Why Los Angeles Lakers Defense Could Be Historically Bad in 2014-15

Last year, the Los Angeles Lakers had one of the worst defenses in the NBA. Porous from every angle, they ended the season having allowed an average of 107.9 points per 100 possessions—the third-worst mark in the league. 

Looking over the changes the Lakers made this offseason, it's hard to see how they're going to get better at that end. They could, in fact, be dramatically worse. 

Although the Lakers' defensive number wasn't the worst in the league last season, it looked pretty awful in a historical context.

By Andrew Lynch's Adjusted DRTG+, which compares a team's defensive efficiency to the league average for that season (essentially accounting for the style of play in different eras), last year's Lakers had the 87th-worst defense of the past 41 years. 87th out of 1,073 team seasons over that time span puts last season's Lakers in the eighth percentile.

The problems were numerous, but most of them originated with the fact that the roster was largely devoid of good defensive players. The chart below shows everyone who played for the Lakers last season, marked by the defensive component of their Real Plus-Minus rating from ESPN.

Real Plus-Minus is an estimate of a player's impact to his team's defense, per 100 possessions, with a positive number representing a positive contribution. You can see from the graph that the Lakers employed just four positive defensive players last season—Chris Kaman, Pau Gasol, Xavier Henry and Robert Sacre.

None of those players has a particularly strong defensive reputation, but the numbers argue that they were the only ones providing anything at that end for the Lakers last year. 

This offseason, the Lakers appeared focused on upgrading the general talent level of their roster as opposed to a specific focus on their defensive shortcomings. Several players from last season are out, including both Kaman and Gasol, and were replaced by Carlos Boozer, Jeremy Lin and Ed Davis as well as rookies Jordan Clarkson and Julius Randle. 

Below, you'll find the same chart we looked at before, updated to reflect the Lakers' current roster.

Although Lin and Davis were both positive defenders last season, neither appears to have the credentials to move the needle for the team's defense.

Obviously, Clarkson and Randle don't appear on this chart because they were playing in college last season. Defense is a notoriously difficult challenge for NBA rookies, and neither Clarkson nor Randle has the kind of defensive reputation that indicates they are ready to make an impact in this area right out of the gate.

The one wild card on that chart that the Lakers may be holding out hope on is Kobe Bryant. There was a point where Bryant had a legitimate claim as one of the best perimeter defenders in the league. 

Those days are long gone.

Toward the end of the 2013 season, nearly 18 months ago, Zach Lowe penned an open letter at Grantland addressed to Bryant and his already declining defense:

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Bryant, as the whole Internet (including this corner of it) has noted repeatedly, has been an irresponsible off-ball defender all season. He gambles out of scheme whenever he feels like it, often turning his back completely to his man, and several of Washington's 11 3s during the Lakers' home loss to the Wiz on Friday were the direct result of Bryant deciding he didn't want to play team defense any longer.

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While Lowe penned his letter in 2013, Kobe's defense had already been in considerable decline for quite awhile. The graph below shows the defensive half of Jeremias Engelmann's Regularized Adjusted Plus-Minus numbers for Bryant over the past few seasons (I've switched plus-minus metrics here because the RPM we mentioned before was only available last season).

D-RAPM is another per-100 possession estimate of defensive impact, with the numbers converted so that a higher positive number is better. You can see from the chart that it's been at least three years since Kobe was a net positive on defense. It's been much longer since he was significantly impactful. 

Kobe will also likely be carrying an enormous offensive load this season, and that's never a recipe for pulling out his best at the defensive end.

While he is still capable of rising to the occasion on crucial possessions, overall, on a night-to-night basis, he provides next to nothing in terms of consistent defense. All of that assumes he's even healthy enough to get back to the downward trajectory his defense was on previously.

The only other significant defensive move the Lakers made this summer was hiring Byron Scott as head coach. Scott is known as a defensive coach, and that side of the ball was one of the first things Scott mentioned when he spoke to ESPN.com's Ramona Shelburne about accepting the job (his comments here reference a text message conversation with Bryant).

"He told me he was working out with Wesley [Johnson] and Nick [Young]," Scott said. "I told them that sounded great, but they 'better be ready to play some defense.'"

The problem is, although Scott has a reputation as a defensive coach, he didn't exactly live up to that reputation in his last stop, three seasons in Cleveland. Here's NBA.com's John Schuhmann on the numbers:

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The Cavs ranked in the bottom five in defensive efficiency (points allowed per 100 possessions) in each of Scott's three seasons. That's not just bad. It's unprecedented.

Before Scott, the last coach to lead his team to the bottom five in defensive efficiency in three straight seasons was Mike Dunleavy, who did it with Milwaukee from 1993-94 to 1995-96, a streak that started when the league had only 27 teams. So Scott is the only coach to do it in a 30-team league.

Note: Before Scott's Cavs, the last team to rank in the bottom five at least three straight seasons was the Warriors, who did it four seasons in a row, from 2008-09 to 2011-12. But three difference coaches — Don Nelson, Keith Smart and Mark Jackson — were responsible for that run.

You could look at those Cleveland rosters (2010-11, 2011-12 and 2012-13) and note their youth and lack of talent. Indeed, Scott didn't have much to work with. But bottom five for three straight years speaks for itself. Scott had a No. 1 defense in New Jersey and top 10 defenses twice with the Hornets, but he wasn't able to coach the young Cavs up. Under Mike Brown last season, Cleveland jumped from 27th to 17th in defensive efficiency.

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The situation Scott finds himself in this season, thin on defensive talent, is much closer to what he had with the Cavs than either of his successful defenses in New Jersey or New Orleans. It also happens to be the most recent part of his coaching record.

These defensive shortcomings are, of course, all on paper, and things are prone to change once the actual games start.

But these are many of the same defensive shortcomings they had last year, and that worked out with disastrous results. The Lakers find themselves with few impact defenders, needing to implement a scheme by a coach with a defensive record that's not quite as solid as it looks, all wrapped around an aging perimeter star whose defensive prowess has been in decline for years. 

You can smear the lens with as much optimism as you'd like, but it is hard to obscure this recipe for defensive disaster.

Statistical support for this story from NBA.com/stats