Can LeBron James and Anthony Davis Both Make 1st-Team All-Defense?
The challenge has been set.
"I want to make sure me and LeBron are on the All-Defensive team," Anthony Davis told Chris Haynes of Yahoo Sports.
The formerly stoic and steady seven-year veteran has found a sovereign voice in the past six months, continually asserting himself off the court. He's publicly declared his displeasure with playing the 5 and, through his agent, Rich Paul, expressed his desire to test free agency in 2020 even though the Los Angeles Lakers just unloaded a treasure trove of assets to acquire him.
But issuing a challenge to the King, one of the greatest basketball players of all time, is something the Lakers may not have expected.
NBA fans know better than to take something such as this lightly. It was just one season ago when Paul George similarly threw down the gauntlet to Russell Westbrook.
"I asked Russ at the start of this year if he had an All-Defensive team [selection] yet, and he said, 'No,'" George told Sam Amick of The Athletic. "And of course, my answer to that was, 'Why not?'"
On Jan. 19, B/R's Sean Highkin wrote: "Never before, though, has Westbrook defended like this. He is fourth among point guards in ESPN's defensive real plus-minus rankings. He's also leading the league in steals with 2.5 per game, besting his previous career high of 2.1 set in 2014-15."
It's hardly uncommon for teammates to finish on the All-Defensive first team. Davis achieved the feat with Jrue Holiday in 2017-18, and Eric Bledsoe and Giannis Antetokounmpo did so just last season. Overall, it has been accomplished 38 times in 51 years, including in four of the previous five seasons.
But can James revive the effort that helped him earn six All-Defensive selections? (He ranks tied for second, with Tony Allen, among active players behind Chris Paul.) James was named to the first team five straight times from 2008-09 to 2012-13 and landed on the second team in 2013-14—so he's played five seasons since his last such honor.
James has over 56,000 regular-season and playoff minutes on his odometer. Can he still put it together for 82 games? Can Davis earn his fourth All-Defensive team accolade, and second first-team nod, after missing out last season?
Here's what it will take.
Effort and Availability
James' lapses in defensive effort were placed under the microscope after Kyle Kuzma's push went viral in March.
But he isn't alone.
Davis has been known to take a play or two off, having shied away from contact at several costly junctures in 2018-19, including on three straight possessions against Steven Adams—twice on defense and once when he had the ball—during the sequence above.
James and Davis must execute on nearly every possession to earn the same designation Davis and Holiday did in 2017-18.
We've seen just how disruptive James can be, and who can forget his chase-down block in the 2015-16 Finals? And there can be no question about Davis' ceiling as a defensive stopper.
But just as important as their consistency will be their availability. The Lakers will likely need to win as many games as the Pelicans did (48) in 2017-18. So, James will have to play more than the career-low 55 games he did in 2018-19.
Though Davis is widely considered to be a top-10 or even top-five player, he hasn't fared well without a co-star by his side. Last season, Davis and the Pelicans were 1-4 without Holiday, and they were just 3-15 without Holiday during the three previous campaigns. (They were 19-10 when Holiday missed about half the 2014-15 season and 17-23 when he missed more than half of 2013-14, his first year with New Orleans. The Pelicans finished 23-41 in Davis' games when he was a rookie in 2012-13.)
And LeBron's teams have floundered without him in recent seasons.
Before 2018-19, James had only once missed more than eight games and never missed more than 13 games in his 16-year career. The Lakers were 9-18 in those contests last season and finished 8.3 points per 100 possessions worse with him off the floor.
The Cleveland Cavaliers went just 4-23 in contests James missed during his most recent four-year stint.
Put simply, if the two desire to finish on the All-Defensive first team, they must remain healthy, and the Lakers will have to win. Only one team with multiple players on the first team has missed the playoffs (the 1992-93 Detroit Pistons with Joe Dumars and Dennis Rodman).
A Position Problem
"It's a long season, and you want to be smart," Davis told Haynes. "Battling [centers] can wear on your body."
Davis played 65 percent of his minutes at power forward in 2018-19, earning a plus-4.0 point differential per 100 possessions while only executing at plus-1.4 at the 5, per Cleaning the Glass. In 2017-18, when Davis finished in the top three in MVP and DPOY voting, he was plus-5.6 at the 4 and plus-4.0 at the 5, though he spent only 54 percent of his minutes at power forward. The Pelicans also thrived with Davis at the 4, as each of his three best five-man lineups carried a center next to Davis.
And while Davis paired perfectly with power forward Nikola Mirotic in the 2017-18 playoffs, few may have noticed Mirotic in the first round took on the role of a traditional low-post 5 on many defensive possessions (21.3 per game compared to 37.3 for Davis). Eight of those possessions came against Jusuf Nurkic, as Mirotic assisted in playing him off the floor. Nurkic was on the court for just 23.4 minutes per game in the Pelicans' sweep of the Portland Trail Blazers.
