In the NBA this season, there has been no shortage of individual offense feats, and Los Angeles Lakers guard Patrick Beverley is not happy about it.
We’ve seen a bunch of 50-point games, and even a 60-pointer, but Donovan Mitchell’s 71-point barrage against the Chicago Bulls Jan. 2 was the final straw that sent Beverley over the edge.
On his podcast, Patrick Beverley let his feelings be known about the lack of defense in an NSFW rant, blasting the current state of the league in light of the offensive fireworks.
During the podcast, Beverley says nobody is playing defense anymore, and as long as he’s on the court, no player will score that many points on him.
The Lakers guard is known as a tenacious defender, and has a knack for getting under the skin of some of the league’s most potent scorers.
With that being said, it’s not like these high-scoring performances aren’t happening under Beverley’s watch. The emphasis on more scoring has taken over, not just in the NBA, but in sports as a whole. It’s easy to see how a trend geared toward offense could bother a player who cut his teeth through playing tough defense, but there isn’t too much that can be done at this point to slow it down.
So Beverley could say no one will score 70 points on him, but we can’t forget he’s part of a Lakers defense that’s one of the worst in the league, 27th in points per game allowed to be exact.
If we want to see Beverley try to cut down on the offense, that time will have to wait. He’s missing Sunday’s game against the Philadelphia 76ers with a non-COVID illness, and there’s no timetable for his return.
