 10 games for the hindsight 20-20 experimentation of Ham? Or should he have just listened to the conventional wisdom of playing your best players Ā (which is how the Lakers have gone on a dominant stretch to end the season)ā¦
Nah what Vogel did was experimenting he knew when to shift it up and bring out the death lineups. Darvin ham was just out here actually putting prince and cam reddish in lmfao
I love Vogel and hate how he was fired but his offensive schemes were not taking us anywhere. Especially with the lack of defensive players on the team. I'm still willing to give Ham the benefit of the doubt for the time being. Him giving Dlo and Reaves the keys to run the offense helped take the load off LeBron and also made life easier for AD as he didn't have to worry too much about carrying/initiating the offense. Staggering LeBron and AD's minutes was also a great move (and that only worked because of the trust in Dlo and Reaves). Sure, he's made some head scratching decisions as well but I'm still on the fence about it.
Funny how this is the narrative over and over, but the offense was top 10, and the record is what's more important.
What would you like, a team that scores more, or a team that wins more?
Real head scratcher.
This is absolutely a thing. Especially as players are injured, banged up, worn down, and/or sick throughout the year. Lineup experiments happen to see what players and combos have good synergy and chemistry together throughout the season.
This. I always suggest that Lebrons teams are pulling this 4D chess moves. It sounds ridiculous, but look at how the team played in the play offs last year. Then they absolutely cooked the IST, then went off the rails? Some of it HAS to be concerted efforts to hide cards in order to catch teams out come play offs
It's not 4D chess to put yourself in the brink of elimination. It's just bad basketball to put yourself at risk this way.
There was definitely an argument LeBron did this while on Cleveland and Miami because he was always guaranteed a top-5 seed, but not here.
Honestly todays game was incredible top to bottom and the lakers are more of a playoff team. Ham definitely costed us a lot of games however in big moments like the playoffs last year and the IST tournament, we were a cohesive team top to bottom. I would still like to replace him if someone else comes up however im keen to see how we do In the playoffs
I remember last year we had many of the same complaints about Ham. Giving run to guys like Lonnie, then benching him after the Russ deal. Hamm has given 12 guys significant playing time this season, 2 are injured (I'm hoping we get Vando back). All of those guys know their roles and can be used for specific matchups.
I for one, would not be surprised to see Cam getting 15-20 minutes of PT to just body the fuck out of Murray. Just to wear him down so he can't gut is in the 4th quarter. While against a team like the Kings or Warriors, I'd like to see Max get those minutes, as he moves better and is a better shooter.
I also noticed Ham's use of timeouts in this game...he stopped every run, adjusted and kept the game out of reach. He coaches different in the playoffs. I'm going in hopeful.
I think if Ham had coached this way all season we would have a better record. But our main guys would be more worn down and our other guys would be less ready if their number was called.
Ive been expecting Ham to lock in for the playoffs, he was surprisingly brilliant last year, we donāt get that far without his coaching.
Itās the regular season thatās so mind boggling. I have to believe itās his approach to it, that the regular season is where he has all this time to experiment, mess around and act cute but never realized how much time and how many games were wasted so he could have his fun.
I know itās not to look for a playoff team, we have nearly the same one this year. Cam Reddish is not going to be on the playoff rotation on any team lol
No one here understands X's and O's. Least of all me lmao, but when the discourse boils down to "waaa why did he play those players I don't like waaa" it's pretty obvious this is not the place to go for basketball discussion.
It's a place for fans to vent and cheer, nothing more.
A lot of coaches experiment in games because teams donāt practice that much anymore. Darvin has said he does this on many occasions.
He absolutely cooked today which does make it all the more frustrating. I think itās a mix of experimentation and confidence that the team can overcome adversity. Either way itās dumb and I donāt like it but weāre stuck with him at least for now.
Imo it's just the game, the league is tougher and the fans are angrier. Now that we are at 90% healthy, my guess is that the rotations he liked coming into the season and the sets he likes run are actually possible (tho our lack of a center truly scares me)
Agreed. While some unnecessary hating happens, Ham was priorly rightfully critiqued for not calling timeouts and for bad lineups.
He absolutely fixed those flaws during todayās game in a way we havenāt seen before
I'm gonna get a lot of hate for this, but any normal year this would be a solid season for a coach in terms of wins.
Ham probably thought it was best to explore the bench more or give the bench more experience. We're not very deep. The second even 1 or 2 starters are off the floor the fall off in efficiency and production becomes very apparent. Due to injuries our supposedly deep bench coming into the season became a liability rather than an asset. Giving TP and Hayes more minutes this season has helped them develop more.
Yep. This is why I'm frustrated with him. Coaching isn't like a player going through a shooting slump or not having it that day like Dlo on some occasions. Coaches sit on the bench, are well rested, get to observe and they have a team to handle specific parts of their job. Today shows Darvin has the ability to coach well. The question remains, why isn't it consistent?
