Still Looking to Leave

From Mike Bresnahan's LATimes column:

When he spoke to The Times at 5:27 p.m. [Wednesday], he reiterated his position from earlier in the morning.

"Nothing's changed," Bryant said. "It's just a matter of I don't want to go no place else. I don't have much of a choice. When things like this go down, you just sit back. What can I do? It's like a broken record."

When asked if he still wanted to be traded, he answered quickly and firmly: "Yes."

I can't say I'm surprised. I think that this will be his tentative stance until something actually gets done. Actions/louder/words. The thing that bothers me is that by taking all of these complaints to the press, he takes away some of the Laker's leverage in the upcoming trade talks; not for trading Kobe, but in trading for help. Other teams know now that the Lakers need to make a move very soon. But I guess you can't light a fire under an organization with stern words in a closed door meeting.

In any case, he's supposed to talk to Jerry Buss today. Stay tuned.

[UPDATE: Jerry Buss released the following statement:

“I talked with Kobe this morning and assured him that I share his frustration and, more importantly, I assured him that we will continue to pursue every avenue possible to improve our team with him as the cornerstone. I told him that we will keep him apprised of our progress and we agreed that we will talk again in the very near future.”

Ok. ]

Kobe Asks For a Trade

What the hell is going on?

He claims it's because he has been lied to. It doesn't matter anymore. The fact is, he wants out and everything he said yesterday was his strained attempt at justifying it.

Everyone needs to take a deep breath. Kobe. The Laker Brass. And especially us.

But if it were up to me. We're sitting on him until we get value back. Plain and simple. Seeing as how difficult that might be, that might never happen.

[UPDATE: Just heard another Kobe interview on AM 570 KLAC with the Loose Cannons (Mychal Thompson, Vic the Brick Jacobs, and Steve Hartman) and Kobe seemed to soften his position a bit. Apparently he had a conversation with Phil today and that calmed him some. He still trusts Phil a great deal and Phil assured him that something will get done this summer.

The Cannons actually did a pretty good job. Lots of Vic the Brick trying to smooth things over by stroking Kobe's ego and emphasizing how much he means to this city. But also, they asked a lot of questions that I think a lot of people were wondering themselves. Here are some points from the interview:

Have you talked to Jerry Buss personally in the last couple of days? (No)

How far would a Buss apology go? (Actions speak louder than words. He has to show Kobe. For example, Phil rebuilt the trust with Kobe -- after Phil's tell all book -- by returning to coach, an action.)

Have you talked to Magic? (No but Kobe said he had just received a voice mail from him. Mychal told him to call him right away)

Do you have any idea who the Laker Insider is? (Without naming names, yes)

Do you realize that if you leave, the team you will be going to will be essentially gutted by the trade? (Kobe said yes, but it isn't about the talent level of the Lakers that he is asking for a trade. It's the trust)

Kobe, do you realize that the whole city of L.A. is listening and shaking in their boots right now? What do you have to say to them? (I hope we can work something out. I want to be here. This is my team. I'm a Laker fan. I don't want to go someplace else.)

What if the team tries it's hardest to bring in some better personnel but for whatever reason cannot? (As long as he and the other players trust the management, he'll stay.)

To Dr. Buss from Kobe: "Call me." Kobe doesn't have his number apparently.

Vick the Brick uses the following words to decribe Kobe during the interview: Magnanimous, revolutionary, poet, transcendant. But not only that, he told Kobe to calm down. Look around. Take a deep breath. All things I'm sure we wanted to tell him.]

More

Kobe essentially makes two points in his interview(s) from yesterday, one I don't agree with and one that I do, kinda.

1) Kobe was misled into thinking that the Lakers would be aggressively trying to achieve an elite level and that he was never informed about a cost cutting plan to get under the cap.

