Despite a surplus of talent, the Lakers always seem to find a way to internally implode. The Portland Trail Blazers are lucky to have such a cohesive squad.
A recent string of events going down in Los Angeles have helped put things into context on just how well the Portland Trail Blazers are currently constructed. Portland’s locker room is full of natural born leaders that will do everything they can to uplift their teammates, instead of putting them down at their earliest convenience.
The Lakers on the other hand? Not as kind.
Last season, LeBron James sent shock waves through the league when he made his decision to head over to Los Angeles to join the Lakers. Arguably the greatest player of all-time would be joining the most historic franchise in the league. That’s big news. Many fans immediately expected to become title contenders. Others understood there would be a few growing pains with the young core until they were ready to compete.
What nobody probably expected however, was that the Lakers would fail to even become playoff contenders and that James would throw his teammates under the bus halfway through his preliminary season with the team. Los Angeles suffered through nearly a full year of disrupted chemistry and dysfunctionality, topped off by Magic Johnson‘s decision to step down from his position as team president.
The Portland Trail Blazers on the other hand, have a reputation for taking care of their own. Unlike LeBron, Damian Lillard has helped uplift his teammates and mentor them to new heights. Portland’s president of basketball operations Neil Olshey has also invested a great deal in this team and would be hard pressed to ever just walk away due to mounting media pressure.
"It helps when your best player is your best person. I think thats even harder than being a great player. You can have off nights as a great player, but I don't know that he has had an off night as a human being since he's been here" @trailblazers GM Neil Olshey on Damian Lillard
— Eric Musselman (@EricPMusselman) July 22, 2019
That string of events ended in the Lakers sending a historic haul to New Orleans in exchange for the superstar Anthony Davis. Both LeBron and Davis have had their fair share of media scrutiny, so the pairing would be questionable if not their otherworldly talent. Surrounding them with other hotheads that have been trouble in the past like DeMarcus Cousins, Rajon Rondo, JaVale McGee and Jared Dudley is even more of a head-scratcher.
The icing on the cake however, was their decision to bring back Dwight Howard. As you may remember, Howard’s last tenure with LA ended in a feud with franchise legend Kobe Bryant. Howard insists he’s had a big change in mindset entering next season; but if things go wrong early, Dwight will absolutely become the scapegoat for their failures.
This level of toxicity just isn’t a healthy team environment capable of fostering a true champion. We are already seeing the leaks in the system.
After tearing his ACL just two weeks ago, it seems the Lakers are already in deep trouble with Boogie Cousins. While the comments made to the mother of his child were certainly unacceptable, the situation has now escalated to an arrest warrant being issued.
While cutting ties with Cousins after his injury would have been a bad look, the Lakers will likely take advantage of their free pass to move on if things escalate any further with this case, even if there aren’t solid grounds for any real punishment.
This just isn’t behavior you’d see from the Portland Trail Blazers organization, on both ends. This current core of players are genuinely respectable humans worthy of being childhood icons for the city. The front office is also abnormally loyal to this group, properly compensating Dame and CJ McCollum for their work two years in advance with just shy of $300 million in extensions.
A championship-or-bust mentality is what Lakers fans feed on. But, winning isn’t all there is to basketball. Regardless of whether or not this group goes on to eventually win a title or not, I imagine we’ll all look back on these days with a bit of nostalgia. It’s much easier to root for players you genuinely like off the court. Portland has a group of great players, and greater men. So let’s just enjoy this ride while it lasts.