The relationship between LeBron James and Los Angeles Lakers head coach Darvin Ham is once again in the spotlight. In the fourth quarter of Tuesday’s game against the Golden State Warriors, James could be seen paying little to no attention to what Ham had to say during a timeout.
Lakers players do not give a f*ck about Darvin Ham 😭 pic.twitter.com/VTgVIrf6JL
— Lakers Empire (@LakersEmpire) April 10, 2024
While Austin Reaves at least appeared to be paying some attention, LeBron really didn’t seem to have any interest in seeing what play Ham was drawing up. It could have been because the game itself was all but over at that point, with the Warriors leading 127-110 with under three minutes remaining.
The Lakers would go on to lose 134-120, and while there were plenty of reasons for that, Ham’s decision-making perhaps played the biggest role in this defeat. The Warriors were only up 90-84 with under four minutes left in the third quarter when he put out a lineup that hadn’t played a minute together prior to that.
With Spencer Dinwiddie, D’Angelo Russell, Gabe Vincent, Taurean Prince, and Jaxson Hayes on the court together for the first time, the Lakers gave up a 16-3 run to close out the quarter. That all but ended the game and you wonder why Ham put out this new lineup at such a critical stage in such a big game.
LeBron himself might have been frustrated by his head coach making a mistake like that. He did his part in the game, as the 39-year-old finished with 33 points, 7 rebounds, 11 assists, and 2 steals, but it wasn’t enough to prevent LA from dropping to 45-35 on the season.
Thanks to this loss, the Lakers are now almost certainly going to end up as the ninth or tenth seed in the Western Conference. That would mean they’ll have to win two elimination games in the NBA Play-In Tournament to even make the playoffs, which is far from ideal.
If the Lakers do get eliminated in the tournament, it’s hard to see how Ham keeps his job. If he had the full support of his superstars, you would have liked his chances, but it seems clear that he and LeBron aren’t on the same page a lot of times.
LeBron James Vetoed Darvin Ham’s Gameplan Against The Clippers
One of the best wins of the season for the Lakers came against the Los Angeles Clippers back in February. They were down 21 points at one stage but roared back to win and LeBron revealed he vetoed Ham’s plan to switch against Kawhi Leonard and James Harden, which helped the Lakers beat the Clippers.
“In the Clippers game, we had switching built in versus Kawhi versus James, whatever the case may be and I vetoed it in the second half because I know Ty Lue, more than any other player that’s ever been with Ty Lue and I know he plays target ball too and it got a point where I knew in order for us to get back into the game, switching anybody else onto Kawhi is not favorable for us or I might as well get ready for Wizards, so I vetoed it.”
The fact that James himself disclosed that little piece of information was quite interesting. It has also been reported that LeBron overrides Ham’s plays during timeouts and team huddles. By all indications, it isn’t the greatest relationship.
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