The Los Angeles Lakers and Boston Celtics seasons’ have not gone as smoothly as each franchise had hoped when the season began. While the Celtics have time to regroup before the playoffs, the Lakers are in serious danger of missing out on the playoffs as they have fallen out of the top eight seeds in the Western Conference.

Recently, Paul has noticed that the Lakers appear to be lacking effort and motivation of late, potentially stemming from the trade rumors that swirled around the team throughout early February. Perhaps, the young players whose names were thrown out in these rumors have disengaged as a result. Whatever the case may be, both the Lakers and Celtics are struggling down the stretch of the regular season, and they need to figure things out soon before their seasons come to a premature end.

“As a leader, you’re here to motivate and inspire your teammates,” Pierce said. And some of these games I’ve been watching with the Lakers, they’ve been playing some real uninspiring basketball. Regardless if you win or lose, as a leader it’s your job to motivate your team to go out there and play hard, and I haven’t been seeing that from the Los Angeles Lakers, so I don’t know if they’re responding to LeBron’s leadership as of now.”