[nj.com]The Most Undeserving Championship Team In NBA History

The Lakers' focus, since the game 6 defeat by Boston last year, was to beat the Celtics in the Finals.

when the Celts lost early in the playoff this season, the Lakers had a momentary lapse of concentration. that was the reason Lakers had difficuty closing the deal against Houston and Denver in the playoff.

 

The Lakers' focus, since the game 6 defeat by Boston last year, was to beat the Celtics in the Finals.

when the Celts lost early in the playoff this season, the Lakers had a momentary lapse of concentration. that was the reason Lakers had difficuty closing the deal against Houston and Denver in the playoff.

 

The Lakers have problems with certain teams. It is not as if they can turn on the switch and demolish their opponent. They had a hard time with Houston. You can just see how Kobe wanted to finish that series as fast as they can but they got frustrated because of the physical play and raised games from some of the Rockets that they did not expect. I do not think that the Celtics was in their minds then because they knew from the start of the playoffs that KG was out and it was Lebron and the Cavs winning easily in the first 2 rounds.

 

Aside from how completely illogical and ridiculous this theory is, the fact is that the Celtics weren't eliminated from the playoffs until after the Lakers series against the Rockets was over.

 

Cat, you just don't get it,

Celts announced that KG would missed the playoff before the pllayoff began.

against the Rox, every Laker, lacking motivation, had a bad series.

 

The Lakers can and have done that this season.

because they're, every one of them, not focused.

Frankly, the Lakers don't give a rat's azz about the Cavs. For them, it's the Celts

 

Is not winning the championship after 7 years enough motivation to play hard? For guys like Gasol, Odom and Ariza, winning their first ring is enough to motivate them to play hard. Its the match up problems that caused them to falter in some games.

 

Oh, so it had no impact in their demolition of Utah, but then suddenly, especially beginning in Game 4, it weighed on them in Round 2?

It's amazing what the media does to people. The Lakers aren't thinking about the Celtics when they're in a halfcourt set against Houston. It's game by game, possession by possession. Can they execute and make the play they need to make on that given possession? That's all these guys are thinking about. All the ridiculous drama about who they want to play several series down the road is fun for the media to talk about and is intriguing to discuss, but has nothing to do with what's going on on the floor.

The Lakers didn't get pushed to Game 7 by the Rockets because they lacked motivation. They were pushed to Game 7 because the Rockets were a damn good team who out-executed the Lakers in three games and thoroughly whipped their collective asses. The Lakers had every reason in the world and every desire to end that series early, but they couldn't. They were motivated. The Rockets were just a very, very good team, especially at Toyota Center, as they were all season long. End of story.

 

No matter how good a team is, they can never turn on or turn off their motivation especially if they had not prove anything yet.

 

Seattle had the best record in the league with 64 wins I believe.

Mario Elie was unhappy with the lack of minutes he was getting. He had a much bigger role in the 95 run.

I agree we could put up big offensive #'s...look at how many 3's we hit in those games. If our 3 pt shooting wasn't there, all we had was Dream to create.

The biggest difference is the Lakers have 3 guys who can generate offense, vs. the Rockets with Dream, and Maxwell to a much lesser degree.

I'm not taking anything away from the Rockets. I feel that it was amazing that they were able to win, despite not having the multiple stars and consistent scoring weapons that other teams had.

Orlando - Shaq & Penny

New York - Ewing, Starks, Harper

Utah -Stockton, Malone, Hornacek, Tom Chambers

Pheonix - Barkley, KJ, Majerle, Ceballos

Seattle - Kemp, Payton, Shrempf

Golden State - Webber, Mullin, Sprewell

Portland - Drexler, Porter, Kersey

Cleveland - Price, Nance, Daugherty

San Antonio - David Robinson, Dennis Rodman, Dale Ellis


To me, the 3 teams that did great in 94 were the Bulls, Pacers, and the Rockets.

In the Playoffs, nobody played better than Hakeem, Pippen, and Reggie Miller that year. They were the only true offensive weapon on their respective teams.

Sure Hakeem had Mad Max, Pippen had Kukoc, and Miller had Smits, but from the teams I listed above, they had no business keeping up with much deeper offensive teams. However, these teams' defenses were all great and they managed to grind it out in the playoffs.

If any of these 3 teams had won with their rosters, it would've been considered an amazing run by an underdog.

Even though the Bulls and Rockets won 58 and 57 games respectively, they were not the deepest teams in the NBA as far as scoring options. I really believe these teams overachieved just a little bit, compared to the competition at the time.

That Rockets team was amazing to me, considering they really only had 1 "go-to" guy on the team.

 

This Blogger (he is not a legit writer) has some serious issues. He is bitter and angry at the world. He was bullied in High school and College (he admits) and has never come to terms with who he is. Read the strange/creepy blog he wrote of himself a couple months ago. He should admit himself to some counseling.

http://www.nj.com/newark/krisseals/index.ssf/2009/04/ten_years.html

 

that is not saying much. they were also better than the Celts of 2008 and Pistons of 2004

Rox 2 Championship team <

Jordan's last Championship team before his first retirement, as well as his first Championship team after his first retirement​

simply put, these 2 Bull teams had MJ (in BB-shape) and Pippen + Phil and scrubbs

period.

 

My issue wasn't so much how he discredited the Rockets roster, its how he had to explain "Why Olajuwon?". As though Hakeem somehow is a "sleeper" pick and had to be validated. Like explaining Chauncey Billups or Tony Parker sneaking on to the list.

Agree. The last part is almost a copy and paste what I was gonna put in this THIS thread how Jerome Solomon was feeding it to Chronicle readers

What what so different from the Lakers 1st, 3rd and 4th series that made them so uninspired their 2nd series against the Rockets? Can make a case maybe 1 game in the series the Lakers played flat, the very 1st game of the series. Lakers weren't motivated after Rockets stole a game on their home court? If the Lakers would have won that game 6 after Yao went out it would have been "business as usual". But somehow cuz they had maybe a flat game earlier, it means they were really doing that the whole series and it shouldnt have even gotten to a 6th game to begin with....

Its the Blazers give the Lakers problems. The Rockets/Blazers series provided great Lakers-esque preparation for the Rockets against the Lakers. The Lakers against the Rockets were similarly battled tested and ready for the Nuggets and everyone else.

Underestimated the Rockets? perhaps. Cruise control? doubtful. Plus the Cavs were the favorite team in the East besides the Celtics anyways.

 

65-17 regular season and a 16-7 playoff record and the lakers were undeserving? Lmao. GTFO.

 

Well deserved champion. They deserve it. case close

 

I don't think that this Lakers team were the greatest championships of the last decade, but this piece is just a hater's rant.

 

What a lousy article. I'm sorry but this is just pure Lakers hating, they won a title and at least give them credit for it.

Sure they didn't meet no last year Celtics or any other strong teams but they did and 5-10 years from now it's what all matters.
Reminds me of people who say that Rockets wouldn't win if Jordan didn't retire?! Please...

 

This is an article from a writer that should be fired and never be allowed to write about anything ever again.

It is clearly a hate article on the Lakers and Kobe and it's disrespectful to the Lakers and here's the proof.

Am I reading this right? Kobe can't win a title without Phil Jackson and says he's NOT Michael Jordan.

If that is the case, Jordan couldn't win a title without Phil Jackson and this should always be brought up when mentioning the titels Jordan has won.

But this is pure hate and complete BS and that one paragraph is the proof.