There's no easy way for them to get into the playoffs even if they perform better even though they are in good shape right now and AD is a beast recently still no guarantee for them to place on playoffs automatically. Remember many teams are so strong and also AD is injury prone so they need to be consistent and healthy so that they can reach their target and will not get another big upset on their careers.
Hmm, what you said is something interesting and valid.
I imagine that this season the Lakers are performing better than the previous season and therefore I imagine that they may have a great chance of reaching the playoffs in this season.
As I said in a previous post, it will be necessary to wait and see what will actually happen.
With the Lakers roster, I believe, LeBron James, AD, Beverley and Westbrook will be an important key for the Lakers, because I have no doubt that they are good players, but they have a lot of experience, mainly LJ, and experience could be a crucial factor for the Lakers during the playoffs (of course, if they reach that step)
But the problem is they are planning to trade Westbrook and Beverly so I guess this will cause a huge trouble to them. Maybe they should stop the trading discussion since this could destroy the focus of their players and maybe they need to develop what currently they have since this is strong team already. The main problem of Lakers is they are impatient to wait for improvements as they want instant result on their campaign.