As I said yesterday, I think this is bull. I definitely remember a well publicized plan to get under the cap by the summer of 07. Check it out for yourself. Google "Lakers cap space" and the first entry you'll see is a May 07 article by Eric Pincus from Hoopsworld.com:

The (Defunct) Cap Space Plan

The Lakers once had a plan to generate cap space for the summer of 2007. While passing up on opportunities that might have helped the team in the short term, they held tight on spending. In 2005 they drafted 17-year old center Andrew Bynum and preached patience for what would be a long term project.

Meanwhile they had hoped to win with veteran additions like Vlade Divac and Aaron McKie. Instead both got hurt and the Lakers in the short term were paying the price for the cap space plan.

In a sudden reversal, LA guaranteed the third year on Kwame Brown's contract. They signed Vladimir Radmanovic to a long-term contract. They gave Brian Cook a three year extension. They picked up the fourth year option on Sasha Vujacic's contract.

Having abandoned their goal, the Lakers are well over the cap this summer [07]. Had they held fast the only players under contract for next season would have been Kobe Bryant, Andrew Bynum, Mo Evans, Jordan Farmar, Lamar Odom and Ronny Turiaf.

The second link in the search is a July 05 article by Sean Deveney on the SportingNews.com:

The Lakers are trying to restrict free-agent contracts to two years in hopes of keeping salary cap space for the summer of 2007. The obvious targets would be young big men such as C Yao Ming and F/C Amare Stoudemire, and it's no secret the Lakers have an eye on signing one of them. That pipe dream will end this summer, when both players sign maximum-dollar extensions and go off the '07 market. It's always wise to save cap space, but in the meantime, the Lakers missed out on G Antonio Daniels because they did not want to include a third year.

If Google knows then Kobe had to have known. I don't buy his anger on this one.

2) Kobe wanted to make it clear that had was NOT responsible for forcing Shaq out of L.A.

For the record, I have never blamed Kobe for running Shaq out of town. In my opinion, that conflict was between the prudent Laker organization and an aging center. Could Kobe have done more to try to convince the two sides that they needed each other? Possibly. But not to the tune of an $80M extension over 3 years for a 31 year old center with a bad toe and a weight problem. And in my opinion, I don't think Shaq would have budged on his contract demands. He had already done too much yakking and he has too much pride to just do a 180 like that.

When asked by Stephen A. Smith yesterday about whether he believes Kobe when he says that Dr. Buss had already made up his mind to trade him regardless of what Kobe decided to do in the summer 04, Shaq had this to say:

"I believe Kobe 100 percent. Absolutely. There's no doubt in my mind Kobe is telling the truth. I believe him a thousand percent. I would have respected Dr. Buss more as a man if he would have told me that himself, because I know he said it. But he didn't [tell me]. He never said a damn word to me."

So, basically, I agree that Kobe should not be blamed for running off Shaq. But it makes me wonder who this "Laker Insider" is. To me, the legitimacy of Kobe's complaint on this issue is directly proportional to the clout of this person within the Laker organization. For example, what if this "insider" is a low level employee who has been there for like 7 months? Why would his opinion matter to Kobe? How responsible is it to take that opinion and treat it as if it came directly from Jerry Buss himself? If that's the case, then that would expose Kobe again as being ingenuine in his anger.

Kobe on PMS

Kobe did an interview (link via Inside Lakers blog) today with Petros Papadakis and Matt "Money" Smith on AM 570 KLAC this afternoon. In short, Kobe is PISSSSSSED right now. According to the blog on KB24.com, he is livid about a report in the LA Times (Heisler) in which a "Laker Insider" came out and directly blamed Kobe for running off Shaq and causing the subsequent decline into mediocrity that the Lakers currently find themselves in. Here are some bullets from the interview [

- He DID NOT demand Jerry West's hiring. He directly contradicts ESPN.com's Rich Bucher's assertion that Kobe's comments were in any way an ultimatum.

- Right before Kobe re-signed with the Lakers, he had a very important phone conversation with Jerry Buss in which the Laker owner promised Kobe that the Lakers would be aggressively striving to achieve a championship level. Kobe states that this singular phone call was the crucial reason why he decided not to leave.

