Depth: 2024-25 season, Jack Laravia player report (offensive article)

"Jack is a high IQ offense and defense player, and his skills are very suitable for JJ Redick's basketball system. He is a destructive defensive player who can use his size and physical strength to make mistakes. On the offensive end, he can score in all three areas and is good at creating space for himself and his teammates. Jack is only 23 years old and we think he has huge basketball potential, which will be well honed in our Lakers basketball development program." -- Robert Pelinka said.

For many people, Laravia is the most "mysterious" of the Lakers' signing players during the offseason - compared to Ayton and Smart, who played the finals as the main player, Laravia in the third grade is just a substitute for a non-traffic team, and even played only 136 games in three years due to injury - many people know very little about him.

"Looking at the leopard in the tube" is inevitable to generalize. So this offseason fan circle has a variety of descriptions of Laravia: some say he is a "DFS substitute", some say he is a "front version of Reeves", some say he is a "Defensive Knector", and some say he is like Kuzma, Li Keil, and Yamura...

In fact, before writing this article, I also lacked understanding of Laravia - in order to write this article, I have watched more than 20 games of Laravia's 2024-2025 season - now I think I know him enough.

Next, let me introduce to you comprehensively and systematically the player Jack Laravia.

Basic Information

Jack Laravia, 23 years old, 201cm tall, 107kg weight, 207cm wingspan, forward.

Average data in the Grizzlies in the 2024-25 season: 20.9 minutes. 7.3 points, 4.4 rebounds, 2.8 assists, 0.9 steals, 0.4 blocks (including 1.4 frontcourt boards), shooting percentage of 49%, averaging 1.9 shots per game in three-pointers, shooting percentage of 44.4%, and shooting 2 shots per game in free throws, shooting percentage of 69.7%;

Average data for the Kings in the 2024-25 season: 19.3 minutes. 6.1 points, 2.8 rebounds, 1.3 assists, 0.9 steals, 0.2 blocks (including 1.2 frontcourt boards), shooting percentage of 43.8%, shooting 2.7 three-pointers, shooting percentage of 38.5%, shooting 1 free throw, shooting percentage of 57.9%;

2024-25 season advanced data:

Integrated advanced data - EPM: -1.4, better than 53% of the league's players in the same position; OEPM (offensive integrated advanced data): -1.3, better than 45% of the league's players in the same position; DEPM (defensive integrated integrated data): -0.1, better than 63% of the league's players in the same position.

ON/OFF (present data) data - +2.0 during the Grizzlies, better than 65% of players in the same position in the league; -3.8 during the Kings, better than 25% of players in the same position in the league.

(ON/OFF data is strongly correlated with the player's lineup when he is on the court, and cannot be regarded as a player's "personal assessment")

Player overview

(key part, if you are too lazy to read long analysis, you can even just look at this part):

Young, energetic 3-4 swinger. Have speed and athletic ability slightly above the league average.

Offensive end, currently a low-yield and medium-effect player. (See the picture above, PSA scored 100 shots for individuals) Last season, only scored 6.9 points per game with 34.6 touches per game, and only ranked 80th among the players with the same number of touches in the league. The goal-scoring ability is not very strong, not the kind of player who is "microwave-style scorer" or "has the ability to score independently and can eat the ball."

(Different from Hachimura and Kuzma)

Unball player (access rate is close to 70%), but is not a mobile shooter, but rather a "open space/cut/create space" player;

The production of three-pointers is not high, and most of them are fixed three-pointers for receiving the ball and rely on empty spots. The performance in the first two years of my career was quite mediocre, but it made significant progress in the 24-25 season. In the case of fixed points + open positions, I shot a reliable three-point shooting percentage (45.5% of the three-point shooting percentage of the big open positions, 44% of the three-point shooting percentage of the ball) - but one of the major characteristics is that I am very keen on breaking through at a fixed point after receiving the ball, and have a high "rejection" frequency;

(difference from Reeves and Kneckett)

can break through (better than Lao Ke/Yacum), but as a breakthrough player, I lack sufficient start/final explosive power;

control skills are ordinary, and I maintain The ball advances in a straight line well and can take into account the vision when dribbling, but the first step when holding the ball is not fast enough, and it is impossible to choose/change the breakthrough route freely, and is not good at keeping the dribble in crowded space (often forced to close the ball in advance/stop the ball); at the same time, it is not the kind of player with obvious advantages in confrontation and excellent confrontation skills - the result of the above is that although Laravia often breaks through 10 feet, the ending production efficiency is not guaranteed;

The key to supporting Laravia's breakthrough logic - is also one of his biggest advantages: his ability to handle the ball.

