In hindsight, one of the moves that may salvage anything from this Lakers season came out of necessity and not even the Lakers first choice. After seeing too many minutes of subpar center player from Dwight Howard and DeAndre Jordan, head coach Frank Vogel turned to LeBron James at center back in December.
The result has been some of the best offensive basketball of James’ career, capped off with a pair of 50-point performances inside of a week against the Warriors and Raptors, the latter coming on Friday. Despite the new position, despite being 37 years old, despite dealing with a knee injury, James’ scoring outbursts have moved him to the NBA scoring leaderboards and, for now, is keeping any hope of a Lakers postseason run alive.