- Kobe actively recruited Baron Davis, Ron Artest, and Carlos Boozer only to be turned away by Mitch Kupchak.

- Kobe dances to Fruit Salad, Yummy Yummy by the Wiggles with his daughter. Money saw him.

- After the 03-04 season, Buss told Kobe that regardless of what Kobe does (re-signs, or leaves), he was planning on trading Shaq based on the issue of Shaq's contract demands.

- Kobe on the Laker front office: "That place is a mess."

- He has not had ANY communication with the Laker front offices since his exit meeting.

- He really doesn't know what is going to happen with his relationship with the Laker organization. This is due to trust issues. Trust issues he did NOT have as recently as yesterday. It's all because of this "insider" throwing him under the bus.

- He talked to Phil this morning. He asked him about Phil's exit meeting from after the 03-04 season and what the Laker Brass told him. (Apparently, since Phil has returned, the two have not talked about the aftermath of the 03-04 season, the book, etc. ) Basically, Phil said that the Laker front office told him that the Lakers were going to be scaling things back in a long term effort to try to get under the cap. They had no reason to have such an expensive coach so he was let go. Phil also said that the front office did say that they were going to trade Shaq regardless of what Kobe does. This one shred of consistency shown by the front office is quickly glossed over by Kobe during the interview; it seems as if it slipped out.

- Kobe said that this "long term" plan was not mentioned to him ever. Especially not in that fateful phone call with Dr. Buss on the eve of his signing. He claims that this is the first time he has ever heard of this.

- Money: "Is this reparable Kobe?"
Kobe: "I don't know."
]

I seem to remember the very public stance that the Lakers took following the Shaq trade regarding an effort to scale back in an effort to have cap space in the summer of 07 during which they would try to sign Amare Stoudamire or Yao Ming. To that end, the Lakers went through a period in which they weren't offering any free agents anything longer than one or two year deals (they ended up losing out on Derek Anderson and Antonio Daniels after they were both offered longer deals by other teams, etc). Then after both Amare and Yao got extended by their respective teams, the Lakers seemed to abandon this plan and they extended Kwame and signed Radmanovich to a 5 year deal. Does that sound right? I mean, some of the details may be a bit inaccurate but if memory serves, that was pretty much it.

Now let me ask. Is this the scaling back that the Laker front office was referring to in their exit meeting with Phil back after the 03-04 season? If so, how could I know about this and how could Kobe claim that he was never informed of a long term plan to get under the cap?

Am I taking crazy pills here?

Something seems fishy. And I don't like fish.

Few Thoughts on the Lottery

+ Poor Bill Simmons. But with the amount he talked about it and the way the Celtics tanked it at the end, you almost saw it coming. The number five pick is a toss up in this draft. It sucks for him but at the same time, how could you hang all of your hope on to a fricken lottery? That question goes out to both him and the Celtics.

Here's YAYSports' take on Boston fans and their inevitable whiny tirade about all of this:

You Boston fans are so funny - you weren’t “entitled” to Oden or Durant - they weren’t cruelly ripped from your grasp by the boogie-man or something.

Shall we go through the list of things that have happened to the Celtics and explain why this isn’t “bad luck”? This is just off the top of our head:

1) Len Bias died of a cocaine overdose. He didn’t die in a car crash, or via a freak blood transfusion, or by getting mugged on the front porch of his home while drinking lemonade. He was a stupid kid who did too much blow, and your braintrust was too inept to figure out he wasn’t an angel. This is not bad luck.

2) Reggie Lewis died of an alleged cocaine overdose. (We’ll always believe this btw. He was a good guy, so the truth got covered, especially since it was way after the fact.)

3) You lost the Tim Duncan lottery in 1997 because the team with the worst record almost never gets the first pick. (2003 was a notable and welcome exception!) Much like Oden/Durant, Timmy was not your property who suddenly was taken away from you. Also, the 1997 NBA Draft Lottery was high on cocaine.

