Players are still thinking playoffs
Right at the trade deadline, Isaiah Thomas was traded to a team that was below .500 by double digits. It was a young team nobody expected to be good just yet. A young team for which slow gains, even without a playoff berth, would be enough.
Actually, that has happened twice. It happened in February 2015, when the Phoenix Suns traded Thomas to the Boston Celtics. Then the same scenario repeated in February 2018, when the Cleveland Cavaliers traded Thomas to the Lakers.
“When I got traded to Boston, it was a young team thinking rebuild, and play the young guys and things like that,” Thomas said. “But we came together and were like, shoot, if we play hard and leave it all out on the floor, anything can happen. I think that’s what we are doing now.”
At 28-34, the Lakers are 6½ games from the final playoff spot with only 20 games left. Despite that, Thomas and the point guard he mentors are unafraid to make the playoffs their goal.
“I mean, that’s why I play,” Lonzo Ball said. “I play to win. So hopefully we can get in.”
The Lakers are now in a fifth season that began with, at best, faint playoff hopes. Since Lakers coach Luke Walton arrived, in fact, the word “playoffs” has been a bit taboo. He made it clear that he didn’t want the goal to be about wins and losses. Rebuilding may include losing, but it still can include progress.
As this season progressed, Walton changed his philosophy slightly. In December, amid a nine-game skid, Walton expected wins. The players set that standard for themselves, he said.
But there is a step between expecting wins and outwardly reaching for the playoffs.
“I think we just keep doing what we’re doing because it’s working, and that’s building our identity as a team,” Julius Randle said, when asked specifically about making a playoff push. “You know, taking the defensive end very seriously and coming out and playing very hard and establishing how we’re playing every night, and the wins and losses take care of themselves.”
Randle’s response fits the mantra Walton repeats to his players: “Control what you can control.”
The Lakers can control how they play. However, they can’t control whether a strong finish will be enough to make a playoff push in the Western Conference.
The Denver Nuggets (3528) hold the final playoff spot in the conference. The Clippers are in ninth place (5½ games ahead of the Lakers) and the Jazz are 10th. The Lakers (28-4), who are in 11th, have won five straight. The problem is, the teams ahead of them keep winning. Utah is 8-2 in its last 10 games, while the Clippers and Nuggets are 7-3 each.
That degree of difficulty might be part of what appeals to Thomas, who has found himself as an underdog many times before and in different ways.
We know what happened in Boston the year the Celtics acquired Thomas. Thomas helped the Celtics accrue one of the best records in the league after the All-Star break. They snuck into the playoffs as the seventh seed.
We don’t know how this year’s story ends for the Lakers. But what Thomas saw happen in Boston, he thinks can happen here.
“I’m trying to make the playoffs; every time I step on the floor I want this team to think ‘we’re going to win,’ ” Thomas said. “Because we have the talent to win. We have the players to win in this locker room and that’s the only thing we should be talking about, and that’s taking the next step and getting to the playoffs.”