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The Los Angeles Lakers made a lot of moves in the summer to form the best possible lineup for this coming season. They are coming off another losing campaign where they only won 26 out of 82 games, and needed to address a lot of facets of their game by adding some key personnel to help them with it.
Outside of the veterans they brought in, the team also took advantage of the draft to add Lonzo Ball and Josh Hart, who was the 30th overall pick back in June. Although he made a name for himself as a scorer during his NCAA days with Villanova, the 6-foot-5 shooting guard is looking to reverse the Lakers’ woes, by being a more defense-focused player.
Josh Hart also shared, via Bill Oram of The Orange County Register, that he takes defense personally, and plans to be a physical defender starting this year.
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“I take defense personally,” Hart said. “When somebody scores on me I don’t care if it’s a good move or what. That infuriates me. I don’t like getting scored on, I take that personally.”
“I think I’m physically a little more mature. Especially how I’m a physical defender, I think that plays into my role a little bit.”
Hart spent four seasons with the Wildcats and averaged impressive numbers of 13.1 points, 5.5 rebounds, 1.8 assists, and 1.1 steals in 28.0 minutes. He also shot 38.9 percent from beyond the arc, and 51.1 percent from the field back in college. However, he understands that he will not have a big role with the Lakers during his rookie year, and will work on adjusting his game to be able to still contribute to their cause whenever he’s asked to be on the court.
If Josh Hart can be the defender he wants to be, it will be a huge boost to the Lakers’ chances this season by making it back to the playoffs for the first time in five years. More importantly for him, he will gain the trust of the coaching staff, which could set him up for more playing time in the future to showcase his complete skill set as well.