4) Antoine Walker. Twice.

+ How happy was I to see the Hawks get the number 3 pick and thus not have to trade it to Phoenix. Like they need to be any deeper. Suddenly the Diaw/Joe Johnson trade looks a lot better for Atlanta. Especially considering Diaw's no-show in game 5 of the Spurs series. Where the hell was that guy?

+ Haven't seen this mentioned yet but does everyone realize that the Western Conference, already the superior conference top to bottom by far, just got the top two picks in what is basically a two pick draft? When will this ever even out?

Asides 10

/*
From Robert Horry (via a Wojciechowski article on ESPN):

"I'm still amazed at the notoriety that this one play got compared to Baron Davis' foul [against Fisher in the Golden State-Utah series] and Mikki Moore's foul [against Aleksandar Pavlovic in the Cleveland Cavaliers series]. Those were like malicious fouls in my eyes. Guys who can't protect themselves off their feet. Blow to the head."
...
"I think on my part -- and I think [Nash has] been in the league long enough to realize -- it's just basketball. I can understand if I had clotheslined him and tried to hurt him, but that was just a bump. Hopefully, in his eyes, he'll look at it as just basketball and no hard feelings. Because when you're trying to win, you have no friends until you walk off the court."

Lost in the mix of this whole thing was the severity of Horry's punishment. If the NBA really wanted to be consistent, and as we all saw with the Stoudemire/Diaw punishment, consistency is paramount, then how could Baron, Moore, and even Bruce Bowen (with his kick to the heel and knee to the balls) go unpunished while Horry gets a two game suspension for what was essentially a hard, basketball foul. Not an elbow to the head. Not a midair take down. A body contact foul.

What happend was they based their punishment on the visual effect of what resulted: Steve Nash flying into the scorers' table, hair whipping, hands flailing above his head -- as if a grenade had exploded out of Horry's shoulder. Well guess what. As much as everyone loves seeing Steve Nash dart around the court using his quickness to make lumbering NBA bigs look like giant clods, the devastating effect of Horry's bump on him illustrates the perilous flipside of playing in the NBA as a 6'3", 195 pound point guard. When someone who is half a foot taller and like 40 pounds heavier puts his body on you, you're going to go flying. It's the equalizer in this situation. Should it be Horry's fault that he's that much bigger and stronger than his opponent? Is it Horry's responsibility to be mindful of the relative size and strength of his opponent before he proceeds with a basketball motion? Contrary to what the NBA-going-small campaign would like you to believe, being small and fast is not and should not always be shits and giggles. Go ask Allen Iverson.

You see, Laker fans have dealt with this issue for years during the Shaq Era. How many times did we see a smaller player (read: any player in the NBA) take it to the basket, hit Shaq mid air, go careening out of bounds and then have a flagrant foul called on Shaq. It didn't matter that Shaq was more or less jumping straight up. It didn't matter that Shaq would get a hand, sometimes two hands on the ball. The flagrant foul call was based on the discrepancy in size and strength between the two players involved in the collision and the sheer visual brutality that ensued. Not the physical act the by the offending player.

And what bothers me the most about the refs being so easily tantalized by how bad a foul looks as opposed to what infraction is actually ocurring is that it will lead to more flopping league wide. And I don't think anyone, with the exception of Raja Bell, wants to see that.
*/

/*
Mediocre offense and poor defense. Didn't work for the Lakers, I hope the Dodgers take notice. That was pretty much the story of the weekend series with the Angels.

Although I guess it would be premature to start worrying too much about the Dodger's early season error proneness (36, leads the NL), I just don't want to see it being the achilles heel of this team. Because as far as achilles heels go, a poor defense is the most frustrating. When your starter puts out a quality start and your bullpen keeps you in the game, only to have those efforts wasted by a few untimely errors. Those are the losses that can leave the team feeling jaded.