The Lakers, however, may seek to employ James at the 4. He played 34 percent of his minutes there last season, according to Cleaning the Glass. Instead of playing man-to-man defense, James sometimes utilizes his awareness and instincts to diagnose plays. In this clip, it appears James lacks effort in not challenging Bruno Caboclo. But Caboclo had been shooting a dreadful 28.9 percent from the perimeter last season, and he was 0-of-3 to start that night. James typically (and perhaps smartly) takes measured risks throughout a season.
That style of defense is similar to Davis' in many instances. When matched up against Al-Farouq Aminu in the first round of the 2017-18 playoffs, Davis sagged off Aminu so he could use his otherworldly help defense against dives toward the basket, swatting 2.3 shots per game.
James, though, will need to play a more traditional defensive role at small forward, fighting over screens and chasing playmakers on the perimeter. That shouldn't come with any difficulty, as James has played 64 percent of his minutes or more at the position since 2014-15. The only trouble will be for him to remain fresh.
But for James and Davis to play the 3 and 4 for the majority of their minutes, Dwight Howard and JaVale McGee will have to stay healthy and hold up their end of the bargain at the 5.
And the Lakers will have to hope their gamble on Howard pays off. The decision to ship out Ivica Zubac in February looms large.
Collective Vision and Execution
The Lakers have surrounded James and Davis with defensive talent at every position, which should help the players' cases for the All-Defensive first team by molding a top-10 defense.
With 12 All-Defensive team selections between Howard (five), Rajon Rondo (four), Avery Bradley (two) and Danny Green (one), Los Angeles has the firepower to put together one of the best units in the NBA if each of them can rekindle the tenacity of their prime.
But it's an older cast, to be sure. At 26, Davis is the youngest of this group, while the others have histories of injuries. And other than Davis and the 28-year-old Bradley, each is 32 or older.
Do they still have it?
And will these veterans buy in to head coach Frank Vogel's principles?
Vogel was widely regarded as one of the NBA's best coaches after his teams finished in the top 10 in defensive rating in each of his five full seasons in Indiana, including No. 1 in 2012-13 and 2013-14.
But two failed campaigns in Orlando erased all that. Coupled with Magic head coach Steve Clifford's success last season and the Lakers' decision to hire Vogel only after they missed on other candidates, Vogel could be treading water in the locker room with assistant Jason Kidd waiting in the wings.
"If we stay healthy, there's no limit," Davis told Haynes. "We have the team to win a championship. We have the coaching staff to win, but we've got to come in with the right mindset, and that all starts in training camp all the way through preseason and all the way through the regular season."
The Lakers must buy in, and, again, they must win. They don't need to have the best defense in the NBA to have two players on the All-Defensive first team; the 2017-18 Pelicans finished 14th in defensive rating, though Bledsoe, Antetokounmpo and the Bucks did finish first in 2018-19.
But they need to play capably on that end throughout the season, especially during the second half, when many of the voters will be swayed. The Pelicans may have finished 14th, but their defensive rating of 105.1 after the All-Star break would have made them the league's fifth-best unit for the season.
Can AD Win Defensive Player of the Year?
"I want to be Defensive Player of the Year," Davis told Haynes.
That would go a long way toward ensuring his place on the All-Defensive team (though it wouldn't cement it). History suggests Davis has a decent shot after finishing third behind Rudy Gobert and Joel Embiid in 2017-18. Gobert was the runner-up in 2016-17 before he won the last two awards, and Draymond Green finished second to Kawhi Leonard in 2014-15 and 2015-16 before he claimed the honor in 2016-17.
There's a big gap to close, however. Gobert finished with nearly 18 times the first-place votes as Davis in 2017-18. So, while Davis was third, he wasn't close. And Gobert handily outdistanced Antetokounmpo last season as well.
The Defensive Player of the Year race is as much a political one as the Most Valuable Player Award contest, and it is arguably more challenging. Defensive tracking continues to improve, but it still has a long ways to go.
Blocked shots could help Davis' cause. Davis would have finished third in blocked shots per game in 2018-19, ahead of Gobert, had he qualified, and he has been the blocks-per-game champion on three occasions in his career.
Defensive rating could be another part of Davis' stat sheet that aids his case. But Davis hasn't come close to leading the league in either of the past two seasons.
Defensive real plus-minus could help too, as Gobert finished first in 2018-19 while Davis finished 15th. In 2017-18, Davis finished sixth. (Gobert has finished first in three successive seasons.)
If Davis can't finish above Gobert in these categories, he'll have to dominate him on national television.
Gobert has been arguably Davis' most significant and terrifying foe, defeating Davis and the Pelicans in seven of their previous eight matchups while outrebounding him in nine of their previous 10. Davis specifically struggles against the Frenchman in one-on-one situations without the benefit of action.
This award is as much about pageantry as anything else, and Davis will undoubtedly get his share of it as the Lakers' television schedule includes a league-high 43 national games.
Davis and Gobert will go head-to-head on ESPN on the fourth night of the season, Oct. 25. They will meet again Dec. 4 (NBA TV), but their most critical matchups may come March 16 and March 18 (ESPN), when the races for the Defensive Player of the Year award and in the Western Conference standings will be at critical points.
