Jeff Van Gundy had an interesting thought late in the Lakers loss to San Antonio on April 4th. The gist was that if Kobe has a poor shooting night and the Lakers are without Bynum they become a very beatable team. Well, Kobe played today and for the third straight game had trouble shooting the ball. I think it's still the finger but his knee injury certainly doesn't help. He had very little lift today and had trouble going to the hole.
Kobe is banged up. Bynum is still hurt. Odom, Artest, Farmar, Sasha and Brown all have injuries as well. The Lakers are hurting and their bench has been a joke for a good month now. But the fact remains that since the All-Star break LA has not played with any rhythm and little purpose. With today's loss, Orlando holds the home court advantage should the two teams meet in the Finals.
So who is to blame? Well, I would start with the coach. By his own admission, PJ has said when guys start tuning you out it's time to move on. A coach not only has to prepare a team for each opponent but to get that team geared for the playoffs. For months now, even when they were relatively healthy, the Lakers have looked poor on defense. They've shown flashes. Last month's game at Houston was a revelation, at least the second quarter. But most of the time the effort is not there. It's Phil's job to coax that effort out of his team. It's Phil's job get the team to move the ball on offense. It's Phil's job to sit Fish when he's not contributing. It's Phil's job to inspire.
Today was another very uninspired effort. Even when they closed the gap late in the fourth, the Blazers' Andre Miller got a layup to put Portland back up by five. I've been hearing about the Lakers defensive philosophy all year. The idea of guards funneling opponents to the middle. It doesn't work. Pau is a mediocre shot blocker and a terrible pick-and-roll defender. Bynum is slow to come from the weak side.
As I've said so many times before, the Lakers seem to survive by Kobe bailing them out with his unbelievable shot making while they give up layups on the other end. And now Kobe can't even make free throws. He better get well soon or the Lakers might be toast in the first round. They can't simply rely on their offense keeping them in games. With five minutes left today, they had scored four points in the fourth Q and were something like 4-20 from three on the game.
Just once, I'd like to see LA come out and dominate from beginning to end in a game. Look at some of the first quarters the Cavs have had this year, 40-45 points against some teams. By my account, the Lakes have played maybe three quality games since the beginning of March. Three! Wins at Phoenix and San Antonio and one against Utah at home. Mixed in those 20 games are the three game road losing streak against Miami, Charlotte and Orlando, a two-point win over Toronto and three-point win over GS (both at home), embarassing losses at OKC, NO and ATL, a 19-point loss at home against the Spurs, and today's loss against a Portland team without Brandon Roy.
LO says every team turns on a switch when it comes to the playoffs. The best thing you can say about the Lakers now is they've been saving energy for a month and a half with their switch set at "off".
Sunday, April 11, 2010
Saturday, February 6, 2010
Saturday, January 30, 2010
Books
"And then Amalfitano walked into his devastated front yard and looked up and down the street, craning his neck he didn’t see any car or Rosa and he gripped Dieste’s book tightly, which he was still holding in his left hand. And he looked up at the sky and saw the moon, too big and too wrinkled, although it wasn’t night yet. And then he returned to his ravaged backyard and for a few seconds he stopped, looking left and right, ahead and behind, trying to see his shadow, but although it was still daytime and the sun was still shining in the west, toward Tijuana, he couldn’t see it. And then his eyes fell on the four rows of cord, each tied at one end to a kind of miniature soccer goal, two posts perhaps six feet tall planted in the ground, and a third post bolted horizontally across the top, making them sturdier, the cords strung from this top bar to hooks fixed in the side of the house. It was the clothesline, although the only things he saw hanging on it were a shirt of Rosa’s, white with ocher embroidery around the neck, and a pair of underpants and two towels, still dripping. In the corner, in a brick hut, was the washing machine. For a while he didn’t move, breathing with his mouth open, leaning on the horizontal bar of the clothesline. Then he went into the hut as if he were short of oxygen, and from a plastic bag with the logo of the supermarket where he went with his daughter to do the weekly shopping, he took out three clothespins, which he persisted in calling perritos, as they were called in Chile, and with them he clamped the book and hung it from one of the cords and then went back into the house, feeling much calmer."
