Analysis With an ID Fellowship Twist
First, let's review the following highlights from an October 26, 2016 email:
___
here's my final pre-season take on this team:
- We will get exposed on the boards; we're a very poor rebounding team right now.
- Randle is pretty much Lamar Odom 2.0. Final conclusion. Lots of promise, but little substance. That's ok, though. That was a very weak draft class. I'm not sure who was available that I would have rather had? Maybe Rodney Hood? Questionable. Randle is probably one of the 3 best players from that draft and we should be good with that.
- Lou Williams is so bad. So so bad. This is the yelling voice in my head every time he touches the ball: "PASS THE FUCKING BALL"
- Russell is the player closest to being a super-star. He's far from it, but he shows flashes of promise. Most people cite his mental make-up as a weakness saying he's too immature. I actually think that's one of his strengths. He generally doesn't care what most people say and he's got just enough "crazy" in him to help him become great, if he so chooses.
- This 2nd string lineup will be very fun to watch (and hopefully frequently used): Calderon (or Huertas or Russell), JC, Ingram, Nance, Black. When they are playing well, they can be a bear to handle.
Bottom line, we're not a playoff team and still stink.
My goal is this: the season is 4 quarters of ~20 games each and I hope we get better each quarter.
It would be nice if in that 4th quarter of games, we go 10-10, for instance.
___
Now, let's analyze this team after 50 games.
It's well-documented that this Lakers team started out over-achieving. With great energy out of the gate, the Lakers put up some very encouraging games. This start, perhaps, is what has made their more recent and complete slump harder to watch.
But, for the sake of discussion, fun, and proper context, we will turn the game of basketball into ID Fellowship.
Point A: Rookie fatigue.
True, the start of ID fellowship was a blast. New people. New hospitals. Awesome cases without having to manage potassiums or sliding scales. This was the life! All ID... all the time! Yeah!
But, come November, the young ID fellow began to drag and have a hard time being energized. Another Pulm-ID case conference. Another Tuesday PowerPoint. Another Mandell Review. Another grossly inefficient VA clinic.
So, it's not surprising that the Lakers' young core has run into the "rookie" wall.
But, you're in the big leagues now. Put your big boy pants on and suck it up. You don't want to play defense or see another diabetic foot consult? Too bad. You don't want to rebound or clean up another ICU bomb? Too bad. You can't solve FUOs and treat Endocarditis all day. Somebody's gotta do the dirty work.
So, yes. We'll take our 17 wins for now. But, we've seen what this team can do. True, we aren't healthy. But, the slump is not an injury issue. It's an effort issue. Suck it up and collect that freshly printed paper from the VA printer. Yes, it's a new consult. And, yes, it's another "Vanco/Zosyn isn't working for my 500lb patient with cellulitis."
Point B: Coaching Analysis
I have been pleasantly surprised. Luke Walton has rightfully been more Glenn Mathisen than MBG, but I think at this stage it's necessary. He took over a fractured team with young players feeling like they are prisoners. It's ok if rounds are short and it's just "I think this is VZV colitis" rather than "Let's talk about the differential diagnosis of colitis until we're blue in the face."
Luke has been very honest and open about everything. And he's been very nice.
His players clearly love him.
I think it was critical to win their trust and get their attention first.
But, eventually, he's going to have to start demanding things from these pups. Not hardcore MBG-like. But, maybe half-way there by the end of the season.
I'm looking for a few comments from Luke that sound like "I trust D'Angelo will be playing way better defense -- maybe even as good as C+ defense -- by the start of next year's training camp." Or "Ingram has to understand that even the great ones put their pants on one leg at a time."
Point C: Management
Wow, the Cedars ID department may be disbanding; OVMC may be hiring a TB doc or an Armenian lady. Things are up in the air. But, what is the right thing to do here?
As far as the Lakers are concerned, the first thing they'll have to overcome is getting over that asinine comments by Jim Buss about stepping down. I think that ridiculous timeline he set for himself needs to be cleaned up. They can't get rid of him, especially because that probably means Mitch's days are numbered. But, I think we should expect a more logical timeline after the season ends.
Point D: Player Evaluation
What I find to be most helpful in assessing the character of our players is to pick on their weakest points and analyze how they've handled that. With that we begin....
Player 1. Let's say there is an ID fellow who is just starting his 2nd year of fellowship. This fellow has some crazy skills with gram positive infections, but has continued to neglect gram negative infections. In fact, he's so bad at gram negative infections that the attendings have started to funnel those consults away from him, but try to funnel gram positive infections to him. How ridiculous and bad does this fellow sound? Is this a fellow you'd want to build a practice around? No way. Is this a fellow that you'd add to your small ID group? Nope. Maybe this could be like a 4th or 5th option fellow. Of course, by now you've realized that gram positive and gram negative is a metaphor for left and right-handedness and we are talking about none other than Julius Randle. It's clear Julius spends time on his craft. He hits the gym. Does reps. Spends time and energy. But, clearly this guy has been told about developing a right hand since before high school. Yet, he has still not figured out how to do it.This sign, alone, should be a huge red flag. Again, I'm glad we got this guy in that draft. Not too many better players to pick from. But, let's be sure we pay him accordingly. He is a starting role player. He should not be getting "team star" money. I'm afraid, however, that some team will pay him that much when the time comes and he won't be a Laker for long. And if he remains a Laker, he'll be overpaid.