Then to top it off, they are also stranding A LOT of runners in scoring position, the offensive equivalent to making errors. And again, something that when it happens too much, can kill a team's spirit.

And as we all saw with the Lakers this year, it is very hard to watch a team that cannot execute.
*/

/*
Later on in the Horry article, referring to an incident in the 1994 Finals against the Knicks in which he went in for a dunk and got floored by Anthony Mason, Horry remembers:

"I had two sprained wrists and a hairline fracture in my ass after it happened. I knew what had happened, but I was hurt. I got up after that, but it was still painful. You just played on. You don't worry about it. Nobody [from the Rockets' bench] ran over there trying to push and shove, trying to cause anything. It was just a hard foul, and you get up and go."

A broken ass and nobody bats an eye. My how the NBA has changed.
*/

My Grandma Wanted to Watch 24

Think, a chihuahua barking...

So I let her change the channel. The Spurs were up by like 8 or 10, middle of the 4th. At home. I was thinking, eh this game is over. Whatever. Then about 20 minutes later, I got curious about the score so I checked it on my phone and it said 98-97 Phx with less than a minute to play. Oh, my. Needless to say, Jack Bauer (and my Grandma) had to wait.

I got back to the game in time to see the Spurs miss and Horry hip check Nash into the scorer's table. At first I thought that Horry clotheslined him. But when I saw the replay, it was more like a bump. The only thing is, when you're giving up about half a foot and about 50 lbs, as Nash was to Horry, a bump can be devastating. Amazing how if that was someone bigger, like Amare or James Jones, that bump probably knocks them off balance, probably to their ass. But when it's Nash, it's like watching a Jackass clip.

Frickin Horry. Now that was a veteran move. Cheap? Yes. Unnecessary? Yes. Smart? Absolutely. The Spurs had lost the game. The Suns were about 30 seconds from waltzing off their home court with a hard fought, breakthrough victory. Now look. Amare might get suspended. Diaw might get suspended. And now there's some bad blood; playing in a heated, chippy atmosphere favors the Spurs. Essentially, it served to steal some thunder from the Suns' impressive victory heading into game five in Phoenix.

Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome to the best series of these playoffs. The winner of which will most likely win the Championship.

Some thoughts:
- I hope they don't get suspended because that would cheapen the series and the playoffs as a whole especially if you agree with the way I just described the magnitude of this series. And by they, I mean Diaw, Amare, and Horry. Diaw and Amare's "infractions" were based on technicalities and hopefully the league is flexible enough to see that. Enforce the spirit of the law, not the letter. As for Horry, I think flagrant II is sufficient. It's not like he extended the elbow or threw a punch at Nash. He basically just stood there. Being heavy.

The punishment should be based on what he actually did, not how small the victim was and how far he flew.

[UPDATE: SUSPENDED! Horry (2), Stoudamire (1), Diaw (1). The League Office is fucking ridiculous. Self righteous bastards. I mean holding Kobe out of MSG for a regular season game is one thing. Creating a huge impact on THE most important series in the playoffs is another. All you have to ask yourself is this: Do the Spurs want it this way? No (but they'll take it). Do the Suns want it this way? HELL NO. Then just who is served? The fans lose. The NBA loses. What the hell is the point? Justice? Tell me, does what Amare and Diaw did last night deserve a suspension? No. So basically, the big winner out of all of this: bureaucracy. That asshole.]

- I didn't think the Suns were capable of the kind of victory they pulled off last night.

- The comedic genius of sports anchors abounds: Big Cheap Shot Bob. You see how they did that? They replaced the "Big" in "Big Shot Bob" with "Cheap," invoking a pun on the word "Shot." Gold. Pure gold.

But while we're here, it's Rob, dammit! Cheap Shot ROB. It was never Bob. Does anyone call him Bob? Bobert Horry? That's right. No. It's Rob. Call him Big. Call him Cheap. But please, call him Rob.

- What are the odds that the Suns will retaliate? 100-1? If this was 1993, I'd be scared for Tony Parker's life. Since it's 2007, we'll all just go back to spanking it to his wife. That rhymes.