Laravia has excellent ball handling skills that are rare among character players (refer to AST:Usg in the picture above). After a fixed-point breakthrough attracts defense, he will not force the box, but will pass the ball according to the situation - this means that his breakthrough is not necessarily the last link of the offense, and he can also choose whether to "flow" the offense based on the good or bad opportunity - this constitutes the essential difference between him and Prince, Reddish, Paway, etc., who can break into the penalty area but end ordinary players. (For example, he is a bit like Exam in this regard)

At the same time, this ability to handle the ball will also optimize the team's outside transmission - I don't need to say more about the advantage of "everyone can handle the ball". However, the only drawback is that Laravia's turnover rate is also relatively high. (See the picture above)

(No ball movement distance on the offensive end of the vertical axis, no ball movement speed on the offensive end of the horizontal axis. This screening is a forward rating)

In addition, another major advantage of Laravia is that as an off-ball player, he has excellent empty-cut and empty-handed movement awareness, and has a good sense of smell and enthusiasm for frontcourt rebounds - he knows how to rely on movement to open up space, and at the same time he will accumulate some "edge advantages" for the team, which may be a trait that the Lakers value. (It will be highlighted later)

defensive end, although Laravia has speed and size, she is not a player with excellent counter-elasticity/diversity.

Currently he is not competent for the role of the outside leader (Ball Screen Navigation above). When facing defenders, the problem of not moving well enough is very obvious, and at the same time, it is not good at dealing with screens - both as a leader and off-Ball Chaser Defense are performing quite poorly.

(Difference from DFS)

I think the most suitable player for him is the No. 3 player and the light body 4 position - when facing the No. 3 position, he has both specific type and horizontal movement, which can keep up with the opponent's speed and interfere with the shooting. The same is true for the light 4 position (at the same time, the pick-and-roll frequency of most forward players will be lower);

In the 2024-25 season, he rarely faces the heavy 4 position or Non-space 5 position - Yes, I've seen the Kings playing against the Nuggets. In that game, Laravia was very tenacious when he was around Jokic, but I still want to point out that this is the only case in my video samples of Laravia who defended against the non-space 5 position - and we all know that there is a difference between defending against Jokic in 2024-25 and defending "other centers": against Jokic, you just need to stop him from receiving the ball as much as possible, which is successful, but against other centers is not the case.

Although Laravia has a certain weight and "hardness", he has similar problems with Hachimura when he appears in the 5th position - they are too short to provide normal quality frame protection (including as the No. 4 bottom line assistant), and at the same time, they are at a great disadvantage in rebounding, and often require the efforts of the whole team to make up for this disadvantage - in the final analysis, they are still players of standard small forward size (Laravia's wingspan is only 207cm). Since modern forwards need a large number of defenders to defend the backs, their horizontal movement problems are exposed, so sometimes in order to "play their strengths and avoid their weaknesses" will make them swing towards the No. 4 or even the No. 5 position - but this does not mean that we can really look at them as inside players.

(In the Grizzlies with many "standard power forwards", this comparison is particularly obvious on the court. In the Kings, you can also feel Laravia's disadvantage in body shape compared to Kean Murray. ps: Kean Murray's wingspan is 212cm)

Comparing with Lakers players - in the 24-25 season, Laravia's reserve requirement ratio reduction rate within 6 feet was +4.3%; in comparison, Finney Smith, who also has the specialty of "front line top inside line", was -4.2% within 6 feet - the difference is still the wingspan (DFS wingspan 213cm).

In addition, one of the major advantages of Laravia's defensive end is his "destructiveness" - he is very aggressive when defending the ball. He can reach more than 1.6 steals every 36 minutes, whether in the Kings or the Grizzlies; and he is also very sensitive to the passing route, averaging 2.2 cuts per game in the 24-25 season, which is more than Vanderbilt and Goodwin, and is only slightly lower than Smart (2.3 times).

Overall, Laravia was a "piezo" player who mainly missed the ball in the 24-25 season.