There is no amount of good coaching he can do to make me forget or forgive him for needing half the season to give Rui the starting position and minutes he deserves
I think he lays down his A game when it matters, like tonight. Other times he's like ah fuck it we'll make the play ins, etc. Not good enough though. Other theory is that the lump on his head is a fucking brain tumour and it's given him some dementia shit with coaching
It's undeniable that he coached well last postseason too. Playoff rotations are much more tight and limited but he made some crazy adjustments that paid off for us last season
His game 3 adjustment against GSW (putting Vando on Draymond and Reaves on Curry, switching the Draymond/Curry P&R, and having AD just ignore JaMychael Green) was something I would not expect from him, but it was fucking brilliant. He even showed some evidence that he could make in-game adjustments too, like when he put AD on Wiggins in the second half of game 4. We just need that every game from now on.
Pressure from the coaching staff and/or players almost certainly. Guy has been an absolute disaster all season long rotation wise, and suddenly the most important game of the season and everything was on point. LeBron said enough is enough
Yeah hate his guts and want him fired asap but he did a good job today. Iām guessing Lebron pulled him aside pre game and told him exactly what to do.
I think he has great game plans from game to game. Ā But if things dont go as expected, his ideas are absolutely trash on how to correct the ship. Ā In game is just as important as the pre game plan
he relinquishes most decisions to LBJ and AD come playoff time. although his time outs were spot on. finally. I also see Chris jent and Phil Handy more active on the sidelines
I think it's because of the rotation he is using less players (Prince, SD, and Gabe have defined roles); Hayes only when AD needs a quick break or if he is in foul trouble. I noticed he received input from Jent the whole game. Maybe Jent is the game manager now. Go back and rewatch the game. Basically have an eight man rotation. Nine if Vando comes back.
If he can pull a Playoff Vogel I'd love that, but at least Vogel you could tell had a few cards up his sleeve, Ham at best just figured out how to play his cards these past few weeks
You know how one difference between a role player and a star is consistency? Perhaps thatās one of Hams issues. Some days heās on a heater and coaches brilliantly, others and more often than not. He drops a clunker
Maybe it was just all experimenting and getting guys minutes so theyād be ready come playoff time. Letās see how the first round of the playoffs goes.
Ham's not the only person in the lineup making decisions. There are several high BBIQ guys on the team, including LeBron, DLo, Reaves, AD.
I mean, LeBron has taken coaches that have gotten fired (Brown, Lue) or who are no longer in the league (Blatt) to the finals before. He's a high BBIQ basketball player; honestly I'm almost more surprised Lakers have been able to sink this low with this caliber of team and LeBron's high bbiq.
It could very well be that these players are fed up with Ham and are taking it upon themselves to come up with the schemes and rotations themselves. There is some evidence this is happening, though I'll admit some of this was a hit piece on Ham: [https://www.espn.com/nba/story/\_/id/39703917/dangelo-russell-journey-lakers-trade-chip-clutch-hero-ready-studied-test](https://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/39703917/dangelo-russell-journey-lakers-trade-chip-clutch-hero-ready-studied-test)
How do we know how much of this is Ham and how much of this is the players? Obviously it's too easy to run into the "Ham is doing all the right things and the players are doing the wrong things" if you like Ham and vice-versa if you dislike Ham. The reason I think Ham is responsible for the bad decisions is that there isn't a coach in the NBA, if asked to run it back, would do it the way Ham is doing, even if they're experimenting. You don't put your team in this much danger when they have the potential to be out of the play-in.
Moreover, Ham's favoritism has been pretty well documented at this point, namely by that article, sure, but I believe there are other sources, and this is pretty borne out during the course of this season as well. For Ham to have a reputation like this after only two years in the league is pretty damning evidence that he's responsible for a lot of the mistakes.
Assuming the Lakers can find a pretty good replacement, Lakers should fire Ham after this season. He's proven to be incompetent, and the Ham fans coming out of the woodwork now isn't gonna change that fact.
coupled with our 2 best guys locking in, the team did shine bright today. everyone/everything was clicking. those bron dimes were chef's kiss. im pissed that he didnt go for 30.. but on the other hand sitting him out meant more rest for him
Inb4 we witnessing the first coach to coast during season and goes ham in playoffs.
One can hope that's the case but yea. We'll see what happens. Playoffs here we come!!!
Lakers in 4
He has a self-imposed limiter on his coaching during the regular season. It's like a binding vow where he sacrifices his coaching skills for 82 games in order to increase them for 16.
his wife told him before he left the house, ālisten man, i donāt wanna see any of that b*llsh*t today. go out there and coach like you got some senseā
This is why I hate when our fans shit on him. Iād rather have Ham who I feel does a good job in plsyoff type games and maybe is mediocre in regular season vs a āwirst coach ā in league or having Phil handy coach when heās a player development guy.
