Lakers news: Bronny's time to shine, All-Star format revealed, Kings back-to-back looms

Isn't it amazing how many times an NBA team's fortunes can change in a single season? The Los Angeles Lakers are only 26 games into their 82-game schedule, and already they've vacillated between looking like a true contender and looking like a team that might not even make the play-in.

The last couple of weeks have not been kind to the purple and gold, as they lost seven out of 10 games at one point. The team's offense, which had seemed so potent early in the year, has stagnated, and the defense ... well, the defense has remained pretty bad since day one.

Lakers fans have been despairing over their team's recent skid, but there are signs that JJ Redick's bunch may be coming out of its funk. The team has come out on the other side of injuries to LeBron James and Austin Reaves still above .500 and in the thick of the playoff race, and with wins over the Blazers and Grizzlies bookending a tough but forgivable road loss at the Timberwolves, it appears that if the Lakers car hasn't quite hit top gear yet, it's at least pulling out of its tailspin.

After two weeks of consistently being inundated with nothing but bad news, this counts as progress, so Lakers fans will take it. The past is the past, though, so let's get into the news of the week.

Bronny James to appear in G League Winter Showcase

ESPN's NBA insider Shams Charania reported on Monday that Bronny James will be playing in the G League Winter Showcase this week in Orlando.

Most basketball fans would have decried this news a week or two ago as a cheap marketing ploy by the league, and another example of nepotism taking center stage, but even Bronny haters have to acknowledge that the kid has been playing some good basketball lately.

Bronny is averaging over 20 points in his last three games with the South Bay Lakers, a marked improvement over his first two games, in which he scored just 10 total points.

Bronny's performance against the Valley Suns on Thursday was the highlight of the bunch, and by far his best game as a pro. He scored a career-high 30 points on 13-23 shooting, while also pitching in three rebounds, two assists, one steal and one block. Even more encouraging is that since turning the ball over five times in his G League debut, he now has just four turnovers in his next four games combined.

The Winter Showcase is one of the best chances for the G League's top players to stand out, as scouts from every NBA team will be in attendance. Not that Bronny is going anywhere, of course.

Subscribe to The Whiteboard, FanSided’s daily email newsletter on everything basketball. If you like The Whiteboard, share it with a friend! If you don't like it, share it with an enemy! 

NBA All-Star Game format revealed

Details began to leak about proposed changes to the NBA All-Star Game format in recent weeks, and on Tuesday, the league finally let the cat out of the bag.

NBA commissioner Adam Silver seemed embarrassed after the reception to last year's All-Star Game, which took the game's infamous lack of defense to new lows. Fans aren't interested in watching the best basketball players in the world give zero effort, so it's no surprise that the league finally made some changes.

This is going to be interesting, and a huge departure from what the game used to be. Of note is the fact that one of the teams will be made up of the winner of the Rising Stars game between NBA rookies and second-year players, which leaves open the hilarious possibility that the All-Star Game MVP could be someone that wasn't an All-Star.

This move also puts the crew of Inside the NBA to the forefront (pour one out for Ernie Johnson, who won't get to captain a team), which is a smart move not only because the show is so beloved, but because it can serve as a reminder to fans that may have missed the memo that Inside the NBA will in fact not be disappearing when TNT loses its NBA rights next year, but will instead be moving to ESPN.

The addition of having a draft instead of a straight East vs. West showdown has been a fun wrinkle since it was implemented in 2018, and it's a good move for the NBA to bring it back after a one-year hiatus. Having team captains who aren't afraid to have fun with their draftees will only help.

In the end, these changes will only move the needle if the games themselves are competitive. Let's hope that they will be.

Lakers prepare to travel to Sacramento for a rare back-to-back road doubleheader

The Lakers' next two games are on Thursday and Saturday, and interestingly, both contests are road matchups with the Sacramento Kings. This is the first of only two times that the Lakers will play the same team twice on the road in consecutive games, with the other being an early April set at Oklahoma City.

These two teams last met way back on October 26th in what was just the Lakers' third game of the season. L.A. prevailed in a 131-127 shootout that featured a LeBron James 32-point trible-double to move to 3-0 and continue the good vibes of JJ Redick's debut as head coach.

The Lakers need to hope that game was a sign of things to come in this rivalry, because last year, the Kings owned them. DeAaron Fox and company swept the season series 4-0 while putting up at least 120 points in each game.

The 127 points the Kings scored in the teams' first meeting this season shows that the Lakers still don't have an answer defensively, but they were still able to escape due to their own offensive explosion. L.A.'s offensive rating has plummeted in recent weeks though, so Lakers fans will need to hope that Anthony Davis and LeBron are ready to put up some points again.