The Los Angeles Lakers have been struggling with consistency, and that inconsistency is costing them games. What's surprising is where that difference in consistency is coming from. 

Their offense, while it has some variance, is not nearly as chaotic as their defense. With offense, you expect there to be some change from game to game. Sometimes you're just tired and the shot doesn't fall. With defense, though, you can have more consistency. 

In games the Lakers have won, they've averaged 94.1 points compared to just 90.5 when they've lost. That's not a dramatic difference. It's actually fairly consistent. On the other hand, the defense yields just 84.5 points in wins but gives up 98.0 points in losses. 

That's one erratic defense!

So, what's happening that the Lakers are giving up so many more points on defense when they are losing games? 

Well, to be fair, one thing is that they are playing better teams. The Lakers have been chewing up and spitting out the below .500 teams of the league, but they are only 6-6 against winning teams. That's the type of thing they have to take care of if they want to win in the playoffs, though. 

The other problem is a matter of effort. They are just getting outworked. When you look at the hustle stats like defensive rebounding (31.6 to 30.9) and  steals, (7.4 to 5.3) the Lakers' opponents just appear to be working harder on defense than the Lakers are. 

Furthermore, the Lakers are committing more fouls and giving up more free throw attempts, 26.6 to 21.9. 

The tendency is to say that what's wrong with the Lakers has something to do with Kobe Bryant taking too many shots. It looks like what's wrong is the defense. 

Now, it's possible that with Andrew Bynum and Pau Gasol, like with a lot of big men, when they aren't involved in the offensive end, they lose interest on the defensive end. The Lakers are 4-0 when Bynum has an efficiency recap of 26 or better and they are 5-1 when Gasol does. 

The Lakers' opponents in those games have a team efficiency of just 90.3 per game compared to 108.1 in games they lose. It seems clear that the Lakers need to involve Gasol and Bynum more on the offensive end, but not just because of what they do on offense.

They need it to keep them in the game defensively. Rightly or wrongly, players lose interest when they run up and down the court and watch someone else take shooting practice. They need to be involved on offense so they can be involved in the defense. 

If the Lakers don't take care of this now, they'll be doomed to another early exit in the postseason. 

Kelly Scaletta is an NBA and Chicago Bulls Featured Columnist, and one of the top NBA writers on Bleacher Report. He is trying to get better at twitter if you would like to follow him.