It’s safe to say that the Los Angeles Lakers are struggling right now. Having lost against the Cleveland Cavaliers on Sunday night, the Lakers are down to a 2-7 record to start the 2022-23 season. Things have gotten so bad for them, fans have already begun to give up on the team just 9 games into the season. And a large concern has been the form of LeBron James.
To be fair to the King, there’s not much he can do when the Lakers have such a poorly constructed roster. While his shooting needs to improve, and he needs to find a way to energize his teammates, a large part of the problem is that the Lakers lack quality role players. And this is wild considering that in just 2020, they had the likes of Rajon Rondo, Kyle Kuzma, Kentavious Caldwell-Pope, and Alex Caruso all seriously contributing and helping them win a championship.
Those players have all subsequently been allowed to leave or traded away, and any one of them would be one of the Lakers’ best players at this moment. Naturally, they are sometimes asked about their former team, considering how poorly the franchise is doing, and Kentavious Caldwell-Pope recently spoke about it.
Kentavious Caldwell-Pope Says He Wants To See That Spark In LeBron James Again
Throughout his long career in the league, James has shown the ability to elevate teams with his play. He can make any team a contender, but it’s starting to look like in Year 20 those powers have begun to fade. And Caldwell-Pope thinks that a spark is missing for LeBron, something he addressed in a message to his legendary former teammate (via ESPN).
“Just watching the games, it just looks like there’s no basketball over there,” Caldwell-Pope said. “It’s just playing pickup. It’s hard to watch sometimes. So from me to him, just get the team together, and I just want to see that spark in him again. I don’t think I see that spark in Bron. So, hopefully, he can get it back.”
This is the year James will likely cross Kareem Abdul-Jabbar for the all-time scoring record in the regular season. But if the Lakers continue to lose, it will likely detract from this incredible achievement the King is about to make. And considering that he is still pursuing Michael Jordan, team failure is not acceptable to James either, so hopefully, KCP’s words can light something of a fire under him.
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