Los Angeles Lakers pie chart of blame if they miss the NBA playoffs

The supporting cast

For better or worse, this team’s supporting cast at the beginning of the season was tasked with helping correct the wrong (missing the playoffs) from last season. Up until the NBA Trade Deadline (when the Lakers actually retooled the supporting cast), it was an absolute failure. And it all has to start with Russell Westbrook. He wasn’t a fit and they decided to let him figure it out and he never did.

Lonnie Walker was probably the team’s best “supporting player” this season but 13 points per game is not going to cut it for your third-best player. No matter how good your top two are. Kendrick Nunn, Patrick Beverley, Juan Toscano-Anderson, and on and on. It wasn’t entirely their fault that the Lakers’ supporting cast didn’t work out but they’re going to take on the blame as each of those players was traded at the deadline for other players.

The new-look supporting cast was working great for the Lakers up until LeBron’s injury. And if they can somehow lead the Lakers to the postseason without LeBron, it will hammer down this point – why in the world did the Lakers wait until the trade deadline to pull the trigger? It makes absolutely no sense (but more on that later).

Blame percentage: 25%