Flying Fox wrote:Captain Ned wrote:In my mind Kobe is one of the symptoms of what's wrong with basketball these days and why this Celtics run is so refreshing. The Lakers' game plan is Kobe leading the 4 dwarfs who happen to be on the court at the moment. The Celtics are clearly a Team in the unfashionable all for one/one for all concept. From what I've watched in this series the Celtics do what they must to win with no regard for personal glory; in fact they have a tinge of March Madness about them. The Lakers, OTOH, have been so beaten down by Kobe's need to be the only star that they've simply resigned themselves to waiting to see what Kobe will do. Phil Jackson is clearly a large part of this; maybe one day he'll finally realize that Kobe is no MJ.
But even back in the regular season it is Gasol who kind of makes Kobe back alive again. I don't see this year's rendition of the Lakers as that Kobe-centric? Perhaps they reverted back to old habits but I guess I wouldn't know, since I didn't watch the last game.
There's certainly been a regression away from what (apparently, as I didn't really watch them) made them successful in the regular season
and in the stretches of this series where they've had success. A lot of it has been Boston D putting the clamps down and slowing the team attack, though. They've certainly played stretches of excellent basketball. They wouldn't have been up 24, nor would they have come back from 20 down, if that wasn't the case. The lack of clamp-down defense and vulnerability to having everyone start watching Kobe do his thing when things get tough are huge weaknesses.
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