One of the best parts of having this humble little blog has been the smart and witty people who have become regular commenters here, not just adding to discussion but coming up with great insights and observations. Plus a few good questions. That discussion had me watching the Laker execution of the triangle a little […]
Lakers Analysis
No Mihm. No George. Who Do You Play?
With an already thin Laker lineup seemingly getting thinner by the day without Chris Mihm and Devean George, Phil Jackson has had to get creative to find a group that works. For example, starting classic energy-off-the-bench-guy Ronnie Turiaf against Minnesota last night (that may also have been a lesson to Brian Cook about playing defense […]
Playing Right
Kurt’s in the desert, and I’m sure he will return with a story to tell about missing this one. If indeed he did. Fourth game in five days, played the runnin’ Suns last night, got in at 3:30 AM… “I can’t understand it’s just because it’s a back-to-back,” Manu Ginobili said. “Every team does them, […]
Know Thyself
It dawned on me that I put up information about other team’s offenses and defenses in previews, but I haven’t done that for the Lakers. So: Record: 32-30 (27-35 Pythagorean), 8th seed in the West Record last 10 games: 6-4 Offensive Rating: 109.3 (9th in the NBA) Defensive Rating: 107.2 (17th in the NBA) —————————————————- […]
A Tale of Two Games
The game against Sacramento may have been the best of times, the Lakers played defense for 48 minutes, ran the offense smoothly, other players besides Kobe stepped up and they handily beat a team chasing them in the playoff hunt. The Boston loss may have been the worst of times. Defense? Ha. The Lakers let […]
Exposed Weaknesses
I’m back, and for the record Maui doesn’t suck. We had to suffer though what the Hawaii local TV weathermen called a “cold front†— the high temperature dropped from 85 down to a bone chilling 81. But we survived. (As much as I’ve mocked LA weathermen in the past — see Steve Martin in […]
Midseason Report Card — The Players
We’ll go through the players in an order selected by me, with little rhyme or reason. Because I can. After the name of the player you will see his PER and his +/- (per 48 minutes), not the end-all-be-all of statistics but they start to paint a picture of contributions. By the way, there is […]
Midseason Report Card
The Lakers have played 41 games, exactly half the season, and if you had told me before the season their record would have been 22-19, I would have taken it. I think things will improve in the second half, but this is the perfect chance to do a mid-season breakdown. We’ll look at the team […]
The 80s Are Hot Again
Update: Want to see all of Kobe’s 81 points in just three minutes? Well, it’s all right here (thanks to Henry at True Hoop for finding this). Well Bill “Sports Guy†Simmons is even happy now online pharmacy buy cytotec no prescription pharmacy . He still misses the point at times (read down a few […]
Kobe Makes His Teammates Better
The conventional wisdom in the mainstream media is that Kobe is a ball hog. “Why can’t he make his teammates better, like all the greats did?†they ask. Well, he does. Over at 82games.com, friend of this site Kevin Pelton did the detailed work and it shows that when Kobe is on the floor, all […]