Lakers News: Patrick Beverley's Message Of Support To Russell Westbrook
There's very little love lost between new Los Angeles Lakers teammates Patrick Beverley and Russell Westbrook. Although Westbrook's long-term future in L.A. appears fairly tenuous, for the time being it appears that at least one of the veteran point guards is hoping to bury the hatchet.
We've reached the "breaking down Twitter conversations" part of the offseason. But as with everything related to the Lakers, there's plenty to parse!
Let's review the timeline of events that led to Beverley's apparent support of Westbrook. First, North Carolina basketball trainer and analyst Cuffs The Legend with ties to Lakers All-Star forward LeBron James sent out a tweet supporting the team's embattled 2021-22 starting point guard and criticizing his detractors for what was, objectively, a terrible season (pure counting stats aside).
Next, James chimed in, seemingly registering his enthusiasm for Westbrook to have a bounce back age-34 season. Reading the tea leaves, we speculated earlier this week that James's Twitter support may not have necessarily been entirely above board.
A few hours later, Beverley quote-tweeted James's response. Though his message was brief, he certainly appeared to be advocating for Westbrook to silence the haters with his play.
This is where the editorializing comes in -- the detractors of Westbrook's on-court contributions last season were pretty justified in criticizing it. Upon arriving in L.A., Westbrook immediately became the highest-paid player on the team. Los Angeles surrounded its core of James, Westbrook and big man Anthony Davis with several veterans on minimum contracts, plus Talen Horton-Tucker and Kendrick Nunn on disastrous non-minimum contracts. Westbrook needed to become something he had never been before: a deferential player, one who looked to cut off-ball and minimize his faulty shooting, as well as an above-average defender. After trying to be a good soldier (albeit not a good defender or shooter) for the first 10 or so contests of the season, Westbrook reverted to his ball-hogging ways.
Beverley lifting up a guy with whom he has a decade of beef with a seemingly innocuous tweet actually is a bit of a big deal. The fact that he's making an effort at all speaks volumes to his excitement to (a) be a Laker and (b) back up LeBron James. Whether Beverley actually believes that Westbrook will have a bounce back year -- and whether Beverley actually thinks that bounce back year would even happen in Los Angeles -- is another matter entirely. Color me dubious.