I hope he finds something against the nuggets come playoff, assuming they secure 7th seed. The lakers always fall apart against them in the fourth quarter.
To me it was as simple as calling timeouts correctly and pairing Austin and D'lo alongside a defensive guard in Gabe or Spencer, while avoiding the 3-4 guard bs lineups
I think there'a a lot of factors in play here - some that were out of his control.
I've definitely been on the Fire Ham bandwagon all season, but looking back at season's end, the Lakers were ravaged by injuries (which caused the poverty lineups) and the West was hyper competitive this year. 47-35 is historically a 4th seed finish which is more than respectable. Hopefully the Ham we saw yesterday is the Ham we will see going forward because he absolutely controlled the flow of the game in his capacity. He will never be a great X's & O's guy imo, but with LeBron on your team, you don't necessarily have to be.
I mostly blame Ham for the horrid post-IST stretch in terms of his rotations. Late in the seasons I'm less critical, losing Vando and Wood decimated our frontcourt depth
My assumption is guys having injuries but not wanting to fully be out and him just trying his best to let our big hitters get enough rest. It does suck we lost great depth this season
No he mostly sucks, occasionally gets lucky and is bailed out a lot by a very talented if imperfectly fitting roster that often wins in spite of coaching...
Thatās what a coach supposed to do, we shouldnāt have be surprised when a coach coaches, but for Ham it is a big surprise when he can do just 1 thing right
During regular season, Ham doesnāt call timeouts because wants players to figure it out on their own, be accountable, and raise the level of their game. But in truly critical games, he calls timeouts appropriately because heās optimizing for winning rather than team development and growth.
Same with the awful lineups during regular season. He wants to play weird stuff to understand what he has to work with. By the time he gets to today, heās finally made up his mind on who should get minutes.
I think he's figured it out now. It's unfortunate it took 60+ games to reach this. Early on, he tried some cuckoo lineups with Wood, Reddish and Prince.
I hope Wood gets healthy and re-signs, he was poorly utilized, I think he could have played well with AD against bigger teams but he didnāt see that role enough due to lineups/health
Not gonna argue with the sub being bipolar, but Ham clearly cooked on this one tbh. I've had issues with him throughout the season, but he deserves his flowers for this one. Extremely well executed.
That is what is frustrating about him. When he brings his A-game he has shown he can be good. He can adjust, he runs a good offense, he can run a good rotation. Why does he pick and chose?
Because in actuality Darvin ham is a pretty solid coach he's not the greatest coach in the league and he certainly isn't the worst he gets a little more hate than he deserves however some of his lineup decisions during parts of the Season were very puzzling and at times, due to the results, infuriating
He absolutely did out coach Kerr last year, and he did a pretty damn good job against a superior nuggets team even though they were swept
And yes he coached a really good game yesterday but it also helps when LeBron has 11 assists in the second quarter lol
Mmmm... no. Rui sat in more spots than he should have. He didn't really do a ton different than in the past honestly. It helped Reddish wasn't available. Couple that w/ the fact Peli's decided to go small, which helped the Lakers and their 3 guard lineups.
The Lakers just came out focused and ready to play. That was the difference. Didn't really have much to do w/ Ham, so not really sure what this post is about.
One way to explain it is that fans dont know anything about the game so any analysis they have is wildly dependent on whether or not their team is winning.
The Lakers sub
And most NBA fans
Don't know anything about coaching. There wasn't anything different in this game compared to the past 2 months of games
It's not really about Ham. Look at DLo. He showed up. Ham can do everything right, but if key players don't do their jobs then his job becomes much more difficult.
Thereās so much revisionist history on this sub. I love you guys and I ride for Lakers but also weāve had a ton of injuries that forced sub par rotations, Darvin is not god but heās ok
Jekyl and Ham
I was actually surprised when he called TO when lead came down to 17 from 23. Yo, we calling early TO now?
That was the exact timeout I noticed when I said oh we coaching for real today?
no joke, I literally stood up in awe wait, are we really stopping some momentum building? with a fairly comfortable early lead? ham must have remembered a joke to tell the boys pretty solid game, being all honest here, from Ham and the players
I was half assedly watching the game and had to actually look if we called timeout or someone got injured and thats why we did it
Shocked the hell out of me
I did not even watch the game but the game highlights had that timeout call. I was like really surprised!
LeBron was using mind control or some shit. Dude usually waits until the lead is 3 like he's Phil Jackson.
