Still, it’s clear small-ball is here to stay, which means reduced minutes for all the true big men.

At the end of the day, we will get production out of the role player spots. There’s just too much talent on the team to expect anything else. With that being said, there’s a reason Kawhi refused to sign here without Paul George and that’s because his talent is what will take us from contender to championship team. He’s said that he’s finally healthy and his play through 4 games has backed that up.

Takeaway number 6: the refs are gonna need some time to get into “game shape” as well. Scrimmages are one thing, but good God was this game hideous to watch for long stretches, thanks to some poor whistles (for/against both teams).

Takeaway number 7: The PF/C rotation looks fine. Noah looks like he can handle himself out there, and JMG/Patterson/MM at C can work in small stretches even against a big team like the Lakers. At this point I can’t think of a single logical rationale for playing Trez for 20 minutes straight and the entire 4th quarter. Leaving Trez out there for too long was a mistake earlier in the season, and now that the Clips have had more time to experiment I think it’d be even more of a mistake to do that going forward if/when Trez gets back.