Nba, Russell Westbrook to the Lakers: ‘From now on I play my way’

Not working. Russell Westbrook was supposed to be the third star of the Lakers, but it is one of the many problems of a team that, playing to win the title, has passed Christmas with 16 wins and 18 losses and an open streak of 5 defeats. Russ is in the eye of the storm: for the 19.6 points per game he puts on the scoresheet, never so few since his second season in the NBA, and for what appears to be a chronic inability to play alongside LeBron. “Everyone tells me to be myself, to play like Russ, but no one really knows what it means – said Westbrook after training on Monday -: from now on I have my way”.

Being Westbrook

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A proclamation that sounds almost like a threat to the Lakers. The problems are also of the game: Westbrook has not yet integrated into the schemes of coach Vogel, still firm for Covid, so much so that the relationship with the coach is not idyllic. The 33-year-old often looks like a fish out of water: he goes twice as fast as his teammates, so much so that when he launches into those counterattacks that have made him lucky, he often finds himself alone, forced to close down at a time when the shot is not entering. “When it happens, you can only go on – he says -: my game does not revolve around the ball that enters the basket or not, but in all the things I do to help the team win. My mentality is to go forward and always try to improve “. When the Lakers took him via trade from Washington, coach Vogel imagined Westbrook as the team’s metronome: the one who dictates the pace, the one who alternates with LeBron in the construction of the game, the one who helps him improve his teammates. None of this has happened: also thanks to the many injuries and the constant line-up changes, Russ still doesn’t seem to have dropped into the part.

the turning point

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Westbrook, who shot 4/20 from the field at Christmas against the Nets, decided it was time for a change. “Everyone has an idea of ​​what I should do, they tell me what they think and how they would like me to be on the pitch,” he said. I just want to play and think about doing what I do best, what I can do to help the team: get the c … on the pitch, trying to improve my teammates as I have been doing for years. People expect me to put in 25 points, 15 rebounds and 15 assists every night, but that’s not normal. I know I’ve done this in the last few years, but it’s not normal. They all say to let Russ be Russ, but nobody but me really knows what it means to be Russ: from now on, I am only interested in doing what I know I can do, regardless of what others think I should do ”.

Group

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Westbrook’s loneliness is evident, despite the words. In the summer, in the dinner at James’ house with LeBron and Anthony Davis that laid the foundations for his move to the Lakers, he had promised to change for the good of the team, to work to integrate himself into a system in which he is no longer the North Star. but one of the columns, in which more than shining with its own light it must understand how to make its light reflect on others. Two months into the season, Westbrook still hasn’t figured out how to be a Laker: “We don’t want to leave him alone in this, but we want him to be himself,” says David Fizdale, coach Vogel’s substitute. He is criticized a lot, but he is doing the things he has to do: the assists, the offensive rebounds, the commitment he puts us in defense. We have to understand together what to do, how to help him: but it all starts with him playing like a real Russ ”. The problem for the Lakers, though, is that Westbrook and the team seem to have different ideas about what it’s like to play as a real Russ.