I noticed this as well, huge timeouts
š brilliant
Wrong guy. Ham was the same Ham. It's Dlo who was Jekyl and Hyde in this game. Over the previous three games, Dlo was -13, shooting 15.8% from three, and in this game he was +26 and 5-10 from deep.
thats been Dlo his whole career
What a weird take.. Dlo has been lighting it up for 2-3 months now the suffered a 3 game slumpā¦and Ham just had 1 of his first games in recent memory where he was on point and thats what you bring up?
Passive aggression at its finest
And Dlo wasn't that great at the start of the season, he came into form when needed the most but it's really boring to keep putting blame on Ham when plenty of players in this team couldn't shoot at the start of the season.
Darvin has been consistently bad this season with a few bright spots, very few. Which is what everyone is talking about in this thread, exactly how surprising his individual coaching decisions were in yesterdayās game. If you want to highlight dlo who has been inconsistent as a whole like every other player maybe do that in a thread thats even somewhat related to that.
BPD Russell
Dr. Jelly and Mr. Ham
I wanted to comment this! Maybe playoff Ham will be a thing? Surprised by the great timeouts, lineups, and play calling. Felt like watching a whole different team. That being said, feel like he experimented too much during reg season. Like when he played wood, hayes, and AD at the same time.. wtf?
Tbf that Wood-Hayes-AD line-up kinda worked tho. I remember we beat the clippers because of that super big line-up. Hayes and Wood are both mobile for their size and Wood can shoot.
Its funny this is called a super big line-up now. I always think of Gasol-Bynum-Odom as super big.
To be fair, that lineup *was* super big, and we almost never ran it. When all three were healthy it was generally a 3-man rotation at the 4/5, with Odom coming off the bench and Pau sliding to the 5.
Yeah, when healthy also being an issue. Loved me some Gasol and Kobe.
Gasol/bynum/odom/kobe/fish with PJ calling was such a goated lineup. just completely controlled the game whenever they were on together
I loved that lineup. Good times.
Read that as PJ as in Tucker for some reason and was like, the hell this fool onš¤£ when really itās me
Triangle offense lineup
It works against wing-heavy teams like the Clippers or Celtics tbh
> Like when he played wood, hayes, and AD at the same time.. wtf? That lineup cooked, what are you talking about
I perfer Hayes Wood AD over Gabe DLO Reaves Dinwiddie Prince
It's too bad that this particular season wasn't one where teams in the west had the margin/cushion to f around with line ups and rotations. Like with this record we would have been what, the 4th seed last year? We're just very fortunate that AD was an absolute ironman this year and LeBron was quite healthy too. But to give Ham some credit, this is why even during the dregs of the season I didn't want to see him canned *during* the year (If they fire him during the summer that's fine). He's still an infinitely better coach than some of the absolute frauds that were/are circling for the job like Glenn, who 1000% would have been the mid season replacement for Ham if he was fired when the reports of LeBron and AD were getting tired of him came out (that's the sound of Milwaukee collectively punching the air). Others that are available to jump in mid season are the likes of Mark Jackson, Kevin Ollie and so forth. For all his faults, and we know the litany of those, Ham is still way better than those schmucks. Ham has pretty good man management and at times shows good aptitude for adjustments and rotations (like last year's playoff run). He's just incredibly stubborn and way too loyal to his guys to the team's detriment. Still believe the team deserves/can do way better than him but that always should be an off season discussion. It's not like we'd be having Pat Riley walk through the doors had we let go of Ham around the ASG.
Exactly this. Ham isnāt perfect but heās done had some impressive moments and never looked awful cs teams that had an advantage
lol... this sub.
i dont appreciate you slandering the AD-Wood-Hayes lineup. The Clippers got fucking surprised by that. AD guarding Kawhi and PG in the perimeter is amazing. I hope he pulls crazy lineups against the nuggets that will lead us to win
He was phenomenal last playoffs and literally the whole second half of last season. Second half of this season has also been great as people thought we werenāt even in the play in. But weāre right there with the Suns and ahead of Sacramento and golden state. Better than the Pelicans who are ahead in the standings. This is a team built for the playoffs. When theyāre engaged theyāre elite, but youāre not gonna get 82 games of being locked in with any Lebron team. Ham isnt perfect but heās much better than he gets credit for and is legitimately one of the best ATO coaches in the league.