The Part about Amalfitano, 2666 by Roberto Bolano
Who hasn’t, even among book lovers (especially among book lovers), thought of clothespinning a particularly irritating tome? Or burying a book in one’s garden (http://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/2009/05/20/fashion/20090521-poison-slideshow_6.html)? To let nature really have at it, in the same way it erodes rock or bone. As Roberto Bolano acknowledges, the idea was Duchamp’s. The surrealist once encouraged his sister to first buy and then fasten a geometry book from strings hanging from her balcony. He called it “Unhappy Readymade” with the idea being for the wind to “go through the book, chose its own problems, turn and tear out the pages.”
I’m hoping Pau Gasol won’t be tempted to do the same with 2666, the book Lakers coach Phil Jackson recently gave him. I read Bolano’s final book last year and now rank it among my favorites, often brutal, but beautifully so. At first I wondered whether Gasol received the English or Spanish edition. But the LA Times said it was the 898-page edition which means English. As my friend Steve points out, the paperback Spanish edition runs around 1100 pages. It sometimes takes longer to say things in Spanish, although I’m sure Gasol would prefer to read en Espanol.
Phil’s annual rite of giving out books to members of the team got me thinking about what books I’d give to my beloved Lakers including ones from my own library. So here it is just in time for their return from an eight-game roadie:
Ron Artest – The Basketball Diaries by Jim Carroll
From one New York City hustler to another. I love this book. I first read it growing up out here in LA and when I lived in New York I used to read it on the subway on my way to parties and the like. I have the thin, pocketsized paperback with the gangly, seated Carroll on the cover. There’s another one with the late JC in a tank top with his arms just popping out. God just molds some people to be junkies. The caveat is not to give Ron Ron the Leonardo DiCaprio cover edition. I like Leo and all but his basketball playing in the film version set hoops films back 20 years.
Shannon Brown – Gravity’s Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon
Not expecting a book report from Shannon any time soon, but title seems apropos for this year’s slam dunk champ.
Kobe Bryant – No Country for Old Men by Cormac McCarthy
When you think about it, Kobe is like the NBA equivalent to Anton Chigurh, a cold-blooded killer with a code who leaves nothing in the chamber (see Nike ad). “You’re asking that I make myself vulnerable and that I can never do,” Chigurh says to Carla Jean Moss moments before dispatching her. “I have only one way to live. It doesn’t allow for special cases.”
Andrew Bynum – The Journal of Bone and Joint Surgery (lifetime subscription)
It’s hard to finds a book for a 22-year-old making 12.5 million a year. This subscription gives him the ability to argue going under the knife versus in-season, three-month rehab. Sit down, Gary Vitti.
Jordan Farmar – Less Than Zero by Bret Easton Ellis
People in Los Angeles are afraid to merge on freeways, or in Jordan’s case consistently hit the three.
Derek Fisher – The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
Clutch shooter. Union rep. Caring father. Great guy. Fish is all of these things, but like Jay Gatsby he’s got a dark side as well. He occasionally flops and some consider him to be a dirty player. The guy is crafty. For all we know, he could be secretly be running a bootlegging operation.
Pau Gasol - 2666 by Roberto Bolano.
Honorable Mention, Hopscotch by Julio Cortazar. The title eludes to the fact that you can play around with the order of Cortazar’s narrative, reading it straight through or following his suggested skips at the end of each chapter. It reminds me of Pau’s recent play. He’s great one night. Skip ahead and he goes 5-14 and misses six free throws.
D.J. Mbenga – The Day of Creation by J.G. Ballard.
Ballard’s tale of a doctor who discovers a third Nile is hallucinatory read set in a fictional land that could be Mbenga’s native DRC. Not that he pines for his homeland.
Adam Morrison – Everything Ravaged, Everything Burned by Wells Tower
I actually gave Adam a book once (Greil Marcus’ Lipstick Traces). This time I'm giving him Tower's book of short stories to send him on his way to his next destination. Plus the title sounds a bit like a summation of AmMo’s career. Note: Nothing about Che. I know he’s exhausted the subject. Honorable Mention: Trotsky: Downfall of a Revolutionary by Bertrand M. Patenaude.
