Los Angeles Lakers: Biggest things we’ve learned from missing the playoffs

1. LeBron James cannot will a team by himself

The biggest story last year during the entire NBA season was where LeBron James was going to sign in the summer. Despite all of that speculation, though, James put together arguably his best year ever and willed the Cleveland Cavaliers to the NBA Finals.

Granted, the Eastern Conference was much weaker than it is this year but James still carried a team that has since turned into one of the worst in the league to an NBA Finals. Let that sink in.

When he signed with the Lakers the easy connection to make was that this Lakers core was better than the Cavaliers (true) and that the ceiling of this team was higher (also, true).

However, what a lot of people didn’t take into account is that LeBron cannot do this by himself. Last year truly was a special year and it took an unprecedented workload to accomplish it. While James was not bad by any means and still posted some of the best numbers in the league, it became evident he needed help.

Just look at how the team played when he returned. The Lakers still were not firing on all cylinders because they were missing a huge defensive piece in Lonzo Ball. Prime LeBron would have been able to take over and make up the difference, this LeBron stopped playing defense altogether.

Every NBA player needs help and James truly was the one exception where he could make everybody else better and take a bunch of Joes to the NBA Playoffs.

To his credit, he did not get a lot of help this year as the team had everything that could possibly go wrong go wrong. However, he also did not show the same leadership skills and dominance that he has shown in the past.