We’ve all heard of the City of Stars, but for Lakers coach JJ Redick on Monday night, Los Angeles felt like the City of Monstars.
After his team was blown out at home by the Phoenix Suns on national television, Redick invoked the famous Space Jam villains while describing his team’s uncharacteristic lack of effort.
The fully healthy Lakers lost by 24 to a Suns team that lost its star scorer, Devin Booker, in the first half. Luka Doncic and Co. coughed up 21 turnovers and were dramatically outscored on the fast break, 28-2. The sleepy performance was enough for Redick to start questioning whether his players had been overtaken by the same body-snatching ghouls that swallowed up Charles Barkley, Patrick Ewing and the other 1990s NBA stars in the classic Looney Tunes film.
“It’s a weird sort of thing, it really is,” Redick said. “It’s like the Monstars taking over people that you’ve grown to coach and they’re not doing anything that they normally do.”
JJ Redick:
“It’s like the Monstars taking over the people that you’ve grown to coach and they’re not doing anything that they normally do. It’s weird” pic.twitter.com/APXqmVujNZ
— Oh No He Didn’t (@ohnohedidnt24) December 2, 2025
Unfortunately, the Lakers won’t be saved by Michael Jordan or Lola Bunny.
Redick shied away from giving his team the excuse of their rigorous schedule (after all, they just got LeBron James back and facing a Booker-less, new-look Suns squad). The Lakers simply lacked the fight that they needed to compete with an intense, physical Phoenix team.
“If you don’t play hard against that team, you’re going to get exposed,” Redick said on a more practical note. “We talked about matching their physicality, we didn’t do that to any extent at any point in the game. Maybe there was brain fog from three (games) in four nights, I don’t know.”
The Lakers have two days to recuperate and exercise the Monstars before they travel to Toronto for a game on Thursday.