So I'm not stupid, obviously LAL was missing Luka, Lebron, and Smart.
But that Lakers defense was terrible, they were leaving guys wide open in the perimeter. And Smart is really the only guy who can probably help there.
I had them as a 4 seed in the West and still think they'll be around there at 3 or 4, but I am curious to see how they look when they start actually playing more of the meat in their conference (Denver, Houston, etc.). LAL so far has played the 5th easiest schedule in the NBA. I'll give them a lot of credit for starting 16-5 and beating teams like Minnesota (2x) and San Antonio, but they got shellacked by OKC a month ago and really haven't played many other elite teams yet