AAAHHHH. Doc Rivers is back! Loved Tony Brown's coaching vs. the Pacers. Rick Carlisle looked confused that he couldn't kick the Celtics around as badly as usual. Also liked to see Gerald Green out there longer than usual. He provided a little spark on defense. You can tell that he's gotten a lot stronger. Anyway, against LA. They can't defend well. Kobe and Brian Cook can play a two man game all day. The hope is that they let Kobe get his thirty and shut everyone else down. Anyway. More pending
The key quarter to watch will be the 3rd quarter. It's haunted the Lakers all season long. The great play in the first half is usually a mirage for the Lakers.
Celts are settling for jumpers early. During the last game against the Lakers they ate up too much of the shot clock. Now they really aren't using enough of it. That's mostly nitpicking. They are playing ok so far, but not taking care of the ball. Tony Allen is playing very, very well over the last few games. He can elevate and run all the sudden.
Home Refs Are pounding on LA. That won't last. Al Jefferson is still not growing up. He gets one more season of free pass. He's babying that ankle something fierce right now. If it's that bad, he shouldn't be playing. Gomes is still mighty smooth when he's out there. I don't normally think that of a four, but he is.
Ugly game As a Boston fan, I can feel the Lakers' pain. They aren't getting any calls at all. Unfortunately I don't care because they are killing the Celts. Terrible turnovers. A team playing dead tired. And Doc isn't playing the fresh legs. It's not Kobe beating them either. It's the other guys. Doc just sits there. He's such a bad coach. Good riddance. Delonte West is having one of his quiet games. Where he doesn't do much. He just loses his aggression in certain games. I guess he's tired. Raef Lafrentz has no elevation. He just can't get up anymore. Not feeling Al. More Tony Allen. He's just getting fun to watch again On the flip side, no Scalabrine. We WILL see him in the second half if they don't make a run. This game is kind of big. They can still catch a sliding Philly for the privilege of being destroying in detroit. Onward and upward. I lack insight this evening.
Kobe Bryant is the opposite of fun to watch. And I can tell you why people don't like him. It's nothing to do with his off-court persona (that doesn't help). It's because he's a two-bit punk on the court. This game has been terribly officiated. Everyone's complained about it, but he's seen that and started getting dirty. He threw a whistling elbow at Tony Allen's head, just because Allen tried to play defense. He hooks, fakes fouls (Pierce does the same), whines, ballhogs, talks all game long. Some people call this competitive. I don't. I know what competitive is. Competitive respects the game and the people in it. Competitive does what it has to do to win, but knows what too much is. Competitive knows the time and the place. Kobe isn't clutch, plays dirty and doesn't respect anyone. You can tell players don't like him, I know I don't like him and no matter how talented he is, his legacy will be that of so many players who nobody liked: He won't get the respect of a true champion. He'll be another rich gunner who fans couldn't wait to see gone. I respect the Lakers fans who love their superstar. I stuck by Paul Pierce when he was busy being the same kind of punk. We love our teams, we love our players, and we won't stop. I've thought to moderate my feelings on a lot of different players: Artest, Reggie Miller (mostly because he's gone), Shaq, even Jordan. I didn't like those guys, because they beat my Celtics. This isn't about that. I learned not to have the silly pride of a fan. But I can watch any game the Lakers play, and I'm still thinking the same, "Man this is boring. Man I hate Kobe." Your commercial's right, Kobe. I hate you for your game. Those eighty one reasons, they make you a chucker. That's it.
I can appreciate your post and opinion on Kobe Bryant. His game is extreme and he will do whatever it takes to win a game. His tactics can be viewed as dirty or veteran savy moves, depending on the fan bias. What he does to his opponents is the same things I used to curse John Stockton and Jeff Hornacek for doing. You're right, Kobe doesn't respect anyone else on the court. All he cares about is winning the game at any cost. I think this is what seperates him from a lot of players in the league, and is the same mentality that seperated Magic, Bird, Jordan and the other legends of the game. Kobe is like the champion boxer who will low blow you to slow you down to keep his belt. I do disagree with you about his lack of respect for the game. I think he has a great appreciation for the history of the game and the people who paved the way for him. He was brought up in the NBA world and has always been a student of basketball. He's very passionate about the game, and I feel the league would be better off if every player had the same drive.
thats fine though but lets be honest. its not JUST about winning with Kobe. I know hes driven to win and at the end of the game the teams best chance to win is with a ball in his hand but the guy cares about his numbers more than most players in the league. more than most veterans anyway. I think kobe's ball hogging hurt his team this year. Its easy to say "he doesnt have anyone he can pass too" but this is the NBA. virtually every player has talent. The guys around kobe have moments and showed potential when they were with other teams but how can any player get into a rythm when theyre obliged to make sure he gets his 30+ shots a game?
