All the talk about Anthony Davis this summer has been about him taking an ascension. LeBron James called Davis a Lakers legend, and Darvin Ham said he wants Davis to shoot more threes.

On the first night, against the Denver Nuggets, that jump looked like it was going to happen soon at halfway.Denver couldn’t stop Davis from getting into the paint. He scored 17 points on 6-11 shooting, including a few strong dunks that kept the Lakers within nine points at halftime. For the Lakers, he was without a doubt their best player. If they could just make some threes and crash the boards, they might still win.

We had no idea that Davis was done for the night.

He didn’t get hurt or kicked out; he just…disappeared. The Lakers only made six field goals and didn’t score a single point in the second half. They never had a lead again and the offense stopped moving, especially when LeBron wasn’t playing. From being a basketball pterodactyl who controlled both ends of the court to just plain lazy, The Brow’s sudden drop in performance was strange.

Davis talked about some of the things that went wrong with his play in the second half after the game.

Davis said, “They started double-teaming to try to pack the paint.” “I missed some little jumpers and easy layups around the basket.” But I wanted to make the right move, which was to throw it to our guys when they doubled. Gabe Vincent and Rui Hachimura both had open threes that just didn’t fall. But I need to shoot it more. What needs to happen for Davis to be in a situation where taking a shot is the best thing to do if the answer is “shoot it more”? When Darvin Ham was asked about possible answers after the game, he spoke to the press.

It’s just to move him around, hit, and play downhill. There were some bad misses for him. He kept us close for a while and had it going there. “But I just want him to be completely aggressive, whether it’s pick and roll, catching the ball in trail position, or direct post-up,” Ham said. I just want him to be mean. Let’s watch the movie again and see what we like. Then we’ll decide what to do next.

There’s no need to worry because it’s only one game, but these are the same problems that people have had with Davis his whole career. Not being aggressive, not wanting to take more shots, and being able to turn into Houdini when the team needs a leader on the court.

If James plays less than 30 minutes this season, the minutes played by players other than LeBron will go up. In the past, LeBron-led teams have had trouble when he’s not on the court. If those minutes are going to add to the score, someone has to do well, and Davis is the best player on the team.

He needs to get better, or James will have to keep pulling a heavier-than-ideal load in Year 21 if the team wants to win games in the West.