I'm with Darth

"GOOOOOOOOOOOOO Warriors!"

Let me just preface this with my acknowledgement that the best series of these playoffs is going to end up being San Antonio v. Phoenix. It's a shame that we're getting it in the second round as opposed to the Western Conference Finals, but what can you do?

That said, the other day I was talking some basketball with my friends and I got resoundedly boo'd when I said I wanted to see San Antonio and Utah in the Western Conference Finals. Apparently that prospect would be too boring, especially with the possibility of a Golden State/Phoenix match up still in the conversation. Seriously, I may as well have been wearing an Imperial Storm Trooper's outfit after that admission.

Why don't you like the Warriors, they ask. But that's the thing. I do. I enjoy watching Baron play hard, pour his heart out actually, night in and night out. I admire the way they took out Dallas. And it's cool to see Matt Barnes get some recognition for being the explosive scorer that any Pacific Division fan knew he was.

I just think Utah is a better team. More boring, maybe. But you know what, you could also argue that Jessica Biel is more boring than Britney Spears. But who would you rather go home with? Because really, that illustrates my only problem with the Warriors: they're sloppy as hell.

And you want to know what would happen if the Warriors meet the Suns in the Western Conference Finals? A sweep. It would be a match up of two teams who play the same style except one team does it 20 times better and more efficiently. Because the Warriors simply commit too many turnovers, miss too many free throws, and their offense stalls up into too many one-on-one possessions (dribble, dribble, dribble, stepback fadeaway) to have any success against the Suns. Yeah they collectively might be a threat to score 300 points in a game, every game of the series, and that would be fun to watch. But not if it's going to be 175-125, Suns.

And as for why I want the Spurs to beat the Suns, it's mostly for the obvious reason. The Suns keep beating the Lakers. So they can all fuck off. Yes, I'm still bitter.

In summary, I know I'm rooting for a potentially boring, defensive grind of a series in a Utah/San Antonio Western Conference Final. But that match up is not without it's charms. Deron Williams will be there and he's hardly boring. And we'll be able to see what looks like would be a hell of a match up between Duncan and Boozer. There's DFish v. Robert Horry in the battle of ex-Laker role player now making clutch shots for other teams. Good coaching means good adjustments which should make for a 6 or 7 game series easily. It would be just good basketball in general.

And I plan on tuning in just in time for the fourth quarter of all of those games.

(Maybe).

DFish

In Willis Reed fashion, Derek Fisher came out and gave a huge emotional boost to the Utah Jazz in their game 2 victory over everyone's sweethearts, the Golden State Warriors. Freed by the good news that his daughter had undergone successful eye cancer surgery, Fish rushed from New York to Utah to make his first appearance in the series. And not a moment too soon. Utah starter, Deron Williams, had just gone out with his fourth foul late in the 3rd quarter and Dee Brown, Fish's replacement during his absence, was somewhere in a hospital bed with an injured spine. The Jazz needed a steady hand to hold the fort, and they got it fast as Fish got off the plane, walked out of the tunnel, and onto the floor to a HUGE ovation.

And like Reed, Fish didn't go on some crazy, possessed scoring binge. He made a couple of key plays that when coupled with the situation and his personal qualities, served to give the Jazz something to play even harder for.

His defense on Baron Davis changes the dimension of the series to a degree. I was watching him chest up to Bomb Dizzle and I was thinking to myself that Fisher, while he might not match up to other elite point guards such as Steve Nash or Tony Parker, matches up really well against Baron. You see, Baron is most effective when he is using his ridiculous mix of strength and speed to get to any spot on the court that he wants and then he makes a play. But Derek Fisher is swole. And he was able to bother Baron into turnovers, fadeaways, and kickouts.

And then Fish dropped a dagger on the Warriors in OT, taking a page from Big Shot Rob. With about a minute left to play, and the Jazz up three, Deron Williams penetrated from the left wing, Fish's man slid over to help, Deron turned and dished to Fish while simultanously setting a seriously genius pick with his butt, and Fisher buried it in cold blood. Game over.

