Vee’s Spot: WHAT HAPPENED?

As Pau Gasol made his debut as a Los Angeles Laker, almost every teammate of his has stepped up to the plate and is playing better than their pre-Gasol days.

I say almost everyone because one teammate sticks out when comparing stats: Luke Walton. These days, it is rare to see Walton make a good play, a good pass, or even a basket. He has been taking shots he hasn’t been succeeding in percentage wise and his infamous high basketball IQ seems to have dropped immensely.

Walton hasn’t started since Gasol entered the team and this seems to have affected his game.

In his 2006-2007 season as a Laker, Walton averaged 11.6 points per game. This season, it has dropped to a very low 6.6 ppg playing about 20 minutes pg.

When Gasol joined the team, there was a great increase of stats for players like Lamar Odom. Odom wasn’t playing his best basketball while Kwame Brown was the Laker center, but quickly changed his game.

While Walton dropped to 6.6 ppg and 3.6 rebounds per game, Odom improved his game making 13.6 ppg and 10 rpg.

You don’t even have to compare seasons, you can simply compare the first half of the ‘07-’08 season to the second half so far.

While trades were being made, there was rumor that Odom and Walton would be traded for someone like Jason Kidd. When the Gasol trade was made, Odom and Walton had a chance to relax, at least for the rest of the season. It is possible that Odom realized the chance of a trade and upped his game, but for Walton, saying that he simply doesn’t care is an understatement.

It is half time in the Seattle SuperSonics vs Lakers game and Walton hasn’t done anything significant but throw the ball away a couple times. Lucky for him, we have Kobe Bryant, Gasol, Odom, and Derek Fisher on the court as well bringing the score to 62-43. If the Lakers win this one, it will bring their winning streak to 8 for the first time in 4 years.

So the question is, what happened to the player with the highest basketball IQ?