The Los Angeles Lakers are back in the playoffs! After winning the title in 2020, the Lakers went on a downward spiral. They made the playoffs in 2021, but were booted out by the Suns in the first round. In 2022, they didn’t even get to the Play-In Tournament. Finally in 2023, LeBron James and the Lakers were able to claw their way out of the Play-In and take the 7th seed.
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By beating the Minnesota Timberwolves yesterday, the Lakers advanced to the playoffs. They are now set to face the Memphis Grizzlies in the first round. It won’t be an easy matchup for either side, but it should be a fun series to watch.
One of the first people to jump and talk about the same was none other than Draymond Green. He took out an episode of his podcast right after the Play-In Games last night, and talked about LBJ and the Lakers(obviously).
Draymond Green picks LeBron James to beat the Grizzlies
Does this come as a shock? No. Draymond Green and LeBron James have become excellent friends over the last couple of years and have been rather very supportive of each other. For Dray to snub Dillion Brooks and pick Bron comes as no surprise.
In his pod, Draymond said,
“I think it’s a tough matchup for Memphis. I expect LeBron [James] to set the tempo of the game to where he thinks it should be, not where the Grizzlies want it…Think the Lakers will take this series. Think it’ll be an upset. It won’t be easy—it will not be easy—but I think the Lakers may take this series, just because they’ll understand [the situation] and slow it down.”
However, after his biased statement, Green went on to analyze the situation as he does best. He believes the Grizzlies have a chance, but only if they’ve grown from the last year, and fixed some of the errors of the past.
“… I think they’ll be able to capitalize on some of the mistakes [by the Grizzlies]. It’ll also be interesting to see if the Grizzlies have grown. We remember some of the mistakes they were making in the playoffs last year, especially in that Minnesota series. Minnesota was making mistakes and giving the games right back, but we’ll see if they have grown. If they’ve grown, it’s going to be very tough on the Lakers, and my opinion will be wrong.”
Can the Warriors beat the Kings?
While Draymond is worried about facing the Lakers in the 2nd round, let’s get back to the first round. The Warriors take the Kings on Saturday. They will be on the road, a whole 89 miles away from home! To take on the Kings is no small challenge, especially considering how good they’ve been all year. They’re a threat in the paint, and from the 3-point line.
The Warriors will have to play some of their best basketball in order to take down Mike Brown and co. Stephen Curry already shared what he expects from Mike Brown. It’ll be a great boost for the Dubs to have Andrew Wiggins back.
We’ll have to wait till Saturday to see if Mike Brown and the Kings can snap Steve Kerr’s 18-0 streak in the West.
