Howard Smith-USA TODAY Sports
After the huge blow of losing superstar Dwight Howard to the Houston Rockets, the tax heavy Los Angeles Lakers set out to sign low budget players. One of these signings was the 28 year old shooting guard Nick Young. The Lakers were able to pick him up for the league minimum worth about $1.1 million with a player option the following year worth about $1.2 million.
Young has had his troubles in the past and is known as quite a bit of a knucklehead. This translates directly into his game as he is very much a gunner. That is a player who takes a high volume of shots with a great deal of those shots being ill-advised. Despite his excellent shooting ability, Young shot only 41.3 percent from the field and 35.7 from beyond the arc. Not necessarily horrible numbers, but they could be so much better.
Defensively Young has a lot of shortcomings. Even though he is pretty athletic he either does not understand how to defend or just doesn’t give an effort. It probably didn’t help that he spent the beginning of his career on the Washington Wizards with a team featuring JaVale McGee and Andray Blatche. Not the best place to develop good defensive habits.
Young will be the starting shooting guard if Kobe Bryant is not ready to go for the start of the season due to his recovering torn Achilles. If Kobe is ready Young will still play a great deal of minutes for this team, which does not bode well.
Now Young will be helpful in the fact that he is a threat from long range. When he is out on the wing, Kobe and Pau Gasol will have more room to operate. Spacing was a big issue for this team last season, and Young just being there pulls defenders away from the paint.
Maybe Young even matures a little and harnesses his offensive talent. Kobe won’t take too much of his shenanigans before he does something about it.
Kyle Lopez is a Golden State Warriors writer for www.RantSports.com. Follow him on Twitter @_KL9_, or follow him on Google.
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