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One of the only bright spots in this awful season for the Los Angeles Lakers has been the constant fast-paced offense this team is trying to run, and watching Nick Young do his thing, which doesn’t always work, but is always entertaining to watch. As they lost their sixth in a row (and 12th in 13), Swaggy P being ejected was a big part of another step backwards for the team and franchise, who are going through a stretch no one in Tinseltown even remembers.

Pointing fingers isn’t going to help. The warning signs were on the wall before this season began, and having Kobe Bryant sitting on the sidelines and making various faces (all of them of the negative kind) isn’t helping anyone. Losing their best scorer midway through the second quarter didn’t really help.

Should have Nick Young been ejected? Probably. He wasn’t the one who instigated the whole affair, but he was the one who elbowed or punched Goran Dragic in the face. Alex Len pulled a dirty one on him by blocking his face instead of the shot, and the Morris twins were quick to react and get in the way of Young trying to dish his own dose of payback at Len (who was also ejected), but it was easy to decide which teams was hurt more by the dual ejection.

Young being angry is understandable, but at his own teammates? He has his reasons.

What I’m mad about is it was 1-on-5. I felt like if someone would have gotten in the middle of everything it wouldn’t have escalated as much. I felt bad for Dragic. He was right there. I didn’t throw a punch. I was trying to shove people out of my way. I was getting pushed further back. It was more trying to get out.

The Lakers lost 114-121 in Phoenix to the Suns who are still without Eric Bledsoe, but it didn’t stop them from harassing the worst defensive team in the NBA (even though the numbers suggest they’re only 29th in points allowed). Gerald Green scored 28 points, Markieff Morris added 24 and Channing Frye had 20 while Goran Dragic orchestrated things quite well, finishing with 18 points and 7 assists.

Things were going well for the Lakers until Young was thrown out of the game, and falling behind by 10 points in the third quarter was too much for them to overcome. The Lakers can run and score with any team, but when it comes to getting stops, it’s impossible to do so with this team. The Mike D’Antoni system is based on outscoring your opponent no matter how badly you defend, but there has to be a bit more talent to make that into reality. Kendall Marshall, despite his 9.9 points and 8.6 assists per game, isn’t Steve Nash, or any other version of point guard who’d be better suited to make the Lakers look slightly better then they have been for about a month.

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