Redick praises LeBron and criticizes others’ lack of effort in the Lakers’ loss

MEMPHIS — After the Grizzlies’ 131-114 victory over the Los Angeles Lakers on Wednesday, Memphis’ Desmond Bane jumped into teammate Scotty Pippen Jr.’s on-court interview to praise him for stealing the ball from LeBron James when Pippen closed the ball. The game ended after Ja Morant left with a right hamstring injury.

“See how he snatched the ball from that old man over there?” Bane said as he grabbed Pippen by the shoulders.

Over in the Losers’ locker room, Lakers coach JJ Redick used this “old man” as an example of how the rest of the LA squad should play.

“I thought LeBron was fantastic tonight,” Redick said after James went 15-for-24 for a season-high 39 points, with the Lakers missing two starters in Anthony Davis (left heel bruise) and Rui Hachimura (illness). “The biggest thing that stood out. … He played hard. He is almost 40 years old and played the hardest on our team. That says a lot about him.”

And it said a lot about the rest of this LA team, which ended its five-game road trip with another loss, going 1-4 overall and 4-4 on the season.

During Redick’s postgame remarks, the first-year coach was asked how he would deal with his team’s perceived lack of effort.

“I just did that,” Redick said, placing the microphone on the table in front of him to end the press conference.

As Redick left the room, he called out to reporters, “First thing I told them.”

Redick began to send the message through the way he distributed playing time.

He doled out just six minutes to D’Angelo Russell in the second half – a season-low total of 22 minutes – as the coach mixed up his rotations to try to find a spark.

“Just the level of competition, the attention to detail, some of the things we’ve been talking to him about for a couple of weeks,” Redick said when asked why he limited Russell’s role in Memphis. “And sometimes he was really good at it. And sometimes it’s easy to fall back into certain habits. But it wasn’t like a punishment. We just felt like we had a chance to win this game, which was the way we wanted to go.

Russell finished the game with 12 points on 4-for-12 shooting (2-for-9 from 3), but he wasn’t the only LA player who struggled against the Grizzlies. Dalton Knecht, starting in place of Hachimura for the first time in his career, shot 1-for-7 with all of his shots coming from beyond the 3-point arc. Austin Reaves scored 19 points but was just 2 of 9 from 3. Gabe Vincent, benefiting from Russell’s reduced minutes, was 2 of 8 overall and 1 of 6 from 3.

James, who on Wednesday became just the sixth player in league history to reach 1,500 career games, was asked about Redick’s statement about the accomplishment.

“At the end of the day, especially when you lose bodies, you have to compete,” said James, who partnered with 6-foot-10 power forward Jaren Jackson Jr. on defense for most of the evening. “You have to compete even harder. You have to go out there and give it everything you can on both ends. I think there were times when we did that, but most of the time I don’t think we could sustain the energy and effort.”

It was the second loss of the trip in which LA allowed more than 130 points, as the Lakers fell to 28th in the NBA in defensive efficiency, scoring 118.8 points per 100 possessions.

“We have to compete and defend,” James said. “We gave up 50% shooting and they shot the 3-pointer well.

“So it wasn’t too much of an offense, even though we didn’t shoot the ball well. We have to do better. But the defense also has to be impressive.”