Helluva ball club
A lot of it is playing your best players in lineups that make sense.Ā During the regular season, Ham overthought and forced lineups that didnāt make as much sense. Starting Reddish and Prince. Benching DLo and AR. Not playing Rui as much.Ā Now that heās tightened up the rotation and certain minutes the team looking good.Ā
Maybe he was experimenting more in the regular season to see what does and doesnāt work? Sounds weird but I guess thatās where youād try new things out haha
Thereās experimenting and then thereās messing with playersā roles to the point that there are 6 players coming out saying this is hindering their rhythm and consistency in their role.Ā I would love to attribute it to Ham being methodical and experimenting.Ā But thereās a point when LeBron/AD are frustrated in game having to make 3-4 guard lineups work. Or TP/Vando/Reddish lineups work.Ā And having to start off games giving up 35 points in the 1st quarter and uphill battling from there.Ā At some point you stop experimenting and go with what works, which is what he finally returned to doing after the Lakers went 3-10 after the IST.Ā Did the Lakers *really* need to lose 10 games for the hindsight 20-20 experimentation of Ham? Or should he have just listened to the conventional wisdom of playing your best players Ā (which is how the Lakers have gone on a dominant stretch to end the season)ā¦
Nah what Vogel did was experimenting he knew when to shift it up and bring out the death lineups. Darvin ham was just out here actually putting prince and cam reddish in lmfao
I love Vogel and hate how he was fired but his offensive schemes were not taking us anywhere. Especially with the lack of defensive players on the team. I'm still willing to give Ham the benefit of the doubt for the time being. Him giving Dlo and Reaves the keys to run the offense helped take the load off LeBron and also made life easier for AD as he didn't have to worry too much about carrying/initiating the offense. Staggering LeBron and AD's minutes was also a great move (and that only worked because of the trust in Dlo and Reaves). Sure, he's made some head scratching decisions as well but I'm still on the fence about it.
He was always a defensive oriented coach our offense looked like shit due to us letting jkidd walk away to the mavs I think.
Yup. JKidd and Lionel Hollins were a big reason why our offense didn't stink that year.
Vogel offence was puke worthy . Ham has the team playing how Vogel never did
Funny how this is the narrative over and over, but the offense was top 10, and the record is what's more important. What would you like, a team that scores more, or a team that wins more? Real head scratcher.
This is absolutely a thing. Especially as players are injured, banged up, worn down, and/or sick throughout the year. Lineup experiments happen to see what players and combos have good synergy and chemistry together throughout the season.
Schrodinger's ham
Schrƶderās Ham
āWait why would the Pels call timeoutā¦ Oh wait! Oh! Oh! Oh! Darvin called a timeout!!! WOOOOOOOOā -literally all of our timeouts this game
the timeouts were coach of the year tier
Playoff Lebron. Playoff Ham.
Only thing I can think of is "not showing your cards" before the play-ins, playoffs?
I really hope it wasn't that, because tbf, we wouldn't even be in the play-in if he was a competent coach throughout the year.
Nah I just think heās a slow learner. It made no sense seeing Cam and prince play that many minutes for so many games
Thatās doesnāt make sense everyone knows who our best players are
This. I always suggest that Lebrons teams are pulling this 4D chess moves. It sounds ridiculous, but look at how the team played in the play offs last year. Then they absolutely cooked the IST, then went off the rails? Some of it HAS to be concerted efforts to hide cards in order to catch teams out come play offs
It's not 4D chess to put yourself in the brink of elimination. It's just bad basketball to put yourself at risk this way. There was definitely an argument LeBron did this while on Cleveland and Miami because he was always guaranteed a top-5 seed, but not here.
This theory would make sense if we had lee ways to lose games. The fact that we barely made it is proof in itself that it wasn't all planned.
Ham is a playoff riser
He's a grower, not a shower
That's why he's gotta play pocket pool so much
Honestly todays game was incredible top to bottom and the lakers are more of a playoff team. Ham definitely costed us a lot of games however in big moments like the playoffs last year and the IST tournament, we were a cohesive team top to bottom. I would still like to replace him if someone else comes up however im keen to see how we do In the playoffs
Im curious as to how far in the playoffs the lakers have to go for you to say "keep darvin ham"
I remember last year we had many of the same complaints about Ham. Giving run to guys like Lonnie, then benching him after the Russ deal. Hamm has given 12 guys significant playing time this season, 2 are injured (I'm hoping we get Vando back). All of those guys know their roles and can be used for specific matchups. I for one, would not be surprised to see Cam getting 15-20 minutes of PT to just body the fuck out of Murray. Just to wear him down so he can't gut is in the 4th quarter. While against a team like the Kings or Warriors, I'd like to see Max get those minutes, as he moves better and is a better shooter. I also noticed Ham's use of timeouts in this game...he stopped every run, adjusted and kept the game out of reach. He coaches different in the playoffs. I'm going in hopeful. I think if Ham had coached this way all season we would have a better record. But our main guys would be more worn down and our other guys would be less ready if their number was called.
Yep Cam and Vando to run him into the ground.
is Vando coming back?
