NBA Notes: Lakers, Anthony Davis, Blazers, Rockets, Jimmy Butler

Lakers

Don’t look now, but Lakers coach JJ Redick is 3-0 (as of this writing). Of course, each of the Lakers’ first three games was at home — which counts for, if not a lot, at least something.

Redick also owes some gratitude to Anthony Davis, who has been utterly fantastic, as written by Marc Stein of The Stein Line, who called Davis “otherworldly.”

“LeBron James rightly seized all the headlines after his fourth-quarter detonation (16 points in a 21-0 run) in Saturday night’s home win over Sacramento, but Davis looks like one of the best two-way players on Earth when he does what he did in impressive home wins over the Timberwolves, Suns Kings,” Stein wrote.

“Davis joined Elgin Baylor (three times), Jerry West (twice) and Kobe Bryant as the only players in franchise history to start the season with three 30-point games. (The league office, of course, does not hand out Coach of the Week awards, but you can safely assume JJ Redick would be the West’s recipient if such an award existed after his 3-0 start to NBA head coaching.).”

So, there you have it. Things are going remarkably well early in Lakerland. And for Redick, this coaching business has been pretty easy.

Trail Blazers

Newcomer Deni Avdija is starting, but off to an otherwise slow start with the Blazers, not really taking many shots and therefore, not contributing much in the points department.

Portland coach Chauncey Billups is taking some of the blame.

“I got to run stuff for him and get some shots for him,” Billups told reporters. “But more than anything, we’re all just trying to get to know Deni and vice versa.”

During the preseason, Billups referred to Avdija as a “Swiss Army knife” type of forward.

“Deni is just a basketball player, so you kind of use him all over the place,” Billups said. “He’s also a really good secondary playmaker. He can really pass. He’s kind of a Swiss Army knife-type of dude in terms of you can use them as a screener, obviously his shot has gotten a lot better. He can finish. We’ll be using him all over.”

Soon enough, the Blazers likely will be doing exactly that.

Rockets

The Rockets are already being linked to Heat forward Jimmy Butler (as well as, yes, Suns star Kevin Durant). We have that full story here.

And a Butler deal may make sense for Miami too, according to Bill Simmons of The Ringer.

“Jimmy Butler might get traded soon,” Simmons said. “Houston was the team that jumped out to me … as a Butler home … in my head, I was thinking (Dillon Brooks) and (Steven Adams) and (Amen Thompson) for Butler. Made a ton of sense for both sides if Miami was like, ‘It’s re-boot time.’

“I don’t know what Miami’s thinking with their future, but I’ll tell you this: they’re not in the class with Orlando anymore. … They’re just not good enough anymore.”

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