I knew that shit was going in as it left his hand. And I'm sure I wasn't alone in L.A. thinking that I've seen that before. Fisher inspiring his teammates and burying big playoff shots. It always seems like that wherever he goes, he ends up being the emotional leader of the team, the heart and soul, so to speak. And while he may not have helped us stop Steve Nash or Leandro Barbosa, he may have -- no, he most definitely would have helped hold this team together throughout all the injuries, infighting, and waning motivation that plagued the Lakers this season.

But enough lamenting. It's always good to see the old Lakers do well.
RobertHorry.net
RickFox.com

UPDATE:
A great read from ESPN's John Hollinger about Derek Fisher's daughter, Tatum and her case of rare eye cancer, Retinoblastoma.

Fisher knows he's one of the lucky ones. The condition is a potential killer if not caught early enough, and tough to diagnose because it's so rare and its symptoms so subtle. But in his daughter Tatum's case, he had the good fortune to run into a doctor who had seen the condition before.

Amazingly enough, it was all because his health plan forced him to switch from an out-of-network pediatrician -- "my first experience with that whole, 'man, kids are really expensive' thing," said Fisher -- to a new one, and the new doctor diagnosed it right away.

"What are the chances of us switching doctors, and the first time we see the doctor she picks up on it and probably saves my daughter's life?" said Fisher. "We would have gone for months more not knowing what was wrong, just that her one eye was a little different."

Amazing. Best wishes to Tatum and the rest of the Fishers.

Bill Simmons on the Lakers

Taken from Friday's Basketball Blog:

That reminds me, with everyone weighing in on the "Where are the Lakers going from here?" debate, it has to be mentioned that their overall game plan never, ever, EVER made sense. Why waste two years of Kobe's prime by trying to develop young players like Andrew Bynum and Kwame Brown over targeting gamers (dealing Caron Butler never made sense) and using expiring contracts to acquire playoff-proven guys (for instance, they could have had Kidd if they included Bynum in the deal). How could they allow all those contracts (over $10 million worth of expiring deals) to simply expire without taking a flier on someone like Stephen Jackson? And why aren't Lakers fans more furious that their team willingly threw away Kobe's prime like this? I don't get it.

First of all, say what you want about Kwame. He has small hands. He pussies out at times. Whatever. And I agree, Caron Butler is a baller who showed just exactly how good he could be this season with the Wizards. But tell me this, what the hell would the Lakers have done without Kwame after Chris Mihm went down last season and subsequently sat out this season? That would have left Bynum (2nd year) as our only center with both Turiaf and Lamar Odom having to take turns in the middle. We saw this when Kwame went out with injury. And Bynum was unable to cut it as the starter. Despite his faults, Kwame most definitely makes his presence felt, especially on the defensive end and missing him for 41 games greatly hurt the Lakers this season.

As for Bynum, here's what Simmons had to say about him earlier this season:

Maybe he'll be up and down this season, but when he's up, is there another center in the league quite like him? He protects the rim, passes out of double teams, has great hands around the basket, up-fakes on his jump-hooks, rebounds in traffic, even has a motor that keeps going and going (unlike a stiff like Eddy Curry). I'm not sure what's missing here. This is stunning. This is startling. There's almost no precedent for it. Just what the Lakers needed: More obscenely good luck.

How can you describe Bynum like that and then, 6 months later, fail to understand the Lakers reluctance to trade him? As if mortaging the franchise's future is so easily done. Yeah we could have had Kidd. But who knows how that would have worked out? That move doesn't make the Lakers a no-brainer contender. And if you're going to trade away the potential future of your franchise, it better make you a threat to win the title. Otherwise some douchebag will write about you in his Atrocious GM Summit.

