Jarred Vanderbilt has had quite a time with the Lakers.
He’s had highs like the 2022-23 season, where he was an integral part of a team that reached the Western Conference Finals. Then came bad luck with
injuries, which have limited his availability over the last two years. Now that he’s healthy, he has been on the outside looking in at head coach JJ Redick’s rotation.
However, against the Suns, Redick finally made a change and Vando was ready.
He was a monster on the glass, with six of his seven boards being offensive. Vanderbilt also had a pair of steals, was a defensive disruptor, and had a plus-minus of +7 in his 15 minutes of play.
It was great to see a player who was sitting on the bench get an opportunity and make the most of it, helping lift the Lakers to a 116-114 road win.
After the victory, Redick spoke of the coaching staff remaining in constant communication with Vando throughout this situation.
“When things aren’t going the way you want them to, it can often seem like communication is not there,” Redick said. “The reality is the communication has been there the whole time. Pre him getting taken out of the rotation, when he got taken out of the rotation, Nate [McMillan] has talked to him, Scott [Brooks] has talked to him.
“This has been a three-week process and one of things that we kept saying is ‘You’re going to get more opportunities. You got to stay read.’…He was in the right headspace and he helped win us the game. Full stop. He helped win us the game.”
While it was obvious that Vanderbilt’s offensive weakness is why he’s seen limited action, it still was hard to justify not playing your best defensive player on a team that, by Redick’s own words, has been “ass” on defense.
Vanderbilt, through all this, has been a professional.
“This isn’t the first time I’ve been in this situation,” Vanderbilt said. “I kind of know how it works. It’s a long season. It’s still early. I know whether guys get injured or something like that, the opportunity is going to come back around. The biggest thing is being ready for it mentally and, obviously, doing your part on the court and showing up to practice and being a good teammate, stuff like that. My main thing was just staying ready because I know, eventually at some point, opportunity was going to come and I wanted to be ready for it.”
He seems aware that just because he played well on Sunday doesn’t mean he’ll play every night. Vando will stay ready. When he does come into a game, he’s going to give his best effort and that’s all Redick and the Lakers can ask for.
We’ll see if Redick can find more ways to leverage Vando’s strengths while mitigating his weaknesses moving forward, but at least for one game, Vando’s playing benefited everyone.
You can follow Edwin on Twitter at @ECreates88 or on Bluesky at @ecreates88.bsky.social.
