It appears speakers don’t work at this drive-through

The defense rests.

Quite often, actually.

The Lakers weren’t too keen on stopping the Cleveland Cavaliers in a 99-90 loss Sunday, the continuation of a pattern that has them lingering near the bottom of the league in points given up.

Game after game, opponents have been penetrating at will, beating them on the boards and scoring in the key. The small things -- calling out screens, calling for help -- have been shoved to the sideline in favor of a quiet on-court cast, at least at the defensive end.

“We don’t communicate,” forward Lamar Odom said. “It’s funny -- a team that’s so close, everybody’s so cool off the court, [but] on the court, we don’t talk at all.

“You go to South Jamaica [N.Y.], where I grew up, if you go to a playground, watch some guys play four-on-four, you’ll hear them -- ‘pick,’ ‘help,’ whatever. They’re talking. Right now, we don’t do a good job of that.”

One play in the final minute of Sunday’s game became an instant part of the nightly TV highlight package: LeBron James needed all of five seconds to take a rebound at one end and dunk untouched at the other as five Lakers stood around and observed.

“Our defense pretty much caved,” Bryant said.

It got so bad that their scheme was indiscernible. Coach Phil Jackson smiled when asked about the unveiling of a zone defense in the fourth quarter.

“We didn’t go to a zone,” he said. “It might have looked like a zone, but it wasn’t.”

The Lakers were 23rd in scoring defense before Sunday, giving up 101.9 points a game.

Their offense, on the other hand, has clicked much more often, jumping to fifth in the league at 103.1 points a game before Sunday.

Maybe that’s part of the problem.

“We expect our offense to always get us out of [jams],” Odom said. “We have yet to win a game in a long time where we just lock down on a team and win games on second effort and energy. Whenever it seems like we win, is when everybody is happy offensively.”

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Lost among the defensive malaise was a decent effort from Vladimir Radmanovic, who was singled out for consecutive “stinkers” by Jackson before collecting his first double-double as a member of the Lakers.

Radmanovic had 12 points and 10 rebounds against the Cavaliers. It was his 50th game this season.

“He played well,” Jackson said. “He played a good game that we had to have from him.”

Radmanovic had scored a total of two points in 32 minutes against Detroit and Toronto before improving against Cleveland.

mike.bresnahan@latimes.com

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KEYS TO THE GAME

* The Lakers shot 39.7%, with almost everybody other than Kobe Bryant (12 for 24) experiencing a poor shooting day.

* Led by Sasha Pavlovic (21 points) and Anderson Varejao (12 points), the Cavaliers’ reserves trounced the Lakers’ reserves, 46-15. Swingman Maurice Evans was one for nine and had six points for the Lakers.

* The Lakers made only four of 20 three-point attempts. Bryant was one for five, Lamar Odom was one for six and Smush Parker missed all four of his attempts.

-- MIKE BRESNAHAN