The Houston Rockets blew out the Los Angeles Lakers 119-96 at Crypto.com Arena on Thursday. With the Rockets being the best rebounding team in the NBA, the Lakers were expected to struggle a bit on the glass, but they got absolutely crushed.
The Rockets absurdly won the rebounding battle 48-25 on the night. The Lakers gave up 17 offensive rebounds, and a look at those plays makes it clear that a certain LeBron James could be blamed for a fair few of them.
17 offensive rebounds for Houston — an obscene 55.6% offensive rebounding rate, per @cleantheglass — and 24 second-chance points. The Rockets do this to everybody, but the defensive rebounding just wasn’t even close to good enough for the Lakers. pic.twitter.com/kGMysOf9Nr
— Dan Devine (@YourManDevine) December 26, 2025
This clip came to the attention of NBA analyst Jason Timpf, and to say he didn’t like what he saw from James would be an understatement.
“Embarrassing and unacceptable effort from LeBron on the glass tonight. My goodness…”
James is 40 years old, so you don’t want to be too harsh on him when he doesn’t give his all on every play, but this was just one too many. Someone listed at 6’9″ has to do better.
Of course, James alone isn’t to be blamed for the Lakers getting dominated on the glass. Deandre Ayton had just two rebounds, and that is unacceptable from your starting center.
Ayton had the same number as James, who finished with 18 points (7-13 FG), two rebounds, five assists, two steals, and one block in this one as the Lakers dropped to 19-10. To go with the lack of rebounding, he also wasn’t putting in a great deal of effort on the defensive end. Quite notably, James didn’t run back on defense on one occasion in the fourth quarter because he thought he got fouled.
[Lowlight] LeBron’s Defense After a Missed Call vs the Rockets
byu/jmike1256 innba
A total of 10 seconds had gone by on the shot clock, and you still couldn’t see James in the frame. He was busy complaining, and that meant Tari Eason got a wide-open three from the corner. James’ not running back didn’t hurt the Lakers, as Eason mised, but he has to do better there.
In all, this was just a night to forget for James, who had a game-low plus-minus of -33 in 33 minutes. The Lakers were just getting completely dominated when the 21-time All-Star was out there on the court.
Lakers head coach JJ Redick went off on his players after this game, and you’d imagine James was one of those whom he was most frustrated with. As for the man himself, he declined to speak to the media postgame.
Former NBA player Austin Rivers believes James has checked out, and he isn’t the only one who is of that opinion. That said, it wasn’t long ago that we saw him put up All-NBA numbers over a five-game stretch. James is still very much capable of putting in great performances, but the bad ones might come with greater regularity than they once did.
The Lakers take on the Sacramento Kings next at Crypto.com Arena on Sunday at 9:30 PM ET. It is the perfect opportunity for James to have a bounce-back game.
