The Los Angeles Lakers did well on Sunday.
No, the Lakers did not play well. In fact, they played about as poorly as they have in this dark season of losing. The Lakers lost big and claimed their 35th loss of the season. In the first half, the Lakers made only 11 baskets, and none of their starters had a single assist.
Incredible as it may be to imagine, no one on the Lakers' starting unit made a single pass that resulted in a made basket in the first half. Yeah, that is bad basketball.
Eventually, Jordan Clarkson would earn an assist in the third quarter, but that was all. The Lakers' starters managed one assist for the game.
Yet the Lakers did well on Sunday.
Playing against the New York Knicks, the Lakers accomplished something special that afternoon. They made the Knicks look good. Only three teams in the NBA had more fewer victories than the Lakers entering the Sunday's contest at Madison Square Garden. The Knicks were one of those teams, and at one point, New York led LA by 20 points.
Why is losing to the Knicks a good thing?
Well, the Lakers have no realistic chance at making the playoffs. They have a better chance of ending up with the worst record in the NBA and guaranteeing a top five NBA draft pick. If the Lakers end up with a top five draft pick, they get to keep it. If they somehow end up with the sixth pick or "worse," the Lakers' pick goes to the Phoenix Suns in accordance with the Steve Nash trade.
And so, the Lakers losing to the Knicks can actually be categorized as a victory in the long run. First of all, the Lakers provided New York it's 10th victory, so LA only has 3 more wins than the Knicks on the season. And the Lakers notched another loss, meaning the Lakers inched closer to the bottom.
Fans may not like the idea of rooting for losses, but when embarrassing defeats are coming fast and hard, focusing on the big picture avoids the depressing reality that the Lakers are 20 points worse than the worst team in the Eastern Conference.
Quickly moving past that reality, one should remember that Sunday's loss will look like a victory when the season ends.
