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Post subject: Business as unusual for the Lakers- LA Times
 Posted: Nov 11, 2007 - 06:51 PM PST
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Die-Hard Laker Fan
Joined: Jul 07, 2006
Posts: 2256
  
votes: 21
Status: Offline
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Business as unusual for the Lakers
Bryant continues to deliver on the court, and his best option might be to stick around.
November 11 2007
Normalcy returns to Lakerdom.
As if.
The Lakers don't do normal and if they ever do, you won't like it. However, a week or two without civil war would be a relief and may not be out of the question.
For all the skepticism surrounding Kobe Bryant, he has been as brilliant as always after calling down the thunder on his own head, averaging a league-leading 30.4 points, 7.6 rebounds and five assists and shooting 50% this season. Of course, by now you could be getting a little tired of the whole subject.
In her book "Ain't No Tomorrow," Elizabeth Kaye wrote: "For readers of the local papers, the Kobe-versus-Shaq struggle was familiar to a point approaching tedium. Since their first season together five years earlier, the Los Angeles Times columnist Mark Heisler had been noting troubles between the players he called 'the Golden Child' and 'Shaq Daddy.' "
That was in 2001 so I'm way past tedium and could be inducing comas. Nevertheless, for anyone who's still with me . . .
Teammates and coaches say Bryant is again acting like one of them. Even if he still wants out -- and he does -- he's being as discreet as only he can be when he feels like it.
As far as the Lakers are concerned, Bryant isn't even the issue. It's kindly paterfamilias Jerry Buss, who's up to here with his rebellious franchise player.
The franchise is at a crossroads. The glory days are gone even if their price scale remains. The way Buss handles this will determine who the Lakers will be and on a scale of 1-10 in degree of difficulty, it's a 10.
To start with, Buss has to handle it as opposed to letting it handle him.
It's one thing to decide to trade Bryant. It's another to give him up for Manny, Mo and Jack because he asks you to.
It's one thing to trade Shaquille O'Neal, knowing Bryant is close to leaving, as Buss did in 2004.
It's another thing to have traded Shaq and Kobe, in both cases before you have to.
Buss' remarks last month in Hawaii weren't the problem. He didn't mean to offend Bryant, who's sensitive for someone who recently went down the front office directory with a blowtorch.
Nor is the problem that Buss didn't try to repair the damage, because he did.
Lakers insiders -- oops, sorry Kobe -- say Buss called Bryant to assure him he hadn't meant to suggest any change in policy, but that Kobe was less than conciliatory.
(Note to Kobe: Yes, stuff gets out in this organization -- as it does in your organization, like your agent Rob Pelinka calling other general managers. This is what we do, at least on our good days.)
Stung anew or even more resigned, Buss came away from their conversation ready to accommodate Bryant's trade request if he got enough back.
That, of course, will be the trick, but if Chicago had given up Luol Deng, Ben Gordon, Tyrus Thomas and Andres Nocioni, Kobe could be a Bull today.
That wasn't exactly fair value. That was more like face-saving.
If Andrew Bynum happens, he and the four little Bulls could be OK. Personally, I'd rather bet on Bynum's continued progress with Bryant here and see where they are in two years.
However, if Buss was willing to discount Bryant, what's to keep him from marking Kobe down further the next time the sky threatens to fall?
All it would take would be three losses in a row, Kobe getting discouraged, Pelinka calling more GMs and ESPN lighting up like a pinball machine.
This is the West. No matter how well the Lakers do, they'll lose three in a row.
All but forgotten is the fact that the team is younger and deeper with the improvement of Bynum, Jordan Farmar and Ronny Turiaf and the return of Derek Fisher, Chris Mihm and the Park City Kid, Vladimir Radmanovic.
In two seasons this could be Kobe's best option, even if he doesn't feel like staying just to see.
It also remains to be seen, after Bryant campaigned to trade Bynum, when, if ever, Kobe will give Andrew his due -- although Bryant's complimentary words last week ("he's doing a fantastic job") might've been a start.
Bynum will have to earn it the hard way, but that's OK.
As promising as Bynum is at 20, as far as he has come from the porker who played two half-seasons in high school, with Bryant and Phil Jackson on a short time frame, he's discussed largely in terms of what he doesn't do.
That's OK too. The more Bynum has to earn the better, especially because he's still tracking up in this demanding, no-coddling regimen.
In the meantime, you'll be able to tell if the organization is serious or just a Buss family toy.
Jerry West, the greatest NBA exec since Red Auerbach and the most restless there ever was, is sitting in Malibu, possibly available to consult if asked the right way.
Aside from West's brain and his brutal honesty, his mere presence would serve to reassure Bryant and help knit what used to be the "Lakers family" back together.
It won't change the hard choices they must make, but it's a no-brainer. If the Lakers can't call up the greatest Laker of all, they're not the Lakers anymore. |
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warrenweelim
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Post subject: RE: Business as unusual for the Lakers- LA Times
Posted: Nov 11, 2007 - 09:18 PM PST
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Laker GM
Joined: May 11, 2007
Posts: 2841
votes: 31
Status: Offline
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George Mikan, Wilt Chamberlain, Jerry West, Elgin Baylor, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Magic Johnson, James Worthy, Shaquille Oneal, Kobe Bryant.
These are the 9 names that will be on the Laker Hall of Fame, irregardless and forever. Its hard to imagine what name comes after eh?
Jordan Farmar? Andrew Bynum? Javaris Crittenton? Ronny Turiaf? these are all of the new generation we have. Lets hope one of them earns that 10th spot. |
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SIM LEAGUE CHAMPS
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JamFan
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Post subject: RE: Business as unusual for the Lakers- LA Times
Posted: Nov 11, 2007 - 10:32 PM PST
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Big-Time Laker Fan
Joined: Oct 04, 2005
Posts: 730
Location: San Luis Obispo
votes: 5
Status: Offline
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| LA Times still filling space with old news. |
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