Russell’s outstanding play this season has also made him one of the Lakers’ most significant verbal leaders.
It only took the Golden State Warriors forward three months of sharing a locker room with Draymond Green to leave his mark on Los Angeles Lakers guard D’Angelo Russell. As the Lakers make a late-season push for the playoffs, Russell has emerged as a prominent leader in the locker room.
The Lakers point guard said he learned from Green how to use his voice to influence his team in an interview with ESPN’s Dave McMenamin.
Russell spent the shortest time of his career with Green and the Warriors, and as he noted, it was even during the team’s worst season—finishing with the poorest record in the NBA—during their historic era.
However, that period of time was beneficial for the former No. 2 overall choice because it allowed him to be a sponge and learn from some of the greatest winners in the game, including Green, while he was part of a winning club.
Along with LeBron James and Anthony Davis, he is emerging as one of the Lakers’ most crucial players this season after applying the skills he gained during that tenure.
Russell Has Overcome A Great Deal of Adversity
Has spent the entire season circulating trade rumors
For Laker Nation, Russell’s in-season comeback has become a spectacle. This is a player who, after dominating trade talks the whole season, is now one of the team’s most vital players both on and off the court.
Russell’s name was frequently mentioned in trade rumors over the most of the season as the Lakers looked for a third star to go with James and Davis.Both Dejounte Murray’s and Zach LaVine’s names were mentioned throughout the conversation. The main piece they planned to send away to acquire one of those two stars was Russell.
The 28-year-old had a patchy season to begin. They were looking to let go of him in part because of this and his fallout from the 2023 NBA playoffs, where he ended up being benched in the Western Conference Finals. The six-foot-3 guard was actually benched for seven games this season.
Russell, though, remained unaffected by the commotion.
For the most part, Russell just let his game do the talking. And he has since made a statement while doing so.
Trade Chip to Significant Partner
Acting as if he were the Lakers’ third star
Although Russell never spoke about the bench demotion, it appears that he took it quite personally. With averages of 22.5 points, 3.3 rebounds, and 6.4 assists on 47.7 percent field goal shooting—including a blistering 45.7 percent from beyond the arc—the Lakers guard has been playing his heart out since returning to the starting lineup.
Russell’s terrible run started far in advance of the trade deadline, which is one of the reasons the Lakers decided to hold onto him. As it happens, the guy they’ve been trying to trade away all along is the third star they’ve been searching for.
Last week, Russell put on maybe his greatest performance of the year, going off for a career-high 44 points. With nine three-pointers and twenty-one of those points coming in the fourth quarter, he helped the Lakers, without LeBron James, defeat the Milwaukee Bucks 123-122.
The Lakers are still very much in the middle of the Western Conference playoff competition. If Los Angeles hopes to have any chance of earning a postseason berth and possibly making another deep run in the playoffs this year, Russell will need to carry on with his recent play.