I don't think it's the numbers or shot attempts at all. It's about trust and faith in his teammates. The last few games his teammates have showed up in the 1st half, but disappeared in the 2nd half. When they aren't playing hard for the entire 48 minutes, Kobe puts on the blinders and tries to win the game himself. He still has a tough time trusting his teammates when they make mistakes on the court. It's just a tough spot for Kobe, because all the spotlight is on him. No matter what he seems to do he takes criticism. If the Lakers are winning he's called a ball hog. If the Lakers lose he gets blamed for not being aggressive enough and making his teammates better. At the end of the day it comes down to the quality of players on the Lakers. Look at the starting 5 of the Lakers, aside from Kobe or Odom, none of these players could start for another team. Then look down the bench, and you'd have to say most of these guys would be hard pressed to find a job on another roster.
Kobe and respect. <div class="quote_poster">Quoting shapecity:</div><div class="quote_post">I can appreciate your post and opinion on Kobe Bryant. His game is extreme and he will do whatever it takes to win a game. His tactics can be viewed as dirty or veteran savy moves, depending on the fan bias. What he does to his opponents is the same things I used to curse John Stockton and Jeff Hornacek for doing. You're right, Kobe doesn't respect anyone else on the court. All he cares about is winning the game at any cost. I think this is what seperates him from a lot of players in the league, and is the same mentality that seperated Magic, Bird, Jordan and the other legends of the game. Kobe is like the champion boxer who will low blow you to slow you down to keep his belt. I do disagree with you about his lack of respect for the game. I think he has a great appreciation for the history of the game and the people who paved the way for him. He was brought up in the NBA world and has always been a student of basketball. He's very passionate about the game, and I feel the league would be better off if every player had the same drive.</div> You may be right. Because the NBA is obviously different than it's ever been, respect for the game may be manifested as respect for what the game was. If this is true of Kobe, then he's deliberately disrespecting what it is now. Watching him on the court, this seems to follow. He shows the highest disdain for the officials, the most obvious on-court representatives of the game itself. The other players might as well not exist. The problem lies in the fact that he has to play the game the way it is played now. The purity of his jumper, the purity of his effort, and his outstanding athleticism would make him a prototypical player in either the ABA or the seventies NBA. But because of Mitch Kupchak's gaffes and the agreed upon lack of talent, he must adopt the current chucking style. He doesn't like the way he plays any more than we do, but feels he has to. That would seem to make it self-hatred. As much as I dislike him, Kobe's probably beyond the current game, and his need to win within that system is destroying public sentiment and any of his legacy. As for his approach to Phil Jackson. Ehh. PJax is probably somewhat overrated, but not hugely. You gotta feel that his shenanigans (like Larry Brown's) are wearing thin. That's an apologist's approach. Kobe's somewhere in between. It takes a massive ego to drive that type of competitor. We can't forget that, from a larger standpoint, that form of ego is often viewed negatively. It's not a nice feeling, knowing you don't exist. That's the feeling you get from Kobe's game. I don't believe that we want a league full of players who have drive like Bryant's. Basketball is always a game that depends upon trust. John Wideman talks about this a fair amount. It's a game where you leave your feet, with only a limited amount of control, and have certain expectations about how you'll be treated in the air. If someone violates those expectations, the risk becomes too great, self-preservation takes over. People would either stop playing or be SEVERELY injured while playing. Kobe can get away with his game because the league protects him, and because there is an intangible set of rules about causing injuries. If everyone played like Kobe, he wouldn't play like that, because there would be repercussions. Really what we need is better team basketball, with the players who don't have drive removed. What makes the NBA a poor product are the players who don't want, and don't have, to work. It's probably union related. I don't feel like delving into that. But with that low effort level removed, the game becomes instantly better by a hundredfold. This pretty much means getting rid of the Blazers. Sad but true. As for Stockton, he was one of the players I really hated that I forgot to name. He flat out cheated to play defense, and set vicious screens. It was also him or Hornacek (I can't remember which) that bridged (undercut) Shawn Marion and nearly killed him. That's cheap. He may have been great, but once again, his game wouldn't have worked out if everyone else played as hard as he did.
I agree with a lot of your views on the current NBA. The growth and popularity of the sport has stripped away a lot of purity of it. I remember in the 80's basketball used teams to promote the league. Now the league promotes individual players and the game has suffered as a result. Not only are the players hungry for the limelight, a lot of officials are out there to show up players instead being a neutral party. As for my comment about more players should have Kobe's drive, let me clarify. I just respect the amount of work he puts into his craft. He's never satisfied with his game and always looks to improve his skills. Most players in the league are satisfied with doing just enough. The majority of the time you can only count on players maxing out their potential during contract years. This definitely has to do with the Union, and the fact all contracts are guaranteed. I know a lot of people have a perception about Kobe not wanting to play team basketball. His actions sometimes support those perceptions, but he does buy into the team concept. The problem with the Lakers team is balance. Most teams have specialty players on their roster to compliment the superstar player. Unfortunately, Kobe Bryant is the best player in almost every category on his team. Best perimeter scorer - Kobe Bryant Best post scorer - Kobe Bryant Best defender - Kobe Bryant Best playmaker - Kobe Bryant So in every game Kobe is responsible to be the #1 option on offense and also stop the best perimeter player on the opposing team. I can't think of another player in the league with this type of pressure every single game.
