It’s time for my one annual non-Lakers post making horseracing picks. (A longer-look at restructuring the Lakers is coming in the next day or so.) My wife and I have been to the Derby a couple times, love horse racing and throw a mean Derby party. This race is always a little hard to pick […]
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Positives To Look Back On
There’s a long off-season ahead, one that should prove to be interesting. But I’m going to take a few days before delving into it, and writing season wrap-ups, and reflect back on some of the positives from the past season. The things from the Lakers worth remembering and enjoying. The emergence of Ronny Turiaf as […]
Laker/Suns Chat: Game 5
Let’s talk about the technical stuff the Lakers need to do tonight. In game three the Lakers started switching on the screen-and-roll the Suns ran, and also did some trapping (having both the center and the guard try to stop Nash from making a play). It worked pretty well for three quarters, as Jackson said […]
True Hoop Talks Lakers
Henry Abbot, the Godfather of basketball bloggers (don’t ask me about the horse head incident) has a long Laker post today, talking mostly about the future. A lot of smart people are quoted (plus me) and it makes a good read. Below is my part, but you really need to read the whole thing: Under […]
Fast Break Thoughts
So many things I wanted to write about the last couple days, but the real world keeps getting in the way. Basically, despite my frustration with the Lakers, there are some positives to write about. • I don’t think enough praise can be heaped on Lamar Odom for his effort in this series. Torn labrum […]
Game Four Thoughts
The Suns made one key adjustment for Sunday’s game — they pushed the tempo up and forced the Lakers to make their reads and decisions more quickly. The Lakers were not athletic enough or smart enough to deal with that, and under pressure got away from what worked before. They didn’t trap on the pick […]
Lakers/Suns Chat: Game 4
It comes down to defense. In game three not only did the Lakers switch (or occasionally trap) on the pick-and-roll, not only did they play better man defense, but they cut off diagonal and other passing lanes. They limited Suns options, and they are going to have to do that again. Thanks to Gatinho for […]
Game Four Preview
Forty-eight minutes. It’s pretty clear what the Lakers need to do to win in this series — if you have not read Nate Jones’s breakdown of game three on Fanhouse yesterday you must, it’s so good and comprehensive I’m not going to repeat it all here. But this time they need to do all that […]
Game 3 Thoughts
Finally! In the second quarter, the Lakers started playing like a desperate team, and washed in with that wave of desperation was hustle and honest-to-goodness pick-and-roll defense. Back for three quarters were the Lakers from last December, the team other squads didn’t want to see come playoff time. Keying the 21-9 second quarter run that […]
Lakers/Suns Chat: Game 3
It says a lot about this Laker team that the coaches are still tinkering with player substitution patterns and lineups well into the first round of the playoffs. They can overcome that if we see a Laker team that’s a little angry tonight, one with a little fire in its belly. They need to be […]