Yep, but I really wanted to see the Lakers play the Rockets at full strength. But Ariza and Odom deserved to be suspended... I know they are still missing Bynum but Bynum may not be back in time so who knows.
Yah blame it on his scrawny body. I don't care if you're freakin Shaq. If you're in the air and you get hit in the head like that you're going down.
dude what do u expect...if my teammate got hit like that i'd be pissed and getting all up in the guys face with him pinned or not...at least roy's not punching him
having a better developed body means you can absorb the blow more and more padding when you land so not much bone on floor hitting you really think shaq would have gotten hurt that bad if he got hit like that? Ariza would have thought twice hitting Shaq like that anyways.
Remember when Stackhouse put Shaq on his back in the NBA Finals. When your in the air, you can be flipped.
Consider this, when they barely beat us back in January, we did not have T-Mac or Artest for that game, while Battier was in and out of the lineup. While we still had Rafer at point guard.... All of this, while the Lakers had their full strength roster. I believe we are about even with Lakers, except they have Kobe that takes them up a few notches. He has to either play great or have total defensive meltdown on our side for the Lakers to win. If it came down between us in WCF, it would have to be Kobe that beats us. I don't think Gasol with (or w/o) Bynum can beat us. Yao and Scola can pretty much match them (or better them) in most places, then consider we have two great defensive stoppers off the bench. I don't think those two are going to be particularly outstanding against us and possibly below average. It will either be Kobe or one of the players of the bench who give us the most fits.
If someobody were 3 inches taller and stronger than Shaq and he was running and vulnerable in the air like that then yes. He would've gotten hurt. It doesn't matter how big or strong you are. If you're in the air you have ZERO control. And for the fact if Shaq or somebody that big did get hit that hard it might be even worse than Rudy's fall. The bigger you are the harder you fall.
And it also means more weight on the body when you impact the floor thus more mass..... The body has no ability to protect itself when you are in the air and get side swiped like that... Just a horrible play by Arriza. DD
Rudy flipped because he has such a lightweight scrawny body, that kind of blow on Shaq would have just landed him straight down on his ass at worst, where your ass has the most padding, not flipped like Rudy well Rudy did land on his butt mostly but that elbow was twisted badly on the fall
Lakers are pretty much coastin now. They know they have 1st seed locked up and teams in the east are also struggling. They are saving themselves for the playoffs and not peaking too early.