Lakers News: Patrick Beverley Sidelined For Today's Team Practice
6'1" Los Angeles Lakers starting "shooting" guard Patrick Beverley, who left LA's 122-109 Monday loss to the Denver Nuggets with a right hip injury, reportedly missed today's team practice for an entirely different reason.
Per Jovan Buha of The Athletic, LA head coach Darvin Ham revealed today that Beverley is dealing with a "non-COVID illness"
Between the hip injury and now this ailment, the 34-year-old seems questionable to join the Lakers at home against the Dallas Mavericks Thursday.
Beverley has had something of a down year in his first season with Los Angeles. "Mr. 94 Feet" is averaging a career-worst 5.8 points on .391/.333/.806 shooting splits this season, along with 3.5 rebounds, 2.6 dimes and 0.8 steals a night for the 19-22 Lakers. Believe it or not, Beverley's shooting has actually improved a bit since an ice-cold start in 2022-23.
He is miscast as the club's starting two-guard. Though Beverley remains a solid defender, he's hardly his peak All-Defensive Team self on that end of the hardwood, and his decline offensively makes his $13 million expiring salary more of an interesting trade chip than anything else.
Ham has made a bad habit of playing a lot of undersized Lakers along the wing this season (aside from 6'2" starting point guard Dennis Schröder). Part of this is due to LA's substandard team building on the perimeter, so Ham wants to feature the team's cadre of point guards more frequently just because they represent some of LA's better players, but it puts the team at an instant defensive disadvantage.