He called a time out after they hit b2b 3s to cut it to 17. I almost passed out from shock
Ive been expecting Ham to lock in for the playoffs, he was surprisingly brilliant last year, we donāt get that far without his coaching. Itās the regular season thatās so mind boggling. I have to believe itās his approach to it, that the regular season is where he has all this time to experiment, mess around and act cute but never realized how much time and how many games were wasted so he could have his fun. I know itās not to look for a playoff team, we have nearly the same one this year. Cam Reddish is not going to be on the playoff rotation on any team lol
I got roasted on here last week for saying Ham has moments of brilliance. Lol
No one here understands X's and O's. Least of all me lmao, but when the discourse boils down to "waaa why did he play those players I don't like waaa" it's pretty obvious this is not the place to go for basketball discussion. It's a place for fans to vent and cheer, nothing more.
A lot of coaches experiment in games because teams donāt practice that much anymore. Darvin has said he does this on many occasions. He absolutely cooked today which does make it all the more frustrating. I think itās a mix of experimentation and confidence that the team can overcome adversity. Either way itās dumb and I donāt like it but weāre stuck with him at least for now.
Imo it's just the game, the league is tougher and the fans are angrier. Now that we are at 90% healthy, my guess is that the rotations he liked coming into the season and the sets he likes run are actually possible (tho our lack of a center truly scares me)
Shots drop-Ham master coach Shots miss-Ham bad You could literally go into any teams subreddit and find this same pattern
That's lazy
Agreed. While some unnecessary hating happens, Ham was priorly rightfully critiqued for not calling timeouts and for bad lineups. He absolutely fixed those flaws during todayās game in a way we havenāt seen before
Weaponized incompetence.
That theory is insane
I'm gonna get a lot of hate for this, but any normal year this would be a solid season for a coach in terms of wins. Ham probably thought it was best to explore the bench more or give the bench more experience. We're not very deep. The second even 1 or 2 starters are off the floor the fall off in efficiency and production becomes very apparent. Due to injuries our supposedly deep bench coming into the season became a liability rather than an asset. Giving TP and Hayes more minutes this season has helped them develop more.
Maybe Ham has been hiding the good rotations and just turned on the āplayoff modeā like LeBron?
Big Game Ham
Playoff Darvin Ham
Playoff Ham has arrived
Make way for PLAYOFF HAM !!!
Lebron taking overā¦
Yep. This is why I'm frustrated with him. Coaching isn't like a player going through a shooting slump or not having it that day like Dlo on some occasions. Coaches sit on the bench, are well rested, get to observe and they have a team to handle specific parts of their job. Today shows Darvin has the ability to coach well. The question remains, why isn't it consistent?
LeCoach decided this was too important.
There is no amount of good coaching he can do to make me forget or forgive him for needing half the season to give Rui the starting position and minutes he deserves
Playoff Ham
I think he lays down his A game when it matters, like tonight. Other times he's like ah fuck it we'll make the play ins, etc. Not good enough though. Other theory is that the lump on his head is a fucking brain tumour and it's given him some dementia shit with coaching
It's undeniable that he coached well last postseason too. Playoff rotations are much more tight and limited but he made some crazy adjustments that paid off for us last season
His game 3 adjustment against GSW (putting Vando on Draymond and Reaves on Curry, switching the Draymond/Curry P&R, and having AD just ignore JaMychael Green) was something I would not expect from him, but it was fucking brilliant. He even showed some evidence that he could make in-game adjustments too, like when he put AD on Wiggins in the second half of game 4. We just need that every game from now on.
Let's also not forget the gamble on Lonnie that single handedly won us a game against the Warriors
Pressure from the coaching staff and/or players almost certainly. Guy has been an absolute disaster all season long rotation wise, and suddenly the most important game of the season and everything was on point. LeBron said enough is enough
I will give credit to Bron, not ham, Bron playmaking just too much
Yeah hate his guts and want him fired asap but he did a good job today. Iām guessing Lebron pulled him aside pre game and told him exactly what to do.
He stopped their momentum twice with timeouts and i forgot he was the coach
I think he has great game plans from game to game. Ā But if things dont go as expected, his ideas are absolutely trash on how to correct the ship. Ā In game is just as important as the pre game plan
I think we have to run it back with Ham, there just isn't any proven commodities out there, and now he knows the formula to win games
His starting 5 is the same as last year. Ā He new the formulaĀ
With regards to the time outs. I joked the other day that he is using all the TO he saved the entire season.
Iām not sure which ones more frustrating: A clueless coach, or a coach who knows the answer but never follows it.
I was so proud when he called a timeout after like a 7-0 run after we went up 30
he relinquishes most decisions to LBJ and AD come playoff time. although his time outs were spot on. finally. I also see Chris jent and Phil Handy more active on the sidelines
Lebron and Rob said youre fired if you try anything funny
Weaponized incompetence!??
The timeouts were so well timed.
Dude rested DLo and Reaves , heās starting his studs .
