awww how cute Miami beat the Lakers on Christmas day in December. Like this loss has any bearing in the playoffs lol They lost last year on Christmas too, how has that turned out? They're 4-7 under Phil Jackson in Christmas day games...Phil hates playing on Christmas no wonder they were lethargic.
Miami is the better team as of now. Nothing to argue about. As for the playoffs, that's a futile argument. Lakers might improve by then, or they might not. I suspect the latter.
That's a darn shame..we see the heat only twice a year, but could play the lakers 10 times in 1 season if you count the playoffs going to a game 7. I can't take a rocket fan who actually wants the Lakers to win seriously.
A question popped into my mind yesterday as I was watching the game. If Kobe is such a fierce competitor and also the leader of this team, why are his teams well known for under-performing in the regular season? Sure, they usually finish with a very good record, but it seems that almost every year (2000-01 and 2008-09 being the two exceptions I can think of) we start talking in the middle of the season about how the Lakers aren't playing well and that they don't really take the regular season that seriously. If your leaders is a fierce competitor who absolutely refuses to accept losing, how does this continue to happen year after year? How do they lose focus and intensity so consistently?
Kobe has clearly lost a step.He just cant blow by people anymore. He cant get into the paint as he used to be beating people off the dribble penetration to draw fouls and get to the line regulary. LBJ is clearly the best player on the planet now and followed by Dwight who is the biggest game changer or has the most impact on both sides of the ball.
head-to-head matchups b/t kobe v. lebron? they've met 14 times. lebron owns the matchup w/ 9 wins. lebron: 27.5ppg, 7.4rpg, 7.3apg, 1.8spg, 44%fg, 30% 3s kobe: 24.9ppg, 4.4rpg, 5.3apg, 1.1spg, 40%fg, 22% 3s and it was still close 2 years ago. the matchups have been one-sided the past 2 years.
Why not, we lebron haters still root for rockets when they play the Lakers, but when heat goes head to head with other teams we want them to fail, nothing wrong with that. No conflict of interest here
Kobe has totally remade his game over the years. He's no longer so much of a high-flyer. His jumper has become almost unguardable, he has gained a lot of strength and has developed an effective post game. It remains to be seen if this is the year where his decline in athleticism severely hampers his ability to take over games.
This seems messed up to me, but to each his own. I don't know how many years you've been a Rockets fan. But with their long history against the Lakers, I don't see how long-time fans can hate LeBron enough to want the Lakers to beat the Heat. That's ridiculous hatred IMO. It's not necessarily a conflict of interest, but just a warped sense of priorities (again IMO) for a Rockets fan. They have had too many emotional playoff series with the Lakers for me to feel any other way. I say this as someone who doesn't like LeBron at all and will never forget how he soiled himself this summer.
A lot of it has to do with Phil Jackson's philosophy of using the regular season to prepare for the playoffs, and another large chunk has to do with Shaq taking the regular season off. PJ doesn't really give a **** about the regular season...I mean sure he wants to win, but he'll also insert guys like the machine, kwame brown and luke walton in do-or-die situations from time to time for them to build up experience. Its the reason why the Lakers tend to lose a lot of gimme games...but at the same time its also a reason why they ramp it up in the playoffs. Pops also does this btw...
That's a fair answer and I hadn't thought about Jackson's role in this. I don't remember it being such a problem for Phil's teams in Chicago, though.
He better give a **** about the regular season because the only series LA has lost in the last 3 years is the one where they didn't have HCA and I doubt they win the Finals last year without HCA, and that's when you need it most due to the 2-3-2 format.
Well 3 years ago Gasol just arrived in Lakerland and was adjusting to Kobe and the triangle. Also 3 year ago Celtics still had a 100% healthy KG as well as starter calibre bench players in Posey and PJ Brown. I'm sure those factors had more to do with LA losing the series than HCA. Anyway HCA didn't really help us against the JAzz.
HCA was the singlemost important factor in the Finals last year. Even if you don't think the league is rigged, you have to admit that there's no way the Lakers shoot 21 FTs in the 4th quarter in Boston.
Well he had MJ, Pippen, and Rodman in Chicago, so yeah I doubt giving away games was a problem then. MJ by himself and some scrubs was probably enough to put away lottery teams.
I don't think so. In a seven game series all you need is 2 straight wins and you have HCA. Ask the Celts whether they'd rather have HCA or Perkins and KG 100% healthy and I'm sure they'd ask for the latter.
If the Celtics had Perkins and KG 100% healthy during the regular season, they would have had HCA. I don't think it would have made a huge difference in game 7 since Wallace was really critical and probably outdid what Perkins would have brought. While it is true that you can steal back HCA, it also presumes you win all of your games at home. The beauty of HCA is that it gives you a little room for error; you can lose a home game and just need to win one road game to get it back. If you don't have HCA and you lose a home game, you have to win 2/4 on the road. In the Finals, this means you basically have to win the three games in a row at home to have a chance, and not many teams do that.