Team Conception <div class="quote_poster">Quoting shapecity:</div><div class="quote_post">I agree with a lot of your views on the current NBA. The growth and popularity of the sport has stripped away a lot of purity of it. I remember in the 80's basketball used teams to promote the league. Now the league promotes individual players and the game has suffered as a result. Not only are the players hungry for the limelight, a lot of officials are out there to show up players instead being a neutral party. As for my comment about more players should have Kobe's drive, let me clarify. I just respect the amount of work he puts into his craft. He's never satisfied with his game and always looks to improve his skills. Most players in the league are satisfied with doing just enough. The majority of the time you can only count on players maxing out their potential during contract years. This definitely has to do with the Union, and the fact all contracts are guaranteed. I know a lot of people have a perception about Kobe not wanting to play team basketball. His actions sometimes support those perceptions, but he does buy into the team concept. The problem with the Lakers team is balance. Most teams have specialty players on their roster to compliment the superstar player. Unfortunately, Kobe Bryant is the best player in almost every category on his team. Best perimeter scorer - Kobe Bryant Best post scorer - Kobe Bryant Best defender - Kobe Bryant Best playmaker - Kobe Bryant So in every game Kobe is responsible to be the #1 option on offense and also stop the best perimeter player on the opposing team. I can't think of another player in the league with this type of pressure every single game.</div> The Lakers are a poorly put together team, that's really the sum of it. So we agree there. They don't have balance or chemistry. Kupchak believed that Kobe was the second coming of Jordan. Jordan had Pippen and a group of role players who had faith in him. Kobe doesn't and didn't. So the end results (combined with some feuding) were panic trades for players who didn't compliment Kobe. Odom and Butler didn't play to the strengths of the team. Odom can create, but he has to be in the post because they can't rebound. Butler can't create, so without a point guard, he's not that great. The truth of it is, that the Lakers haven't had a point guard of any real ability for the whole Kobe era. With a real point guard, ridiculous shots don't go up, Kobe doesn't have to work as hard, and his percentages rise. He can be a more productive player without ball-handling responsibilities, and can definitely become more efficient. As for qualifying Kobe as this or that, specialty wise, you're going down a rabbit's hole. There are plenty of stars playing for teams on which said stars are better than role players at their roles. Great teams just divide the responsibility. The problem with the Lakers is the aforementiond overall weakness of the team and the fact that no one really buys into it. I understand that it correlates with the pressure on Kobe, but he's gonna have to stop being a control freak sooner or later. Some of your assessments are also a little misleading: I don't believe that Kobe is the best post player on that team, I feel Odom is. It's just that Kobe is much more likely to get a mismatch than Odom. Also, because of his constant offensive effort level, Kobe's perimeter defense has reverted to being mostly average (this still makes him the best perimeter defender on the team.) He sacrifices more now on defense than he ever did when Shaq was there. Also, the Lakers gamble way too much, hallmark of a team that knows it can't play defense. This exposes Kobe to working even harder to correct for those failed gambles. In reality, Smush Parker can play up the level Kobe demonstrates these days, but he doesn't know the tricks, and he'll never get all the calls that Kobe would. Really, Kobe's will to win, and to show that he could win, has proven that basketball must still be played as a team game. The new era's best teams are just that: teams. San Antonio, Detroit, even Phoenix, play games that rely on certain players to do certain things. Those players do those things, and the team wins. Kobe can't trust anyone to do anything, and he's justified in that to some regard, but it won't impress players and it won't win games. What will really be fascinating is when he finally leaves the Lakers. Will a team build around him? Or learn from all these mistakes, and hope he can play on a team. I'm very interested in the playing out of Kobe's career.
Lamar Odom is not the best post player on the Lakers. How can he be, when he doesn't know how to finish with his right hand? Odom has one move in the post which is faking right, spinning left, and banking it off the glass. I would say Odom is a better passer in the post area, but until he can finish with both hands I'd put him 3rd on the team behind Kobe and Mihm. Assuming Kobe leaves the Lakers, he will be too, old for a team to build around him. He's signed for another 5 years, but he does have an ETO clause for 2008. Right now the Lakers are just buying time until Brian Grant's contract comes off the books and the team has some cap flexibility again.
Gotta bow to your superior knowledge of the Lakers on that one. I suppose I've seen Odom make that move a few times. There's also a surprising number of players that cannot finish with both hands, an embarassing fact. It's also going to take a very savvy operator to make the Lakers a championship team. They don't really have any hot commodities at the moment. Players will come to them through free agency, but without that cap room, there's no real value to that.
