JJ Redick thinks the Lakers need to trust the process offensively
Despite some rough shooting outings by the Lakers recently, JJ Redick believes their stats will improve as long as they remain aggressive and stick to the game plan.
It's no secret that the Lakers have had trouble scoring points this season. Their woeful 80-point total in a blowout against Minnesota was rough and there have been some other ugly losses, like their 41-point blowout against the Heat.
Head coach JJ Redick reached back into his playing days with the Sixers to try to find a motto for the Lakers to lean on offensively.
"I think you have to trust the process of running good offense and getting good looks and trust that those shots will, in the aggregate, go in more," Redick said after the team's loss versus the Wolves.
This most recent matchup versus the Wolves wasn't as bad as their 80-point game, but it was only marginally better. The Lakers lost 97-87, but the context to that low-scoring output is that LeBron James, the team's second-highest scorer, was out for this contest.
In this game, the Lakers shot poorly as a team, going 38% from the field. Such a low number of made field goals, given the kind of open looks L.A. got, seems more like a one-game anomaly than a constant concern.
"We can't control makes or misses," Anthony Davis said postgame. "We just have to continue to create those looks. We continue to create those looks then eventually those shots have to fall, especially if guys continue to put in the work and shoot the ball with confidence."
Believing in the math here means that, over time, the Lakers will hit more of the kind of looks that didn't go in against Minnesota. Still, there have been enough tough offensive outings where inconsistent scoring seems to be the only consistency.
The Lakers are 18th in scoring in the NBA, averaging 111.3 points per game. Their offensive rating is 111.7, which is 16th in the league. The Lakers' offensive numbers are mediocre, but they aren't horrendous.
They'll need to have less of these kinds of offensive showings moving forward if they want to climb in the standings and be contenders in the West.
Barring a trade, the bench players will be the most important factor in determining where the Lakers can improve offensively. The Lakers' reserves currently score 15.5 points per game, the fourth-worst bench production in the NBA.
So, yes, there can and should be trust in the process and the game plan, but the non-stars will need to execute to raise this team's ceiling.
Hopefully, the process the Lakers trust in will bear better fruit than the one the Sixers trusted in.
You can follow Edwin on Twitter at @ECreates88.