Off-season Outlook: Jordan Farmar

Once considered a major part of the Lakers’ future, Jordan Farmar has himself a lot of explaining to do after a season gone horribly awry.  Let’s see if we can’t get to the bottom of this:

It is never a good thing when Pau Gasol has to yell at you instead of the other way around.

2009 Recap:

After a breakout 2007-2008 campaign, Farmar was poised to give Derek Fisher a run for his money as the Lakers starting point guard, but by the end of the NBA Finals, Farmar was doing all he could to hold his tenuous grasp on the back-up point guard role.  Poor shooting and shoddy defense now seem to have damned Farmar’s future who could very well be entering his final season as a Laker.

To cut Farmar some slack, it seems he was never really healthy this recent season.  He suffered a knee injury early in the season, robbing him of his quickness and then was hampered by tendinitis in his foot late in the year.  While those injuries certainly didn’t help as they no doubt robbed him of his quickness, it doesn’t explain why he struggled since the first game of the season.  Functioning largely as a spot-up shooter, Farmar still only managed to make a 39.1% of his shots from the field and even fell all the way down to 58.4% from the charity stripe.

The shame of it is that the Lakers really could have used Farmar this year.  His quickness makes him the perfect complement to the aging but more physical Derek Fisher and Farmar is the only point guard on the roster capable of getting into the lane and making plays.  Instead, it seems Farmar ended up letting himself get frustrated by his early season performance and health struggles, leading to a few run-ins with the Laker coaching staff by season’s end.  The emergence of Shannon Brown will only make this frustration even worse next year or hopefully light a fire under him to get his job back next season.

It was just that kind of season for Jordan Farmar in 2008-2009.

Homework:

With the Lakers reportedly shopping him in the off-season, Farmar has his work cut out for him to not only earn a spot in the rotation, but to just remain employed by the Lakers:

• Work your ass off. Farmar is going to have to dedicate himself big time this off-season to show the Lakers he not only wants to stay but to also re-establish himself as the point guard of the future.  With Shannon Brown getting a nice new contract, Farmar is clearly at the bottom of the depth chart now, so coming into camp in stellar shape would be a huge demonstration of dedication.  Spending the early parts of his off-season screwing around in the World Series of Poker is the exact opposite of what he should be doing right now.
• Get defensive. While his shooting was lousy and inconsistent, Farmar really lost playing time due to defensive deficiencies.  Offense is nice and all, but Farmar isn’t going to move in front of Shannon Brown until he proves he can be a reliable defender against the quicker point guards in the league.  He doesn’t need to be a stopper, just not a liability.
• Smarten up. Injuries aside, Farmar needs to get his head on straight to perform better next year.  He did not seem to take his post-season demotion very well and is still prone to making bad decisions on both ends of the floor.  He has to remember that he is the true point guard and Brown is just a recent convert.  If he can prove to Phil Jackson that he is more trustworthy with the ball in his hands, he might be able to sneak ahead of Shannon the depth chart.

Tags: Jordan Farmar, Player Review