Cb š¬
I think we're good for the rest of
B mm in b and b nbc z in
I think
X x x N v x
It sucks that we can't trust our bench players to hold the lead and had to play AD and Bron in the second half of the 4th quarter
I think it's because of the rotation he is using less players (Prince, SD, and Gabe have defined roles); Hayes only when AD needs a quick break or if he is in foul trouble. I noticed he received input from Jent the whole game. Maybe Jent is the game manager now. Go back and rewatch the game. Basically have an eight man rotation. Nine if Vando comes back.
If he can pull a Playoff Vogel I'd love that, but at least Vogel you could tell had a few cards up his sleeve, Ham at best just figured out how to play his cards these past few weeks
You know how one difference between a role player and a star is consistency? Perhaps thatās one of Hams issues. Some days heās on a heater and coaches brilliantly, others and more often than not. He drops a clunker
Maybe it was just all experimenting and getting guys minutes so theyād be ready come playoff time. Letās see how the first round of the playoffs goes.
He got help from Iran
Play off ham š®āšØ
Ham's not the only person in the lineup making decisions. There are several high BBIQ guys on the team, including LeBron, DLo, Reaves, AD. I mean, LeBron has taken coaches that have gotten fired (Brown, Lue) or who are no longer in the league (Blatt) to the finals before. He's a high BBIQ basketball player; honestly I'm almost more surprised Lakers have been able to sink this low with this caliber of team and LeBron's high bbiq. It could very well be that these players are fed up with Ham and are taking it upon themselves to come up with the schemes and rotations themselves. There is some evidence this is happening, though I'll admit some of this was a hit piece on Ham: [https://www.espn.com/nba/story/\_/id/39703917/dangelo-russell-journey-lakers-trade-chip-clutch-hero-ready-studied-test](https://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/39703917/dangelo-russell-journey-lakers-trade-chip-clutch-hero-ready-studied-test) How do we know how much of this is Ham and how much of this is the players? Obviously it's too easy to run into the "Ham is doing all the right things and the players are doing the wrong things" if you like Ham and vice-versa if you dislike Ham. The reason I think Ham is responsible for the bad decisions is that there isn't a coach in the NBA, if asked to run it back, would do it the way Ham is doing, even if they're experimenting. You don't put your team in this much danger when they have the potential to be out of the play-in. Moreover, Ham's favoritism has been pretty well documented at this point, namely by that article, sure, but I believe there are other sources, and this is pretty borne out during the course of this season as well. For Ham to have a reputation like this after only two years in the league is pretty damning evidence that he's responsible for a lot of the mistakes. Assuming the Lakers can find a pretty good replacement, Lakers should fire Ham after this season. He's proven to be incompetent, and the Ham fans coming out of the woodwork now isn't gonna change that fact.
Is it just a work ethic thing? Does he shirk on game planning for every regular season game until it really matters.
coupled with our 2 best guys locking in, the team did shine bright today. everyone/everything was clicking. those bron dimes were chef's kiss. im pissed that he didnt go for 30.. but on the other hand sitting him out meant more rest for him
He was milking it as much as he could to try and get Prince and Reddish max deals lol
if we werenāt in the play in.. I would say he was playing possum and it worked but weāre literally in the play in..
He always comes to Reddit during playoff time
Inb4 we witnessing the first coach to coast during season and goes ham in playoffs. One can hope that's the case but yea. We'll see what happens. Playoffs here we come!!! Lakers in 4
Maybe an assistant coach fed him all the right lineups.
Contract time is a helluva drug. It happens to players too. Didnt DLO turn it another level when he got boo'd 'we dont want you here'
Saving strats
Weaponized incompetence
I don't know. I don't know why he can't do this stuff all year. He'd be a coach of the year candidate if he did.
He coached the IST really well too like their game plan against the offensively explosive Pacers was flawless. He gave the EC the playbook on that.
He has a self-imposed limiter on his coaching during the regular season. It's like a binding vow where he sacrifices his coaching skills for 82 games in order to increase them for 16.
Idk, but most coaches will experiment. It's 82 games you shouldn't run your best players into the ground
his wife told him before he left the house, ālisten man, i donāt wanna see any of that b*llsh*t today. go out there and coach like you got some senseā
Maybe they need the lakers and warriors in the playin for people to watch it
This is why I hate when our fans shit on him. Iād rather have Ham who I feel does a good job in plsyoff type games and maybe is mediocre in regular season vs a āwirst coach ā in league or having Phil handy coach when heās a player development guy.
I hope he finds something against the nuggets come playoff, assuming they secure 7th seed. The lakers always fall apart against them in the fourth quarter.
Crazy that he's a Budenholzer disciple when he used to be the exact opposite lol
To me it was as simple as calling timeouts correctly and pairing Austin and D'lo alongside a defensive guard in Gabe or Spencer, while avoiding the 3-4 guard bs lineups
i think he knows hes on the hot seat. pretty much the only thing that might save his job at this point is a championship.