Relying on opening up space and handling balls, he has good compatibility and can integrate into multiple lineups in secondary roles; he can do a lot of things, but due to the insufficient completion of some "important functions", the overall positioning on the court is relatively vague and has high substitutability - he is not a typical No. 3 position in this era, nor a typical No. 4 position; he is not a powerful offensive player, nor a "gate" type of defensive player.

If you think of it as a leader-defense 3D, a substitute high-yield scorer, a high-quality bottom-line assistant, an excellent shooter or a small ball No. 5, you will most likely be disappointed - on the contrary, if you only think of Laravia as Laravia:

A certain ability to open up space and have excellent empty-cut awareness, can handle the ball, and is suitable for the 3rd position on the defensive end (complementary with LeBron's Eight Village), has a strong defense aggressiveness, and has a little counter-elasticity No. 3-4 substitute - then I think Laravia's stadium contribution and his compatibility with the Lakers are worthy of his contract.

Of course, I would hope that Laravia will continue to improve his shooting and anti-ball screening - as the number 3 projection is insufficient and unable to cope with the screen is his biggest "pain point" and the root of his "fuzzy" - he must improve in these two aspects to become a real No. 3 position without having to swing a lot to the No. 4 position where he is at a disadvantage. If he can do it, his value will reach another level.

Next we enter the detailed shot review player analysis:

Start from the shot

First, let's start with the shot:

Advantages and problems of shooters - I actually didn't deliberately select shots, but unexpectedly found that these shots reflect his advantages and disadvantages very clearly:

Laravia is not the kind of top shooter who will keep defenders in a row. The opponent will not fear his shooting and give up assisting defense - but when the opponent really "disrespects" him, Laravia in the 2024-25 season can punish his opponent and make the defense pay the price. (As mentioned earlier, the shooting percentage of large open positions is 45.5%)

It can be seen that when the large open positions catch the ball, Laravia's shooting mode is quite stable and smooth - the above five GIFs are like copied and pasted. There is no problem with the adjustment of footsteps after receiving the ball, the consistency of upper and lower limb movements, the shooting speed, shooting position, and the arc of the ball. At the same time, it also has certain adjustment capabilities. Figure 2 adjusted the footsteps well after receiving an overly high pass from a teammate.

In addition, in terms of shooting distribution, Laravia is not a typical "bottom-angle shooter", but is more like a "wing shooter" - I will analyze the value of this feature in detail in the future:

🔺Frequency of shooting in each area (Corner Three: bottom corner three-pointer; Non Corner: non-bottom corner three-pointer)

🔺Fast percentage of shooting in each area

Even if the concept of "open space" has improved a lot today, you still have to admit that three-pointers are the most critical skill that determines the player's ability to open space - and "open three-point response ability" is the main difference between Laravia and Kuzma, including Li Kaile mentioned by some friends.

This ability forms the "foundation" of Laravia's offensive logic - if the opponent is close to Laravia, Laravia can get rid of the cutting, or use empty-handed movement to open up space for his teammates; if the opponent leaves him, when Laravia receives the ball, he can shoot or attack the opponent's Close out breakout, and then complete the attack box or use his ability to handle the ball.

Laravia has its own closed-loop offensive logic. But we also need to be vigilant - the "foundation" of Laravia's offensive logic is not stable: What if Laravia's three-point shooting does not get better, but "returns" to the open three-point shooting percentage of about 35-37% in the first two years of his career?

can be said-that will be troublesome. Laravia's projection resume is still too small and is not absolutely optimistic, which has increased my "uneasiness" to a certain extent. Let's take a look at the BBI rating:

(refer to Smart for various interpretations)

(vertical axis projection ability, horizontal axis vacancy rate rating)

It can be seen that even the "projection year" 24 -Season 25, Laravia is still not a player with high shooting ratings and frequent defenses - the two highest scores of BBI were "shooting quality" and "three-point shooting percentage" - which fully reflects the source of Laravia's high three-point shooting percentage:

Laravia has performed "optimization" on his own, and by refusing to shoot those "low-quality shots", he has obtained more decent three-point shooting percentage data.

Let's take a look at how he did it specifically:

A double-edged sword: a fixed-point breakthrough after receiving the ball, a double-edged sword in Laravia's game.

Best side:

Laravia is often used by the opponent as the worst defense player. He can use the breakthrough to attack the opponent's defensive weak rings:

Catch the ball and break the ball and attack Doncic;

Catch the ball and break the ball and attack Curry make a foul;

Catch the ball and break the ball and attack Hilde make a layup;

Catch the ball and break the ball and attack Lao Ke 2+1;

Catch the ball and break the ball and attack Strower score;

Catch the ball and break the ball and attack Potter, attack close out make a foul.

