Being the starting center of the Lakers is always going to bring an inherent pressure with it. After embracing that pressure coming into the season, Deandre Ayton has faded into the background.
With each subpar game, the focus on him intensifies. Recently, those games have come with more frequency for Ayton.
Sunday, though, was a big test for the Lakers and one that they passed with flying colors with an impressive win over the Knicks. Many players stepped up in the victory with Ayton included among
them. His box score might not be his most gaudy of the season at six points and eight rebounds.
However, he was impactful defensively, fought for loose balls on both ends of the floor and generally played at a high level.
“He was great,” head coach JJ Redick said. “I thought the pursuit of the basketball, loose balls, going to block shots. There was a couple of times where he was outside the play, shot goes up, he goes and pursues the rebound. I thought he played really hard tonight. He was great.”
Effort level has waned throughout not just Ayton’s time in LA but also his NBA career. It will certainly continue to wane even after the Knicks game. But that game showed how important he can still be for the Lakers.
According to NBA’s matchup data, Karl-Anthony Towns shot just 1-6 from the field with Ayton as the primary defender. In fact, no player made more than one field goal on Ayton, including when he was switched onto guards like Jalen Brunson or Josh Hart.
Again, the Lakers can’t realistically expect Ayton to perform like this every game, no matter how much they may want that to be the case. In an ideal world, they can get this level of production from Ayton. But there’s a career’s worth of data for Ayton to suggest that isn’t going to happen.
However, there’s no point in not striving for the best. And, much like the win overall was a step in the right direction for the team, it was, too, for Ayton and hopefully the beginning of a string of strong games.
You can follow Jacob on Twitter at @JacobRude or on Bluesky at @jacobrude.bsky.social.
