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The Los Angeles Lakers will start this season by having an open tryout for their vacant starting shooting guard spot in the rotation. Kentavious Caldwell-Pope (currently serving a two-game suspension) and Josh Hart (Achilles bursitis) are both out for the season opener against the Los Angeles Clippers.
Luke Walton has been reluctant to break up the bench group, so that pretty much takes Jordan Clarkson out of contention to start. Looking down the roster, that doesn’t leave many options for who might start the game alongside Lonzo Ball.
Speaking of the Lakers’ latest second overall pick, Luke gave some specifics on how long he’ll play. This, via Pete Zayas of Forum Blue & Gold.
Luke said that Lonzo is in the shape to play about 25 minutes right now.
— Laker Film Room (@LakerFilmRoom) October 19, 2017
Between the hole at the shooting guard spot and the minutes limit on Ball, that leaves quite a bit of opportunity for guys like Corey Brewer, Tyler Ennis, Alex Caruso and oh God this is depressing.
In better news, Julius Randle did say he would play tonight and, in order to find as many minutes as possible for Kyle Kuzma, Luke did mention he would be playing both the small and power forward spots.
The Lakers are facing a hungry, healthy Clippers team anxious to show they won’t miss a step despite no longer having Chris Paul, so this could get ugly. Gametime is 7:30 PM, PT, on TNT.
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