The Los Angeles Lakers have only been practicing together as a team now for a handful of days, but sadly, they’ve already been dealt their first injury of the re-opened season. Luckily, the absence isn’t being caused by COVID-19 but is instead a fractured thumb injury sustained by Rajon Rondo. The injury will keep him out for six-to-eight weeks and will allow him to join the Lakers if they are in the middle of a playoff run.
There hasn’t been a clear “back-up point guard” for the Lakers this year, just as much as there hasn’t been a clear “starting point guard” for the Lakers. This is nearly all in part due to LeBron James’ nature as a large forward in size with the ball-handling of an All-NBA point guard. In addition, the Lakers have a roster full of guys who are much more accurately measured as “two-way” guards who can manage the point guard position sometimes while mostly being a shooting guard. Rondo was usually put into that box of “back-up point guard” though, due to his nature of being a traditional point guard.
There’s no one below Rondo on the pecking order that would neatly fit into that role, with Danny Green and head coach Frank Vogel confirming as much with their comments today (reported by Mike Trudell of Spectrum SportsNet and the Lakers).
Frank Vogel said he expects several guys to pick up the slack with Rajon Rondo out in terms of secondary ballhandling, with Caruso and Cook the most obvious, but he said he’s curious to see what Dion Waiters can do as well. We’ll also see AD/Kuz initiate offense.
— Mike Trudell (@LakersReporter) July 13, 2020
Danny Green is on a Zoom call right now, suggesting that it will be a group effort to try and replace both Avery Bradley and now Rajon Rondo. Alongside Green, LAL have KCP, Caruso, Cook, and now Waiters and Smith as options in the backcourt (plus LeBron as the lead ballhandler).
— Mike Trudell (@LakersReporter) July 13, 2020
Vogel and Green instead say that it will be a group effort from several players to replace Rondo, including Danny Green, Kentavious Caldwell-Pope, Alex Caruso, Quinn Cook, J.R. Smith, and even Dion Waiters. As the two both preached it being a “group effort” I wouldn’t expect any of those players to see a drastic increase in minutes, but instead we will be seeing some J.R. Smith and Dion Waiters get some minutes in their first handful of games in the purple-and-gold.