Cam Reddish had an up-and-down season for the Lakers last year.
He had a few standout offensive performances, such as his 18-point game against the Portland Trail Blazers in November and his 13-point night against the Toronto Raptors in January.
However, his best use was as a defender around the perimeter. Reddish embraced all on-ball defensive duties and shined in that role while on the floor.
Unfortunately, his left ankle injury lingered for most of the season’s second half, forcing him to miss many games.
With another year in Los Angeles, Reddish spoke to ESPN LA on Media Day about working in the offseason to improve his catch-and-shoot ability.
“I started off with my ankles, working on my body, stuff like that,” Reddish said. “Put on some weight and then just got back in the gym working on catch-and-shoot things. Obviously, my conditioning for my defense. Pretty much everything, but specialized in a lot of catch-and-shoot.”
Last season, Reddish averaged the seventh most catch-and-shoot 3-pointers on the Lakers, taking 2.1 attempts per game. He converted on 34.4% of them, just below the league average of 36.6%.
With Lakers coach JJ Redick wanting all players to shoot more threes, converting on these is a priority.
If Reddish can be relied upon to hit these threes, it can up his value and give him a strong case of cracking Redick’s desired nine-man rotation.
His defensive game will likely always be his bread and butter, but developing into a respectable 3-and-D player would increase Reddish’s value significantly. Those are exactly the kind of players every NBA team wants and one the Lakers are desperately looking for.
The question is, can Reddish improve enough to be depended on consistently and can his body hold up so he can log big minutes?
At the start of training camp, Reddish wasn’t participating in five-on-five scrimmages but has ramped up his work and played in the Lakers’ second preseason game, a 118-114 loss to the Suns.
In that contest, he was respectable but nothing to write home about. Hopefully, his injury days are now behind him and as training camp concludes, his offseason work can start to show once the games matter later in October and beyond.
