LA Lakers' failure to address their shooting issues could lead to another wasted season for LeBron James

The LA Lakers are now 0-4 to begin the new NBA season and their shooting, oft-criticised and long since known as the team's glaring weakness, has been simply woeful to begin the campaign – and it is costing the team dearly on a nightly basis.

No team has ever won the title after losing their opening four games - as the Lakers now have after a 110-99 defeat to the Denver Nuggets on Wednesday night - and it already feels like another season where the genius of LeBron James might be being wasted as time is running out for him to add to his existing four championship rings.

You cannot blame Darvin Ham either, the head coach has been in the door five minutes and is doing the best with what he has been given.

• Team-by-team guide for 2022-23 NBA season
• Five storylines to keep an eye on in the NBA this season
• Six exciting NBA duos to watch this year
• Live NBA matches on Sky Sports: TV listings

"We're four games and it sucks to lose, but we have 78 games left," Ham said, attempting to put a brave face on things. "It's plenty of time for us to right the ship. And it starts now."

The boo-boys' favourite victim to pick on, Russell Westbrook, was held out to rest a sore left hamstring so could not even shoulder the blame for this latest dismal showing offensively from the Lakers. Even without the much-maligned former MVP, LA still shot less than 45 per cent from the field and only 26.7 per cent from three (which actually trended their season percentage upwards!).

Overall, the Lakers have a 96.9 offensive rating this season, per NBA Stats. Every other team in the NBA clocks in at 100 or over on that metric. The reality must be setting in now that, unless there is a vast improvement, this could be a historically bad team. The Lakers are on pace to have the third worst offensive rating in the last 20 seasons. Only the 2012 Bobcats and 2015 Sixers, per StatMuse – a very low bar indeed – are worse.

Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player

Opposing teams know they do not have to respect the three-point shot and that compounds the Lakers' myriad of offensive issues. In the previous game, the Blazers knew they could rely upon the home team to miss often enough from beyond the arc that they did not respect the three-point shot for most of the night. They knew they did not need to close out and guard because their opponents just were not going to make many of the shots.

James was throwing air-balls, Anthony Davis was hitting the side of the backboard from the corner and none of the Lakers could really get it to drop.

In total, the Lakers are 33-for-118 on three-pointers through the first four games. It is, frankly, appalling and the worst thing from their point of view is their big two players have been playing pretty well overall.

There was a point during that match-up against the Blazers where Davis took over the game, demolishing everything which came his way on the defensive end (on his way to six blocks on the night) and flushing home every ball which was tossed up in anything approaching proximity to the rim on the other side of the court.

Against the Nuggets, dealing with lower-back tightness, 'The Brow' had 22 points and 14 rebounds for Los Angeles. James had 19 points to run his double-digit scoring streak to 1,100 games.

Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player

James is also averaging a double-double, at 25.3 points, 10.0 rebounds and 7.3 assists per game, through the opening four losses. The big two are doing their bit but everything else is completely dysfunctional.

Lakers vice-president of basketball operations Rob Pelinka's attempt to bring together a cast of ageing role players last year, who were a shadow of their former selves, did not work – and although he has tried to move the needle this year somewhat by acquiring Lonnie Walker IV and Patrick Beverley (dealing Taylor Horton-Tucker for the latter), the team is still lacking what it has always needed most: shooting.

Just for historical context, the Los Angeles Lakers never started 0-4 during Dr Jerry Buss' 34-year ownership tenure. Lakers will now start 0-4 for third time in past nine years (having done so previously in 2014-15 and 2015-16). It is hard to see where the franchise goes next, especially with the New Orleans Pelicans holding the rights to a pick swap in the upcoming NBA Draft as well as the Lakers' picks in the 2024 and 2025 drafts.

After losing to the Warriors in the season opener where the Lakers went 10-of-40 from three, James said: "To be completely honest, we're not a team constructed of great shooting. It's not like we're sitting here with a lot of lasers on our team."

A veiled shot at the front office, perhaps, for not addressing what was a known issue?

LeBron extended his remarks even further following the Blazers clash at the weekend, stating: "We can't shoot a penny in the ocean."

He is not wrong. Of the players on the current roster to attempt more than 10 three-pointers this season, not one player has hit at better than a 30 per cent clip. For the players who have hit double-figures in attempts, James leads the way on just 25.7 per cent; Kendrick Nunn has shot 23.5 per cent; Patrick Beverley is at 18.8 per cent; Davis at 18.2 per cent, Lonnie Walker IV is at 17.4 per cent, and Westbrook is 1-for-12 through his three games to clock in at 8.3 per cent.

It has been proved in the past that if you surround James with shooters, you have a good shot at winning a title (no pun intended). Pelinka – who cashed in his chips by trading for Westbrook, a move that many considered folly on a team which already had James as the primary ball-handler – tried to deviate from that template and it may prove to be the undoing for him, and this team in the end.

Despite all of that, in the offseason the Lakers' front-office chief was locked into a contract extension which stretches to 2026 – potentially an even more baffling move than the trade for Westbrook, a notoriously bad shooter. That perhaps points to the fact that the culpability for this whole mess extends wider than just Pelinka himself.

The Lakers' front office has a decision-making committee which reportedly comprises president Jeanie Buss, Pelinka, and Kurt Rambis. Buss' siblings Joey and Jesse have also taken an increasing role within the organisation's hierarchy.

The Athletic reports, though, that it was Pelinka who – after working the phones to try and make a trade happen, namely with the Utah Jazz, Brooklyn Nets and Indiana Pacers – ultimately made the decision to proceed with Westbrook on the roster for the current season.

The report stated: "While Pelinka has been given the ultimate power to make these decisions, sources say there was a desire for the entire group to come to a consensus. It appears the voices of Joey and Jesse Buss are being considered among Lakers leaders now more than ever. If they were going to gamble on a make-or-break move of this magnitude, the thinking went, then everyone had to have confidence in the same vision.

"But when that wasn't the case, sources say, the choice was made by Pelinka to remain patient and see, yet again, if Westbrook might find a way to make this imperfect fit with the Lakers work."

The road forward from here is fairly bleak. Westbrook opted into his $47m contract for this season and, with the Lakers' cupboard already fairly shorn of moveable assets, it makes that pretty much an impossible salary to offload. Once the books are clear of that at the end of this season it should afford Pelinka a little more flexibility but everyone can see how the Lakers are toiling right now and that fact in itself changes the conversation in terms of the value shooters will have for them.

It is hard to say how many years James can continue to operate at the level he is currently at because 'King James', so far, continues to defy the passing of time and the usual onset wear-and-tear that causes athletes' performance levels to degrade as they age.

He is nearly 38 and is still one of the most dominant physical specimens in any sport. He spends over $1m each year to ensure his body remains in peak physical power to compete but he cannot continue to defy physiology forever.

All signs point to this being another year that the Lakers will be treading water, another year wasted in LeBron's quest to win as many rings as he can before retirement.

Live NBA action returns on Saturday night as Sacramento Kings host Miami Heat, late at night from 11pm live on Sky Sports Mix & Main Event, followed by OKC Thunder's trip to face Dallas Mavericks, from 1am, live on Sky Sports Mix