EL SEGUNDO — On the fly, JJ Redick reached for a metaphor.
His words appeared apt for a man readying for his third season as the Lakers’ head coach – and title expectations, as always, looming in the background of the franchise.
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For Redick, the titles on Tuesday were literally in the background. When the proverbial sky is falling, Redick said as he joked about the reality of every loss with the Lakers, he’s focusing on the step in front of him.
“I’m trying to climb the stairs so I can put one of those things in there,” Redick said, pointing to the championship banners hanging from the rafters of the Lakers’ training facility the day before Wednesday night’s season opener against the Golden State Warriors.
“And if you start getting distracted or you get up too high and you start looking down, right? Maybe you get a little dizzy from being afraid of heights. Just focus on the step in front of you. Sometimes if you’re down in the basement, you have that feeling of like darkness, just focus on the step in front of you.”
Looking forward to Game 1 of another 82-game trek, Redick said the biggest unknown about his team is how they will handle adversity.
He’s already had months to take in the reality of nine new players, including adding center Walker Kessler to play alongside Luka Doncic and Austin Reaves. How a team reacts to the struggle is another task entirely.
“When I predict what this team could become or what I think about what this team could become, I think the biggest unknown to me is how this team deals with adversity,” Redick said. “And that’s different for every team, and that’s different maybe how we deal with adversity in November versus how we deal with adversity in March. Hopefully there’s growth throughout the season so that we can deal with adversity in the right way, and that ultimately will prepare us for a deep playoff run.”
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Part of Redick’s job is helping prepare his players for what life is like with the Lakers rather than other NBA franchises. Kessler went from playing in Salt Lake City for a Western Conference bottom-dweller with the Utah Jazz, to playing with the Lakers. Ziaire Williams went from playing for the Brooklyn Nets, the Eastern Conference’s third-worst team last season, to playing for the Lakers.
Night and day.
Reaves said Tuesday that because of the high-character individuals on the roster, he has no doubt that the status of playing on the Lakers won’t affect how they play basketball Wednesday. The 28-year-old guard remembers his first game, entering in the fourth quarter with the team trailing the Phoenix Suns by 27 points in the second game of the 2021-22 regular season.
“I was just nervous as (expletive),” Reaves said.
The Lakers hope that when 7 p.m. arrives on Wednesday at Crypto.com Arena, the nerves evaporate and the season opener turns in their favor.
“There’s going to be a lot of nerves going in the game,” Kessler said. “But you know, as soon as the whistle blows and you tip the ball, I think the rest of it will take care of itself.”
EXTRA POINTS
Neither second-year forward Adou Thiero nor rookie guard Cameron Carr, two of the Lakers’ young wings, practiced on Tuesday afternoon and Redick said more would be revealed at 5 p.m. when the team’s first injury report of the season is revealed. …
Guard Bronny James, who was excused from practice Monday after being under the weather, returned Tuesday and practiced.
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WARRIORS AT LAKERS
When: Wednesday, 7 p.m.
Where: Crypto.com Arena
TV/Radio: ESPN, 710 AM