The Los Angeles Lakers continued their downward spiral on Friday night, as they lost to the Memphis Grizzlies at home, 127–113. The loss marked the Lakers’ fourth consecutive defeat and their 10th loss in 13 games since winning the inaugural NBA in-season tournament.
The Lakers are now 17–19 and sit at the No. 11 seed in the Western Conference, which wouldn’t be good enough for a play-in tournament berth if the season ended today. After Friday night’s game, Los Angeles superstar LeBron James judged his team’s performance bluntly.
“I mean, we just suck right now,” James said, via ESPN’s Dave McMenamin.
Jayne Kamin-Oncea/USA Today network
What makes this stretch of losses even more surprising is that Los Angeles played so well to start the season, which included a 4-0 mark to secure the NBA’s first in-season tournament title. However, James doesn’t seem to believe his team’s dominant performances in the in-season tournament semifinals and championship game at Las Vegas matter much now.
“That was just two games,” James said. “It’s a small sample. Everyone is getting so cracked up about Vegas and keep bringing up Vegas. It was two games. We took care of that business. It was the in-season tournament. We played it. We won it. But that was literally just two games.”
Los Angeles entered the season with high expectations after reaching the Western Conference finals last year, but so far they haven’t been able to rise to that level this season.
The Lakers will try to halt their losing streak Sunday against the rival Los Angeles Clippers (22–12), who are surging with five consecutive wins and 14 victories in their past 16 games. Tip off is scheduled for 9:30 p.m. at Crypto.com Arena.