The Los Angeles Lakers clearly have the two best players in the NBA Finals, with LeBron James and Anthony Davis being top five players in the entire league. However, the conversation heading into the Finals was, while L.A. has the two best players, perhaps Miami has the next 5-8 best players, depending on who you asked. The Lakers' role players didn't seem to match up with the Heat's, and there was no clear third-best player on the Lakers.
On the daily Locked On Lakers Podcast host, Anthony Irwin and Pete Zayas (LakerFilmRoom) discussed the Lakers' big Game 4 win and how Kentavious Caldwell-Pope is emerging as the L.A.'s third-best player and a key piece for a team one win away from a title.
Anthony Irwin: I really hope that the conversation about KCP shifts significantly next year. I don't even think, heading into this, that he was regarded as even a top tier role player. In this series even, we would see the conversation about LeBron and AD being the two best players and then Miami had the next best five players. However, with KCP, you can make the argument has been in that in that gap that we talked about or that we were told about heading into the series. He's been that good.
Caldwell-Pope's shooting numbers haven't been the best; he's averaging 11.0 points per game but only shooting 28.6 percent from three in the series. He is making key plays and playing good defense in this series, though, and that has made a huge difference.
Late in the fourth quarter of Game 4, KCP hit a big three and a layup in back-to-back possessions to extend the Lakers' lead to seven with just two minutes to go.
Los Angeles needs just one more victory to win their 17th title and they may need KCP to step up one more time to get it.
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