If Laravia can maintain her current catch/open three-point shooting percentage and make herself a more threatening shooter, then his ability to catch and break through the ball will make him more dangerous than other "fifth offensive points" - because he can not only punish these defensive weak rings through the shooting advantages he brings from his height, but also directly attack or even kill them.

At the same time, Laravia does not have to take action by himself after breaking through the fixed point of attack. It is also a common choice for him to allocate to a more confident teammate after attracting defense. From here, we can see that Laravia has better passing vision and techniques than ordinary role players:

Catch the ball and break into the ball, attracting multiple players to assist in defense, and assisting the open position Wells to hit a three-pointer;

Catch the ball and break into the weak ring of the attack and defense. When entering the inside, encountering multiple players to assist in defense, it is not strong, and it is excellent to find a 45-degree open teammate in the private siege - assisting Morant to hit a three-pointer;

The ball was caught and broke through to attract the defense and found his teammates at the top of the arc, assisting Khufu to hit a three-pointer;

The ball was caught and broke through on the wing and did not act recklessly when facing Edie. Read the defense and passed the arc, assisting his teammates to hit a three-pointer;

The ball was caught and attacked and broke into the inside, covered by Post, cleverly stuffed the ball from behind Post, and assisted Ellis who cut into the cut layup;

The key breakthrough pass against the Clippers at the last moment - after passing Harden, he did not choose to challenge Zubac directly, but calmly passed to the outside line, assisting DeRozan to hit a two-pointer - this goal forced Leonard's final kill.

After receiving the ball, you can split it out without a chance, then pop it out again, and catch the ball and make a three-pointer again.

As you can see, the boxing and reprocessing of the ball are important parts of the Laravia game, but like the title of this part - it is a "double-edged sword".

La Lavia's catch-up breakthrough is not always a good thing. The main reason is what the player review said - he is actually a player who lacks the final and first step explosive power, and has a relatively ordinary operation control:

Look at the final explosive power first.

Since high school, Laravia has been a player who mainly plays without the ball. The first step is explosive power and ending explosive power, which is very talented and difficult to improve by gaining strength. I personally do not expect that he will make some leap forward in this field in the future, and tend to regard Laravia's ball-holding as his "non-main skill".

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Don't quit in a hurry - because we haven't talked about the best part of Laravia and the most compatible with the Lakers.

To discuss the combination of fixed-point and sudden shots, Laravia is not an excellent position in the league, and there are even many stronger people in the Lakers (Trent and Prince, who are better at fixed-point offense than him, both receive basic salary in the Bucks) - And what makes Laravia really "different" is not only the defense mentioned later, but also his sense of movement without the ball and ability to handle the ball.

The Lakers have too many people who can get the ball in the 2025-26 season, and there are too many players who need to digest the ending opportunity - the three cores have to take action, Ayton has to take action, and Hachimura has to take action, and even Kneckett, Smart, and Vincent are the kind of players who are more valuable when shooting - but there is only one ball, which means that the Lakers urgently need some different players:

Some players who can contribute even if they don't take action or even if they don't take action.

This is what I think Laravia is truly worth to the Lakers. Let's look at the game directly:

A classic move in the Laravia game is to first be in the bottom corner, so that the opponent's opponent becomes the "bottom line assistant". Then, when the opponent's attention is attracted by the strong side attack, quietly "Shake" (the movement from the bottom corner along the three-point line to the ball holder) to 45 degrees, and then catch the ball and shoot or cut in - the above round is an example.

This ghostly cut often helps Laravia get rid of the opponents, and once he attracts more defenders' attention, he can use his passes to create opportunities for his teammates.

is the same round again. This time Dillon focused on "Tag" Edie and didn't notice Laravia's movements at all (he might think Laravia is still in the bottom corner), so Laravia cuts and shakes away Shen Kyung to score;

When cutting, he can even play some moves that surprised me - it is also a "Shake" to 45 degrees cut. Dinwiddie noticed Laravia's movements in this round, but Laravia actually used a "no ball European step" to get rid of the defense - although this is a very simple action, not every player will do this.

