Praise has been heaped in bundles to countless Lakers win throughout the first days of training camp. A new name was added to the mix on Monday and is one Lakers fans will likely be excited to hear about.
While head coach JJ Redick admitted he’s still young and going through the struggles any rookie would, Cameron Carr also was on the receiving end of some of that acclaim on Thursday.
“Cam, we see a player in Cam,” Redick said. “We’re really excited about him. You can also see through three days that
he’s a rookie. There were times where we kind of had to stop a drill or, at one point a minute into the second scrimmage, I had to call timeout and bring him over and just teach him a little bit.
“He picks up things quick so very confident that he’ll have opportunities this year.”
Carr will certainly have an uphill battle to playing time. Given the little we have to go on right now, it seems that a number of wings are excelling early in training camp. It will come down to impressing in the moments Carr will have during preseason games.
But even if that doesn’t happen in the exhibition slate, it’s a long season and, as Redick noted, opportunities will come.
Mysterious injuries
Redick has alluded a couple of times during training camp that a couple of players were limited. On Thursday, he was asked a bit more about it and provided very little more insight.
“Everybody did something,” Redick said of practice. “Again, we’ve had to modify a couple guys. We had an extended scrimmage today and cleaned up some things offensively for the first time since, really, last Wednesday when we were doing our small group work. We’ll continue to have an emphasis on that over the weekend on Saturday and Sunday before we go to [Sacramento].”
When asked if those unspecified injuries would keep players out of games, Redick said that was to be determined but that it was nothing they were worried about long term.
Best training camp ever
Ziaire Williams hasn’t been in the NBA long, but this training camp has left an impression. After years of training camps on teams without a focus on winning, joining a Lakers side focused on winning has been a change of pace.
“It’s a little different, for sure,” Williams said. “This is a winning culture, a winning culture, a winning team, a team that has high standards, so it’s a little different. Guys have been more experienced, more in the league so it’s a little less teaching and more just concepts and schemes versus Brooklyn, it was eight rookies or however many we had…so it was a lot more teaching.
“But training camp here has been great. I’m comfortable. Guys have helped me work my way in and I just feel like I belong. I’m happy where I’m at and we just got to keep doing it.”
Multiple players have said this training camp has been great. For basically every team outside of the Kings, vibes at this point in the season probably are good. Another theme that has gone hand-in-hand with that, though, has been the competitiveness during camp, too.
“This has been a very physical, competitive, intense training camp,” Jake LaRavia said. “I think it’s been the best one that I’ve been a part of since I’ve been in the league and this third day just really put a stamp on what we’ve been doing.”
Other notes
- Redick spoke about Dalton Knecht, who he said has “been a pro” during training camp. He credited his offseason work and said he was hungry to earn a rotation spot.
- Add LaRavia to the list of people who have singled out Adou Thiero this summer. He said the second-year player had been “really good,” praise he also gave Williams.
- Speaking of LaRavia, Redick talked about his conversations with him this summer, saying they spoke a lot in the first six weeks of the offseason, both about shooting and the “mental side of things.” To that point, Redick said LaRavia is in not just a good place physically this traning camp, but mentally as well.
You can follow Jacob on Twitter at @JacobRude or on Bluesky at @jacobrude.bsky.social.
