Each week throughout the 2024-25 NBA season, we’ll be taking a deeper look at some of the league’s biggest storylines to find out whether future trends are based more on fact or fiction.

(Last week: The NBA’s 2024 free agency class was a dud)

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Fact or fiction: LeBron James’ Lakers are stuck in the middle

After a road win against the defending champion Boston Celtics this season, Golden State Warriors superstar Stephen Curry simplified things: “A good team or a relevant team wins the games they’re supposed to win and steals a few on the road against good ones.” teams and protects the home court.”

By that definition, LeBron James’ Los Angeles Lakers (12-10) are a good team. They face a play-in tournament in a crowded Western Conference. They are 10-3 against teams with worse records than themselves, they have taken three road wins away from potential postseason teams and they are 7-3 at home.

But what does one do? Great Team? It wins more games than it should. Championship teams of this century have won an average of 63% of their games against teams with a record of .500 or better during the regular season. And they steal more than a few on the road against good teams. Title teams since 2000 have averaged a .635 winning percentage against away teams in the regular season.

Only three teams have surpassed both marks in the first quarter of this season: the Boston Celtics, Cleveland Cavaliers and Oklahoma City Thunder, making for a pretty good short list of true contenders.

How much do these benchmarks mean for a team’s title ambitions? Only one of the 25 champions of this century, the 2006 Miami Heat, performed below .500 (19-21) against opponents with winning records. And only one champion since 2000, the 2023 Denver Nuggets, has posted a record below .500 (19-22) on the road. In other words, it is virtually impossible to win a title with a losing record in both categories.

Two other teams – the Dallas Mavericks and Houston Rockets – are better than .500 on the road And against victorious opponents. You can also include them in a longer list of candidates with a clear conscience. One reached the NBA Finals last season; the other is in second place in this high-profile Western Conference.

The complete list of all teams this season in both categories:

No team fights harder than the Lakers against the championship indicators to post a winning record.

They are 5-9 against teams with winning records and 5-7 on the road. Since the first two games of the season, when James and Anthony Davis were coming off rest, the Lakers have picked up three quality wins – one against the Ja Morant-less Memphis Grizzlies and two against the 11-10 San Antonio Spurs .

Over the last two weeks, as the rigors of the regular season took their toll on the 39-year-old James and the oft-injured Davis, the Lakers were outscored by 16.8 points per 100 possessions and lost four 20-point blowouts. Only the Washington Wizards, who have lost 15 straight, have been worse during that time.

The Lakers have a net rating of -4.7, which is both the Charlotte Hornets’ rating (6-15) and a 27-win projection.

That’s frightening. Even more concerning: The Lakers have a margin of 9.3 points per 100 possessions when James is on the floor. Their offensive (109.0) and defensive ratings (118.3) when he’s on the court match those of NBA teams ranked 25th and 29th. (That’s bad.) It doesn’t help that the Lakers have him surrounded by porous defenders, except for Davis. And it’s a miracle that they have the track record that they do.

By that definition, not Curry’s, the Lakers aren’t even a good team. But we will give them the benefit of the doubt. I don’t want to argue about whether they are good, average or bad. They’re not great.

Whether James hits a wall at age 40 is a question for another time – and one that everyone should be wary of. What is clear is that he was no longer the same player he was at the start of the season. These divisions:

• First 11 games: 24.3 points (52/46/79 shooting), 9.4 assists (3.1 turnovers), 8.1 rebounds per game

• Last 11 games: 20.3 points (46/22/71 shooting splits), 8.7 assists (5.1 turnovers), 7.7 rebounds per game

And often this level of defense:

What does it mean for James to be on a “good” team that is anything but great? That means The question, and only he can answer it. The realization will come this season if it hasn’t already. Because we now know that the Lakers are miles away from real competition. To reach the 63% benchmarks above, the Lakers would need to finish the season 23-7 against teams with winning records and 21-8 on the road.

That’s not happening, not with a net rating of -4.7. Not when blowout losses mount. Not when James hasn’t missed a game just weeks before his 40th birthday and Davis has only missed one.

Are the Lakers despairing of this? And what does this despair look like? Zach LaVine doesn’t make it a real point of contention where Boston, Cleveland and Oklahoma City are located. They have little to offer other than remaining young talent (Austin Reaves, Dalton Knecht and their cap space) and first-round draft picks in 2029 and 2031. To make this definitive or relevant requires an answer from James.

The Lakers need to know where James is this season, the next and beyond. Or you have to call yourself. Spending the rest of this decade’s wealth on a team that can’t win the title – and could send James into retirement at the end of every season – would be madness. But what do we call what they do?

The Lakers have failed to win a playoff series in three of the last four seasons and are on pace to make it four out of five. Over that span, they are 97-137 (.415 winning percentage) against teams with winning records and 77-93 away from home (.453 winning percentage), about where they are now. Nothing has changed.

And why should we expect this? James’s is clearly going downhill, as it should be at 40, although it’s nowhere near as steep as everyone else’s. (Should we say that?) Still, he’s owed $48.7 million this season and $52.6 million next season. Reconstructing a contender around James and Davis has proven impossible since they can no longer carry one on their own and their salaries don’t allow for much support.

This is the Catch-22 in Los Angeles. James is good enough to make the Lakers relevant, but no longer good enough to make them contenders. So the sideshow must continue. Only James can tell us how much longer.

Purpose: Fact. LeBron James’ Lakers are stuck in the middle.