Podcast: The Lakers need Playoff LeBron to show up

Photo by Mike Ehrmann/Getty Images

The Lakers dropped a winnable game against the Denver Nuggets. We tried to figure out where they can go from here.

The Los Angeles Lakers were almost totally run out of the gym by the Denver Nuggets in Game 3 of the Western Conference Finals on Tuesday night, with LeBron James and Co. needing a Herculean, zone defense-fueled run just to only lose by single digits. On the latest episode of the Silver Screen and Roll postgame podcast, Anthony Irwin was joined by Harrison Faigen to assess the damage, and figure out where the team can improve.

First, the guys started out by talking about how the loss wasn’t the worst moment of Anthony’s night — his dog got sprayed by a skunk and tracked the smell all around their house, which is not a bad metaphor for the Lakers’ game, but we digress — followed by them diving into where the damage really came from in this loss. They talked about how the Lakers’ need to adjust to the way the officials are calling the game, what Anthony Davis has to do differently, and some possible lineup changes they’d like to see.

Harrison and Anthony also discussed the elephant in the room: How sub-par LeBron has looked for the majority of this series (by his usual lofty standards), what he may need to do differently, and what the team can do to try and set him up for success.

They also talked about Danny Green’s woeful night, credited Kentavious Caldwell-Pope for showing up to play on a night not many Lakers did, and broke down why they think it’s time to start Dwight Howard over JaVale McGee for the rest of this series.

You can listen to the entire episode in the player below, and to make sure you nevver miss a single one moving forward, subscribe to the Silver Screen and Roll podcast feed on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher or Google Podcasts.

You can follow Harrison on Twitter at @hmfaigen, and Anthony at @AnthonyIrwinLA.