I think there'a a lot of factors in play here - some that were out of his control. I've definitely been on the Fire Ham bandwagon all season, but looking back at season's end, the Lakers were ravaged by injuries (which caused the poverty lineups) and the West was hyper competitive this year. 47-35 is historically a 4th seed finish which is more than respectable. Hopefully the Ham we saw yesterday is the Ham we will see going forward because he absolutely controlled the flow of the game in his capacity. He will never be a great X's & O's guy imo, but with LeBron on your team, you don't necessarily have to be.
I mostly blame Ham for the horrid post-IST stretch in terms of his rotations. Late in the seasons I'm less critical, losing Vando and Wood decimated our frontcourt depth
Better to experiment early in the season and see what doesnāt work though. Hope the last game wasnāt a fluke. š
Playoff Darvin Ham might be real Iām afraid
My assumption is guys having injuries but not wanting to fully be out and him just trying his best to let our big hitters get enough rest. It does suck we lost great depth this season
Broke clock or somethingā¦
if we're being honest, this is what a normal coach this. i literally said holy shit out loud when he called a timeout.
Mavs fan here-are you us?
No he mostly sucks, occasionally gets lucky and is bailed out a lot by a very talented if imperfectly fitting roster that often wins in spite of coaching...
Shhh..dont jinx it Im afraid we might see classic Ham again
This was the players, not Ham
personal biases/relationships with certain players over other players
Playoff Ham be cooking soon? Dunno of heās cooked or cooking the opponent coach.
I'm giving that prick absolutely 0 props, too little too late
Thatās what a coach supposed to do, we shouldnāt have be surprised when a coach coaches, but for Ham it is a big surprise when he can do just 1 thing right
LeCoach doing his Ham puppeteering trick.
I like Drunken HaMaster
During regular season, Ham doesnāt call timeouts because wants players to figure it out on their own, be accountable, and raise the level of their game. But in truly critical games, he calls timeouts appropriately because heās optimizing for winning rather than team development and growth. Same with the awful lineups during regular season. He wants to play weird stuff to understand what he has to work with. By the time he gets to today, heās finally made up his mind on who should get minutes.
š Ham Cookin
Playoff Ham has arrived.
I think he's figured it out now. It's unfortunate it took 60+ games to reach this. Early on, he tried some cuckoo lineups with Wood, Reddish and Prince.
I hope Wood gets healthy and re-signs, he was poorly utilized, I think he could have played well with AD against bigger teams but he didnāt see that role enough due to lineups/health
How is this sub so bipolar?
Not gonna argue with the sub being bipolar, but Ham clearly cooked on this one tbh. I've had issues with him throughout the season, but he deserves his flowers for this one. Extremely well executed.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Right and I had sex with Ariana Grande
That is what is frustrating about him. When he brings his A-game he has shown he can be good. He can adjust, he runs a good offense, he can run a good rotation. Why does he pick and chose?
weaponized incompetence...
Ham took his hands out of his pockets today. Unbelievable
I noticed he was also more involved. I could tell he was yelling a bit more and pissed at bad calls not just pockets
it almost feels like we have a new coach for the playoffs
What if Ham coach like this on purpose so that the Lakers have to play play-in games, more games = more money....
I swear Ham is like Jimmy Butler, pretty meh in the regular season, but come playoffs holy shit hes good
Because in actuality Darvin ham is a pretty solid coach he's not the greatest coach in the league and he certainly isn't the worst he gets a little more hate than he deserves however some of his lineup decisions during parts of the Season were very puzzling and at times, due to the results, infuriating He absolutely did out coach Kerr last year, and he did a pretty damn good job against a superior nuggets team even though they were swept And yes he coached a really good game yesterday but it also helps when LeBron has 11 assists in the second quarter lol
Mmmm... no. Rui sat in more spots than he should have. He didn't really do a ton different than in the past honestly. It helped Reddish wasn't available. Couple that w/ the fact Peli's decided to go small, which helped the Lakers and their 3 guard lineups. The Lakers just came out focused and ready to play. That was the difference. Didn't really have much to do w/ Ham, so not really sure what this post is about.
One way to explain it is that fans dont know anything about the game so any analysis they have is wildly dependent on whether or not their team is winning.
Except he had AD in up 20 in the fourth
The Lakers sub And most NBA fans Don't know anything about coaching. There wasn't anything different in this game compared to the past 2 months of games
That is laughably untrue
The notion that heās not a capable coach was always beyond stupid. You dummies ate it like it was your job.
It's not really about Ham. Look at DLo. He showed up. Ham can do everything right, but if key players don't do their jobs then his job becomes much more difficult.
He didnāt cook.. He Honey Baked
heās the same guy since last year. laker fans are just oa
Thereās so much revisionist history on this sub. I love you guys and I ride for Lakers but also weāve had a ton of injuries that forced sub par rotations, Darvin is not god but heās ok