Believe it, Lakers are NBA championship contenders

The Lakers are championship contenders. 

Luka Dončić is playing as though he’s on a revenge tour and every opposing player has former Mavericks general manager Nico Harrison’s face superimposed on it. 

Austin Reaves is playing as though he were shortchanged by signing a four-year, $180 million deal over the summer, the richest contract in NBA history for a player who went undrafted. 

Walker Kessler is playing as though he’s hellbent on fulfilling his vow to “run through a wall” for the Lakers after they emptied their treasure trove of draft capital to acquire him in July. 

And the Lakers’ role players are playing as though they deeply understood the assignment when they joined a 17-time championship franchise. 

The Lakers have the league’s best record at 10-2. They’ve won six games in a row. 

They’re the real deal. 

They could win it all this season. 

That isn’t a sentence we thought we’d write heading into this season. Not with nine new players. Not with so many question marks around their perimeter defense. Not with their lack of depth at backup center. 

But now, Lakers general manager Rob Pelinka looks like the Albert Einstein of basketball rosters and coach JJ Redick looks like a superstar whisperer. 

The Lakers last won a championship in 2020, their first title in 10 years. 

They could snap their six-year drought this season.

Dončić is on a historic tear, averaging 39.3 points (49.8% shooting from the field, 40.7% from beyond the arc), 7.8 rebounds, 7.9 assists and two steals per game. 

In his first nine games of the season, Dončić scored 361 points, surpassing Michael Jordan’s 347 points in 1986-87 for the most points scored through that period in modern NBA history. 

But what really made the Lakers look like contenders is how they played without Dončić (lower back tightness) on Sunday against the Pistons.  

Without the league’s current front-runner for the MVP Award and against a Pistons team with the third-highest defensive rating, Reaves scored a season-high 43 points in the Lakers’ 121-116 win. 

He reminded everyone of what he can do when he’s unleashed. 

Reaves has quietly been putting together a spectacular season. He’s averaging 25.3 points on a very efficient 50.8% from the field and 41.3% from beyond the arc.

He’s the 15th leading scorer in the league, and of those ahead of him, only Giannis Antetokounmpo, Anthony Davis and Victor Wembanyama have higher field-goal percentages than Reaves. 

And only Jamal Murray and Steph Curry are shooting at a higher percentage from beyond the 3-point line. 

Dončić and Reaves are the NBA’s highest-scoring duo by a mile, averaging 64.6 points, 12.6 more than the second-leading duo of Steph Curry and Yaxel Lendeborg, who are averaging a combined 52 points per game. 

Then there’s Kessler, who’s averaging a double-double with 14.9 points and 10.8 rebounds per game. 

The Lakers’ Big 3 is ferocious. 

But it doesn’t stop there. 

When Reaves was out for Monday’s 124-114 win over the Hawks because of an illness, Dončić got help from the Lakers’ reserves, with Collin Sexton having an 18-point, six-assist performance and Sandro Mamukelashvili pouring in 23 points and grabbing eight rebounds. 

The Lakers are great.

They’re deep. 

They’ve soared past their expectations. 

The Lakers have the highest offensive rating in the league at 121.5. And even though they’re 19th in defensive rating (113.8), they rank second in the league in steals per game (10.8), second in total deflections (240) and third in blocks per game (6.4). 

Kessler leads the NBA in contested shots (140). 

Heck, even Dončić, who has notoriously been slammed for his defense throughout his career, is showing a lot of effort on the less glamorous end of the court. He leads the league in defensive loose balls recovered (nine) and is tied for second in charges drawn (four). 

Entering this season, it was presumed that the Lakers needed time to jell. It seemed as though they had major holes. They weren’t ready to compete with the league’s elite teams, such as the Thunder, Spurs or Knicks. 

Well, we were all wrong. 

The Lakers have sprinted past their doubters, proving that they’re a team to watch. 

Heck, they’re the team to watch.