Player 2. Let's say that one of the ID fellows has all the smarts you could possibly want. They know the bugs. They know the drugs. They know the tests to order. They do it all very very well. Young, but well. Yet, when it comes to writing the actual order, this ID fellow constantly drops the ball and writes the wrong thing. Ceftriaxone for endocarditis is written as Ciprofloxacin with the wrong dose. Gentamicin for urosepsis is written instead as Clindamycin. IV is written as PO. PO is written as PR. PR is written as IO. It's all fine and dandy right up until the boneheaded writing. Of course, these proverbial turnovers are akin to those of none other than D'Angelo Russell. It's clear that this is a smart player with plenty of size and talent to be elite in this league. Yet, the biggest red flag is that he has yet to figure out how to stop being a turnover machine. This is actually very concerning to me. He's taking on the persona of a space cadet, because his errors are nothing more than lack of focus. And, that lack of focus can be seen in other areas too. Defense, particularly. It's at the point where Luke is not letting him finish games. This is bad. Real bad. Not saying the dye is cast just yet, but this needs to be fixed immediately. If we start next year with this same red flag, I'm afraid it could be too late for D'Lo. He'll go from potentially being a star in this league to being JR Smith.
Player 3. Let's say that your brand new ID fellow did awesome in residency and was a superstar. Yet, when he got to your fellowship, you realized that you forgot to note he speaks no English. First day rounding, he can't even talk about, listen to, or write notes about a case. It's clear that he can play ball, but he just has to learn English first and this could take a long time. You wish you could evaluate him, but you really can't. On the count of you can't talk to this guy. Such is the analogy for Brandon Ingram and his weight/strength.
Now, I will say that he has already shown improved strength. First part of the season, he couldn't even take the slightest contact without losing balance and the ball. Now, he can absorb some basic contact and half the time gets up a shot. I think the fact that he's worked on his strength is really encouraging. What bothers me is that I'm sure he's been told about his weight/strength most of the last 3-5 years and hasn't done much about it. His ceiling is sky high. But, he better have a very strong (literally) offseason. Otherwise, he can't hang in this English-speaking league.
Player 4. Let's say you had an ID fellow who was not the most skilled or the smartest, but the effort was A+. You just knew that every single minute, you were getting the best. Maybe the best wasn't exactly MBG quality, but it wasn't Hardy either. It was solid and maxed out. I would say this about two players: Nance and Clarkson. I don't think either will be stars. But, I think they can both be very important players for years to come. Whenever it comes time to make a decision about Randle, I'm glad we'll have Nance on the roster because while he's not as talented or skilled, he may be better on many other levels.
Player 5. This ID fellow used to be homeless and is so glad you gave him a chance at a job. He's really taking whatever you can spare. You have him round at the SNF on weekends? That's ok. You want him to listen to tapes of rounds late into the night? Great! You make him do ID trivia against MBG and WLG every day and he loses miserably? More, please! This is Zubac who drives to Bakersfield to play in the D-league, keeps the bench warm as long as you need, and has to go against Mozgov and Black in practice everyday as they completely overpower him. And not a peep of complaining? That is all you need to know about this kid. He's good. He's real good. In fact, I think he leads his draft class in double doubles at this point in time. Sure, he has a lot of work to do. But, he'll gladly mop the VA Fellow room twice daily if that's what you ask of him. Really glad we have him. When Mozgov's contract is up in 2051 (don't look it up, it's 2020 actually), we'll hopefully have nothing to worry about.
Player 6 and 7. Let's say that two of your ID fellows are in their 3rd years (they both did an extra year just because) and are the type to ALWAYS raise their hands to discuss conference cases. They don't let any of the new fellows talk. During rounds, they always want to make the decision when MBG or WLG ask open-ended questions. They're not the greatest ID docs, but they are well liked and do decent work. But, they do ALL the work. And some days, they do work bad enough to make you cringe. Oh, and by the way, one of them is dating the newest, hottest surgery intern at any given time. These are none other than Lou Will and Swaggy P. They had a good run and even won us some games. They are well loved. But, hot-dang do they hog up minutes and shots. I would love to see half of those minutes and shots go to the younger crew. I'd badly love to see that. As we sit here near the mid-way point, it's gotten to the point where our young guys actually believe Lou and Swaggy should get the minutes. And the kids are starting to give up, in a sense, and be ok with that. This is bad for all parties not name Lou and Swaggy. I think Luke needs to do something about this soon.
I'll skip Deng and Mozgov because I really have nothing to say.
In summary, though, I think we have some seriously concerning issues with the three players that we are counting on to become stars. Randle has no right hand and isnt' close to developing one. D'Lo is creeping too close to space-cadet status with his TOs and defense. And Ingram is too weak. If we're seein these same issues in 12 months.... then we have chosen poorly.
No comments:
Post a Comment