Lakers did the right thing....

Isn't the whole choosing Kobe over Shaq thing a myth? I thought this summer, during the "trade Kobe" scandal, Kobe told the press that the story was BS, that Buss had decided to trade Shaq without any demands from Kobe, and that it infuriated Kobe that for all these years that the team allowed Kobe to take the fall with the fans for the Shaq trade.

If I remember correctly, Shaq corroborated Kobe's story and said that he and Kobe were cool, and that Kobe never made any demands.

 

and i think riley would make that move again if he could. they suck right now, but he made that move to win a title and they did it. you really cant put a price on that. they will rebuild over the next season and if they make the right moves, be right back in the mix.

face it rockets fans...the decade of playoff futility is much easier to stomach when we have two titles to hold on to.

i think laker management had a legitimate argument with fact that shaq is lazy and was demanding too much money, but i still think they should have given in and given him his 5 years, milked another title out of him and than did what miami just did and trade him.

agree - ill admit that they are far better than i figured them for at the beginning of the season, but i still dont see them getting to the conference finals or anything.

he came it at 18 and is 30 now, right? will he be able to play till he is 38? thats a pretty hard 20 years.

 

I don't think he has slowed down in his level of performance. He is showing signs of his body breaking down like every other player who has been in the league for over a decade has. Currently, he needs surgery on his finger, he has also had shoulder surgery and knee surgery and that is what I come up with off the top of my head.

To think he will still be the same player in 8 more years is not realistic. It is even less realistic with a guy who already has more mileage than most 15-16 year vets.

 

Wrong. Had Shaq stayed, they would of won AT LEAST 1 more championship. As good as they are now, who knows.

 

but kobe was a free agent. they couldn't trade him unless he agreed to a sign and trade. and despite his and shaq's comments to the contrary, i don't think he was going back to the lakers if they kept shaq. maybe it would've been like his trade demands this summer and he would have eventually caved and gone back, but the whole notion of this thread is that they had to choose, so there would be no fetching dwyane wade. you just lose kobe for nothing.

why do people keep saying 3 years? the lakers and heat were either equal last year or the lakers were slightly better considering their records and the fact the heat were swept by the weak bulls while the lakers at least took one from the suns in the playoffs. it was a 2 year trade off (and if you're the heat it was well worth the suffering now) but 2 years versus the next 6 or 7 would seem to make the lakers choice easy.

 

8 years is still waaaay too optimistic, IMO. I agree with Dave on this point.

I think the "prime" of an NBA player's career is generally considered to be in the 26-32 range or so, give or take a year or two on either end. How many guards can you think of who were still as productive at age 36 and 37 as they were when they were 29 and 30? Heck, how many big guys can you think of?

Kobe's an incredible, incredible player. That said, I think you can count on him being fairly dominant through, I dunno... age 33 or 34? After that he'll still be good, but I'd say if he's still "dominant" at age 36, that's just gravy right there.

 

I always thought the lakers made the right choice even before this year....Kobe was younger therefore you go with the younger guy.........

 

yep, like other said:

Shaq = 1 ring
Kobe = first round exits

Till other thing happens, that stays that way.

 

how??? they might have. but they didnt the last 2 years shaq was there. and he has gotten a little worse every year since then.

i remember watching some of those games in the finals where the heat won. he hardly did anything. wade almost won that series by himself. dirk not withstanding.

i think there may have been about a 25% chance they could have won one title. depending who they had around shaq if kobe would have left. maybe less

 

have Shaw and Kobe switch teams, Shaq will too be 1st round exit.

btw, D Wade won the ring, Shaq---scoring >10 pts less than his career avg---was merely riding on his coattail. arguably, on that team, Mourning was more of a contributor than Shaq.

 

That same Shaq in Miami would of had the same impact on the Lakers. There is noway, and as good as Wade is, he would of been able to dominate without Shaq on the floor. AND this would be with a Kobe Bryant who I believe is a better player than Wade. They got thumped by the Pistons but the MADE IT TO THE FINALS. This is all hypothetical though because obviously it would depend on the other pieces around the two.

I know the Lakers would of only kept one. Obviously Bryant is the no brainer. But if they didn't have any problems, why couldn't they have kept both?

 

lol riding wade. More like wade being exposed like penny hardaway.

 

yeah, maye Wade was the main player, but shaq got attention, and wade was not doubled-team, like kobe in LA, that maybe would happened with kobe if shaq stayed in LA, is more easy to find another great guard then finding another great center.

And he didnt need to score a lot of points, because he share the scoring with Wade, like McGrady now, his average is bad considering all the scoring titles with the magic, but is because he dont need that, like kobe that he was the only player who scored.

And Shaq lead the Heat, to Conference Finals, and then to NBA Finals.

 

No, I think they should have found a way to work it out and keep both of them, and let Kobe eventually take over like Magic did with Kareem. But they went from a championship contender each season to the lotto and 2 first round exits...and the team they gave Shaq to won a title. I can't see how anyone can say they made the right choice on purpose. Now if you wanna say they got lucky as hell with the Gasol gift and became contenders again then I'm fine with that. Heck, Kobe didn't even want to be there at the start of this season....so they would have lost both of them if he had his way....

If you go from title contention to lotto and first round fodder and the dude you let go goes to conference finals and wins titles then no, you did not make the right decision. NO ONE SAW THE GASOL GIFT COMING AND WITHOUT THAT LA IS STILL NOT CONTENDING.

 

Agree with those saying that the rings determine the score.

Personally, I HIGHLY doubt that keeping Shaq (especially if it meant Kobe becoming a Clipper) would have led to another LA title. Shaq needed to be traded to play with any motivation (and that lasted all of two seasons with Miami before he quit on them too).

Also, the Lakers right now look very much like they're going to win one. They haven't done it yet, but if they do, I'd say they come out of the entire thing as the winners (though technically tied 1-1). Beyond this year, it's imperative that they keep Odom on the team.

Evan

 

Its not the right thing if you dont got the bling.

Shaq doesnt need Wade. Wade needed Shaq. Think about where Shaq has gone in his career and which guards became spectacular. Orlando (penny)
Lakers (kobe) Miami (Wade). Shoot I bet Shaq could make almost any above average guard look like Wade. The focus of the defense will always be on Shaq therefore guards have better looks heck the whole team would have better looks. If you guys want to play the WHAT IFS game then Shaq could of possibly had 3 more titles already after Kobe left.

 

8 years?

You know how long 8 years is on a basketball body that has ALREADY been pro for, what, 13?

If you're going to give Kobe an 8 year prime, why not go ahead and pencil the Spurs in for at least 7 of those (Manu's only 1 year older, Tim 2 (but he's a big who doesn't rely on athleticism, and Tony's younger).

Shaq has already one a ring w/o Kobe, and like a previous poster indicated, THEY haven't done ANYTHING yet! As good as they've looked, ain't no way I take them in a 7 game series over the Spurs right now.

 

I agree with everything, the miami heat got a ring (hard to argue) but shaq wasn't going to win in l.a. because he was fat and happy. anyone actually remember how the lakers went out that series against detroit. anyone actually remember how valuable karl malone was to that team when he had big games.

sidenote, its so good that karl got hurt and couldn't help them because karl was the one who b****ed in kobe's first all-star game that kobe waved him off to go one on one with jordan and then to actually try to ride their coattails for a a title, poetic justice