You see, it's so much easier to say these kinds of things Simmons is saying when you have the knowledge that the path that was taken didn't ultimately work out. Hindsight is 20/20. And he demonstrates this again with his why not take a flier on Stephen Jackson comment. He just finished watching (with a raging hard-on, apparently) the Warriors take out the Mavs, a campaign to which Stephen Jackson fruitfully contributed. But why didn't the Lakers take a flier on Stephen Jackson? For the same god damn reason that the rest of the league didn't:
So what? Suddenly Mitch Kupchak is a dumbass because he didn't want a proven bad apple on his team? And for the record, the Warriors traded both Troy Murphy and Mike Dunleavy to get Jackson (and Al Harrington), so I don't see how that is "taking a flier." Fliers are free. Murphy and Dunleavy are at least two, three bucks.

But the last part of his quote is the one that bothered me the most. And why aren't Lakers fans more furious that their team willingly threw away Kobe's prime like this? The reason why we're not more furious is because Kobe's prime is NOT over. I'd say he's right there, maybe starting to hit the downslope on the athletic side (the point at which Michael Jordan truly became lethal, btw). People are making such a big deal about Kobe's window and how many years he has left. Who the hell knows. We don't know how long a perimeter player out of high school will last in the NBA because we have yet to see such a career take its course. And honestly, given Kobe's work ethic and determination, I'd say he's got a good a chance to play another 5 years at an extremely high level.

And don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to defend Kupchak. The job he has done so far leaves a lot to be desired and he has a LOT of work to do this summer. But to say that the team willingly threw away Kobe's prime is a ludicrous statement. As if Mitch purposely tried to avoid winning a championship this year. The man took some gambles, didn't take others, and is currently losing the battle. Plain and simple.

The only teams who willingly lost anything this season were teams who were tanking for lottery postion. Teams like the Celtics.

What the...

Bigamist.

What about Long Beach, Snoop? WHAT ABOUT LONG BEACH?

PHX/LAL Game 5

I thought we had them.

Kobe started hot early, got cold late and refused to take it to the basket. That's pretty much the game. Because the Suns were ripe last night. The Laker D took them deep into shot clocks. Steve Nash was having an off night (7 TOs). Amare was in foul trouble. Barbosa wasn't torching us with his speed. But of course, the Lakers couldn't capitalize. And even if they did, they'd have to do it again. And again.

In fact, the only reason why they were even close last night was Lamar Odom. As he did in game 4, Odom played inspired basketball. In my opinion, he earned his place on this team as the legit second option with his last two games. He knows that he will be the center piece in many trade talks this off season and that there is more than a good chance that he will be wearing another uniform next year. He could have easily taken that cue and mailed it in especially with all his injuries as legitimate excuses. But no, he came out and left it all on the floor. With desperation. I think it's clear. He wants to be on this team.

And since it seems like things will be changing in Lakerland, I just hope they remember that.

So that's the season. I'll be reflecting on it over the next few weeks. But at this point right now, my assessment is that the team has taken a step backward. And not just because they lost. But because they unraveled as a unit in the second half of the season. Yes, the injuries played a big role in that but that threat isn't going anywhere. Hardships such as injuries can be overcome with proper leadership. And with proper leadership in place, sometimes hardships can even bring a team closer. That was the most disappointing part. And I think that's the aspect of the team that needs to change first.

We need some good veterans. We're young, we're athletic. But what we need to be is tough. Robust. We can't be a team that is only elite in the best of conditions because that's the thing, conditions are rarely ideal and completely in the hands of fate. And honestly, it doesn't seem like fate likes us right now.

That said, there was a lot of good coming out of this season. Kobe continued his legacy as one of the greatest scorers this league as ever seen and in breathtaking fashion. Lamar made strides this season both in terms of his play and his mental approach to the game (his game last night would have never happened if not for some added maturity). Turiaf and Farmar (and to a lesser extent, Bynum) showed potential of being good NBA players and Luke Walton proved this year that he is just that. So, it most definitely wasn't a total loss, just a disappointing finish.