At the same time, Laravia's cutting was very "dynamic" and flexible - this round, he cut from the wing, but realized that the ball could not be passed, he immediately cut out to the top of the arc to avoid blocking his teammates' space - and then when the defender relaxed his guard, he suddenly cut in from the top of the arc again. Alexander Walker did not notice this cut at all, and Laravia got a perfect opportunity to cut into the scoring. (Unfortunately, the problem of insufficient ending explosive power was exposed again)

Another round that reflects the IQ of no ball movement - first cut from the bottom line to the "reset position" from the bottom line to the weak side, but when Xiao Pippen dribbled to the weak side, the strong and weak side was about to reset again, he immediately moved back to the original right bottom corner - completely correct movement.

Salic was unwilling to leave the strong side guard position, so Laravia got an open opportunity - he did not choose to shoot (reject to shoot). After receiving the ball and breaking into the inside, he turned around and passed the ball. After assisting, Bain moved to the bottom corner, and made a three-pointer - a very Warrior-like round.

Laravia's empty-handed mobile IQ and secondary ball handling ability (including a tendency to refuse shots) are all vividly reflected in this round.

First, he used the cover to cut into the bottom corner, and immediately ran back again after the failure. He handed over his hand and rolled the ball to the basket, causing a foul.

Not only in the Grizzlies, but also in the Kings also have tactics designed specifically to use Laravia's unball running ability - this tactic is a bit "Floppy" meaning:

Laravia first cut into the bottom of the basket, with covers on both sides, Laravia cuts to one side (Floppy here, used as a front misleading in this tactic), but then, Lara immediately turned around and set up a double cover for Laraven with her teammates for Laraven to cut out (Stagger) - Just when the opponent thought this must be the real offensive intention, Laraven made a cross cover with Laraven, cut out to the weak bottom corner, and cooperated with the ball to break through at the top of the arc to catch the ball and hit a three-pointer. After the tactic of

was beaten once, and the king quickly fought again. There was no chance, but Laravia used "Shake" again later - moving from the wing to the bottom corner and receiving the ball and hitting a three-pointer.

Laravia has many cutting cases and is very rich in types:

Conversion cut when the weak ring is against the weak ring / without the ball;

Give&Go, back-door cuts to attack the opponent's defense weak ring;

The bottom corner cuts into the secondary processing ball;

Sudden back-run cuts when used as a coverer;

Face-frame cuts to punish those who are not focused. (The foul caused, but in these two rounds, it can also be seen that Laravia lacks the final explosive power)

Laravia is a very active ball movement expert. We can clearly see this in the scatter plot in the previous player overview part - this is certainly related to the Grizzlies/Kings offensive system to a certain extent, but since Laravia is a player that Redick personally recruited in the first time in the market, we have reason to believe that his ball movement ability is valued by Redick and believes that it can play a role in the Lakers' offensive system in the new season.

"The most attractive person on the court is Luca. He can break into the inside eight of his ten offenses, and then there will be four defensive players around. As long as you can run to the right position and enter his field of vision, he can pass the ball to you."

"I think he (La Lavia) will get a lot of shooting opportunities. LeBron is another player who can tear the opponent's defense, and Reeves has the ability. So, if you have a bright mind and know how to run to the right position and put yourself in the passer's line of sight, you will benefit from it." - Lakers legend James Worthy said.

In addition, Laravia's offense awareness is also reflected in his rush to frontcourt rebounds:

🔺 Personal frontcourt rebound rate

🔺on/off frontcourt rebound influence

It can be seen that Laravia's performance is excellent, whether it is personal frontcourt rebound data or frontcourt rebound influence.

Let's take a look at how he did it:

Snatch the frontcourt board from the slot entry point;

Shake from the wing to the top of the arc, and then cut into the tip-in;

Step into the knife ball from the bottom line and complete the second attack;

Step into the tip-in from the bottom line;

Skate from the bottom line and use Murray's dazedness to surround him and occupy the rebound position, and score a tip-in;

There is no chance to cut in the wing, but it doesn't matter, this position can also grab the frontcourt rebound.

"I feel that since Reeves made a name for himself, the kind of person that the Lakers have been missing who can create running and create threats when they are out of the ball is back." - Paj C, a Lakers reporter at ClutchPoints, wrote on X.

As you can see - I have shown you the advantages and disadvantages of Jack Laravia in detail - Laravia is not a very powerful offensive player, but considering the Lakers' player configuration, I think he is indeed well adapted to the Lakers as a "caulking" player.