Dude is right, the Lakers have stepped up a lot this year. From last year, anyway. Saying that they're better than or even close to the Showtime Lakers is an absolute joke, and in my opinion they're not even quite where they were with Shaq and Kobe - they weren't as deep then but Fisher was better, they had guys who came in and made shots when needed, Kobe was not quite as good then as he is now but this team has nothing on Shaq, who was in his apex of being an unstoppable force in the early part of this decade (he alone with any power forward was better than Gasol and Bynum together now) - but they are very good and much improved from last year, which was a good team that just faced a buzzsaw.
Their toughness (albeit in a regular season game, but one with playoff intensity for surt) really surprised and impressed me on Thursday. They didn't back down, they didn't let the Celtics put them away when Boston had several opportunities to do so. They outplayed the Celtics in the Garden, not a small feat. I just want to see them do it consistently.
We all see the problems with the Celtics. They have no backup center, and no backup point. They can't go small like they could last year, so they're more limited. And there's always the question of age. On the other hand, their starters are playing better together than ever before, since they now have a year and a half under their belts, Ray Allen has adjusted to his new role much better than he ever did last year, and Rondo has emerged from question mark to All Star candidate, bringing a new dimension to their offense.
For the Lakers, they're playing better, but I think you might be ignoring some big problems there if you're proclaiming them among the best teams ever. Everybody's going nuts over Lamar Odom right now. But haven't we been down this road before? He is wildly inconsistent and over time, self-combusts. And have you noticed how much better Gasol plays without Bynum? I mean, Gasol can't play defense anyway, so having Bynum won't help him (even if it does help the team) on that end. But when Gasol's on the offensive end with Bynum, he can't get his inside passing game going as well as he can with Odom, and that is the thing that makes him a special player. So how is Bynum's return going to make them appreciably better all around, when he's gonna have to readjust, Gasol's offensive game will take a step back (and Gasol's offensive game is an IMMENSE part of why the Lakers are so good) and we don't know when exactly he will return? That's not to get into the fact that your point guard situation is suspect at best, good defenses keep Bryant from penetrating and force him to be a shooter, which he is good but not great at, and Ariza still gives them very little on the offensive end but is their only non-Kobe wing defender. It is a very good team, but they have enough questions that it's wildly premature to call them the best Laker team ever, or one of the greatest teams of all time.
Fact is, I still would take the Celtics with a healthy Kevin Garnett in a seven game series that is well officiated (I didn't think the calls on Thursday were tremendously one-sided, but it was just poor poor officiating). But that Laker team is going to be tough for anybody, San Antonio, Cleveland or Boston, to get past.
Now, his comments on the Celtics, those are his opinions, he's certainly not the only one who thinks the Celtics have become too full of themselves for their own good. I think they will ratchet up the playing intensity as we get closer to the playoffs, and I still think the Celtics have more talent in their starting lineup than almost anybody else has on their entire teams. But they do need to show it a bit more on the court.
When it counts. In May and June.
Discoflux, I hope we meet in the Finals again, that game last week looked more like a preview than anything else. Hopefully, we'll get through Cleveland and get another chance to bring you back to the 60s when our "rivalry" consisted of you consistently losing to us in the Finals. But I think it would be an absolutely epic series, better than last year, with or without Bynum.
But that doesn't mean these teams are better than the past great versions of these teams.
Topic: Why the Celtics are bugging me (Read 10699 times)