Players Grades: Lakers vs. Suns

Grading every Lakers player’s performance from the team’s 118-114 loss to the Suns in their second preseason outing.

The preseason debut of LeBron James and Anthony Davis on Sunday brought with it plenty of excitement to the Lakers’ second exhibition game of the year against the Suns.

While it ended in a loss, the Lakers’ looked a much-improved side in the first half against Phoenix, scoring 69 points in the opening two frames. LeBron and AD sat in the third quarter, leading to the Lakers falling late, but it still provided plenty of optimism moving forward in the preseason.

So, let’s dive into the loss. As always, grades are based on expectations for each player. “A” grade represents the average performance for that player.

Also, and I’m reiterating this again, it’s the preseason. I’m not grading this on the same standard as a real game because nobody treats these like real games.

Anthony Davis

18 minutes, 17 points, 8 rebounds, 3 assists, 1 steal, 7-10 FG, 1-3 3PT, 2-4 FT, +15

The first signs of AD being the hub of the offense looked pretty dang good. For one, he was not just taking 3-pointers, but positioning himself off the ball to shoot them. For two, he was aggressive in the mid-post and drew a number of fouls there as well.

The Suns are a team without much size to match up against him, so that plays into this as well. But that was as good of a showing as you could hope in his first preseason action.

Grade: A

Rui Hachimura

22 minutes, 13 points, 8 rebounds, 1 assist, 1 steal, 6-8 FG, 1-1 3PT, +10

There should be one number that jumps off the screen in that stat line: eight rebounds. Rui’s had one-off games before where he’s had a strong night on the glass, so the challenge is going to be doing this consistently.

But considering how much Redick and Rui talked about the need for him to improve as a rebounder, this was a welcome sign. Only one of those was an offensive rebound, so this wasn’t some direct result of him corner crashing, but I’m not going to complain about how he got the rebounds.

Grade: A-

LeBron James

16 minutes, 19 points, 5 rebounds, 4 assists, 2 blocks, 8-12 FG, 2-3 3PT, 1-1 FT, +9

Yeah, man, I just don’t know what to say about LeBron. It’s clear he just stayed in game shape from the end of the Olympics in August because he was absolutely in mid-season form on Sunday.

He will have no points funnier than these two all season long, though.

Grade: A+

D’Angelo Russell

23 minutes, 14 points, 2 rebounds, 4 assists, 1 steal, 6-12 FG, 2-6 3PT, +13

Much of the same from D’Lo, who look to be continuing off the form he had during the regular season last year. This starting five is going to gel nicely and it looks even better when D’Lo knocks down shots.

Grade: B+

Austin Reaves

28 minutes, 9 points, 6 rebounds, 7 assists, 2 steals, 2-10 FG, 0-7 3PT, 5-5 FT, +11

I’m not going to worry just yet about Reaves’ shooting slump, but he hasn’t started great this preseason. Through two games, he’s now 2-12 from behind the arc.

Much like last year, even when he’s not shooting well, he’s still contributing in other ways. Especially when he’s dropping dimes like this.

Grade: B-

Max Christie

29 minutes, 12 points, 4 rebounds, 1 assist, 1 steal, 3-14 FG, 2-8 3PT, 4-4, -2

Well, this was a much different game from Christie on Sunday. After shining on Friday, he had a much rougher outing against the Suns.

These nights will come with any NBA player, especially young players. There’s always a higher level of variance with young players. The key for Christie is leveling out the lows so they aren’t quite this bad.

Even as bad as he was offensively, he still brought it defensively, which is encouraging.

Grade: D+

Dalton Knecht

21 minutes, 7 points, 1 rebound, 3 assists, 1 steal, 1 block, 3-9 FG, 1-7 3PT, +7

Knecht had the shot late to potentially win the game that did not fall. All six of his misses on the evening were from range as he struggled to find his shooting rhythm.

A positive for him is that he found himself in the right place defensively and even blocked a shot rotating over as the low man. If he can compete on that end, the path to him finding minutes on the floor becomes clearer.

Grade: C-

Jaxson Hayes

21 minutes, 5 points, 8 rebounds, 2 assists, 1 steal, 2 blocks, 2-5 FG, 1-4 FT, -8

How many times do you think Hayes had eight rebounds last season? The answer is four. Again, this is a preseason game and what not, but having him being a contributor on the glass would be a huge bonus.

Hayes also brought the energy tonight, too. Overall, a nice showing from him.

Grade: B+

Jalen Hood-Schifino

16 minutes, 9 points, 3 rebounds, 3 assists, 4-7 FG, 0-1 3PT, 1-1 FT, -18

Another solid outing from JHS, this time coming in some more traditional lineups, too. He continues to look like a solid point guard who can organize the offense and showed off his mid-range touch, too.

He only took one 3-pointer and it did not look all that great. But that’s definitely something to wait for a larger sample size.

Grade: B+

Bronny James

13 minutes, 2 rebounds, 0-1 FG, 0-1 3PT, -19

Bronny again got some time early in this one, this time resulting in him and LeBron sharing the floor. However, that was about his only highlight. While he showed defensive flashes on Friday, he showed his youth on that end a number of times on Sunday.

Grade: F

Gabe Vincent

11 minutes, 6 points, 1 rebound, 1 assist, 2-4 FG, 1-2 3PT, 1-1 FT, +6

Vincent looked solid enough in the first half as part of the regular rotation. It’s interesting how few minutes he played on the night overall. Perhaps they’re limiting his minutes to slowly ramp him up.

Either way, it was just a ho-hum game for Vincent.

Grade: B-

Cam Reddish

10 minutes, 3 points, 1 rebound, 1 steal, 1 block, 1-2 FG, 1-1 3PT, -3

After missing parts of practice last week and the game on Friday, Reddish returned to the floor on Sunday and looked like Cam Reddish. He still doesn’t provide much offensively but can pressure well up the court defensively and create havoc.

There just isn’t much of an argument for him to get minutes over a whole host of young players, though.

Grade: C

Colin Castleton

10 minutes, 1 rebound, 2 assists, 1 block

Similar to Reddish, Colin Castleton looks just like Colin Castleton. He’s been largely the same player for multiple seasons now, and that player isn’t good enough to contribute at the NBA level.

I would imagine the team keeps him around so long as Christian Wood is out injured, but if there’s someone that they need or want to cut as a two-way player this year, I’d imagine Castleton is atop that list.

Grade: C-

You can follow Jacob on Twitter at @JacobRude.