Los Angeles Lakers vs. Brooklyn Nets: Two Different Paths to Championship!
It’s a shame Anthony Davis and Kevin Durant will miss tonight’s matchup between the teams favored to meet in the NBA Finals but there’s clearly a sense of fairness and karma by having both teams missing a superstar.
But there’s more at stake tonight than just bragging rights between the Nets and Lakers. Tonight we get our first look at a possible answer to the question of whether a third superstar or a deep and talented roster is more important. Granted, we’d get a truer answer were AD and KD both playing but tonight’s game still comes down to a contest between the Nets with two superstars and a weak roster vs. the Lakers with one superstar and deep and talented roster.
The outcome of tonight’s game could even impact the decisions of the Lakers and Nets front offices before the trade deadline. The Lakers have long been scheming ways to add a third superstar to LeBron James and Anthony Davis. Tonight’s game could motivate them to chase a third superstar or stand pat. Meanwhile, the Nets will be looking for ways to bolster their shallow, weak bench after trading away their depth to add third superstar James Harden.
In the end, it’s unlikely the results of tonight’s game will change anything for either team as it’s just another regular season game and neither team has the necessary trading chips to make dramatic changes to their overall rosters. The Lakers aren’t going to jettison their invaluable roster depth and talent for a third superstar and the both teams are going to be realistically limited to shopping the buyout markets to upgrade their rosters at this point in time.
But that doesn’t mean tonight’s game is not going to give us a glimpse of how the Lakers and Nets matchup and a preview of whom we may see in the NBA Finals. This is a superstar league and the Lakers and Nets are superstar teams. So who should be favored? That Anthony Davis and Kevin Durant are not playing should favor the Lakers as they have the deeper and more talented roster and expose the Nets who have the weaker and more flawed roster.
In addition to having the deeper and more talented bench, two other factors that should favor the Lakers are they are the top ranked defensive team in the league and also have the best superstar on the planet in LeBron James. Finally, while superstars dominate the NBA, championships are still won by teams and the Lakers at this point in time are clearly a ‘better’ team than the Nets, who are still trying to figure out how to play with each other.
Assuming their deeper and more talented roster can execute its ‘Next Man Up’ philosophy, the Lakers should be able to contain the Nets’ Harden and Irving like they consistently did to the Rockets’ Harden and Westbrook.
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