Lamar Odom – The Big Rock Candy Mountain by Wallace Stegner
Just looking at the title sitting on his shelf should make LO’s mouth water. Honorable Mention: Roald Dahl's Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.
Josh Powell – Edisto by Padgett Powell (no relation)
I don’t know much about JP other than he can roll out of bed and hit a fifteen footer. But he’s from Charleston, SC, a jumper away from the setting of Padgett’s best novel.
Sasha Vujacic – Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy
I’m going big guns here. The current Mr. Maria Sharapova needs to know how a Russian woman thinks and this classic offers the best insight.
Luke Walton – Wooden, A Lifetime of Observations and Reflections On and Off the Court by Coach John Wooden with Steve Jamison (Bill Walton autographed copy)
Learn from the master teachers, Luke. And no parties in Papa’s house.
The Part about Amalfitano, 2666 by Roberto Bolano
Who hasn’t, even among book lovers (especially among book lovers), thought of clothespinning a particularly irritating tome? Or burying a book in one’s garden (http://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/2009/05/20/fashion/20090521-poison-slideshow_6.html)? To let nature really have at it, in the same way it erodes rock or bone. As Roberto Bolano acknowledges, the idea was Duchamp’s. The surrealist once encouraged his sister to first buy and then fasten a geometry book from strings hanging from her balcony. He called it “Unhappy Readymade” with the idea being for the wind to “go through the book, chose its own problems, turn and tear out the pages.”
I’m hoping Pau Gasol won’t be tempted to do the same with 2666, the book Lakers coach Phil Jackson recently gave him. I read Bolano’s final book last year and now rank it among my favorites, often brutal, but beautifully so. At first I wondered whether Gasol received the English or Spanish edition. But the LA Times said it was the 898-page edition which means English. As my friend Steve points out, the paperback Spanish edition runs around 1100 pages. It sometimes takes longer to say things in Spanish, although I’m sure Gasol would prefer to read en Espanol.
Phil’s annual rite of giving out books to members of the team got me thinking about what books I’d give to my beloved Lakers including ones from my own library. So here it is just in time for their return from an eight-game roadie:
Ron Artest – The Basketball Diaries by Jim Carroll
From one New York City hustler to another. I love this book. I first read it growing up out here in LA and when I lived in New York I used to read it on the subway on my way to parties and the like. I have the thin, pocketsized paperback with the gangly, seated Carroll on the cover. There’s another one with the late JC in a tank top with his arms just popping out. God just molds some people to be junkies. The caveat is not to give Ron Ron the Leonardo DiCaprio cover edition. I like Leo and all but his basketball playing in the film version set hoops films back 20 years.
Shannon Brown – Gravity’s Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon
Not expecting a book report from Shannon any time soon, but title seems apropos for this year’s slam dunk champ.
Kobe Bryant – No Country for Old Men by Cormac McCarthy
When you think about it, Kobe is like the NBA equivalent to Anton Chigurh, a cold-blooded killer with a code who leaves nothing in the chamber (see Nike ad). “You’re asking that I make myself vulnerable and that I can never do,” Chigurh says to Carla Jean Moss moments before dispatching her. “I have only one way to live. It doesn’t allow for special cases.”
Andrew Bynum – The Journal of Bone and Joint Surgery (lifetime subscription)
It’s hard to finds a book for a 22-year-old making 12.5 million a year. This subscription gives him the ability to argue going under the knife versus in-season, three-month rehab. Sit down, Gary Vitti.
Jordan Farmar – Less Than Zero by Bret Easton Ellis
People in Los Angeles are afraid to merge on freeways, or in Jordan’s case consistently hit the three.
Derek Fisher – The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
Clutch shooter. Union rep. Caring father. Great guy. Fish is all of these things, but like Jay Gatsby he’s got a dark side as well. He occasionally flops and some consider him to be a dirty player. The guy is crafty. For all we know, he could be secretly be running a bootlegging operation.
Pau Gasol - 2666 by Roberto Bolano.
Honorable Mention, Hopscotch by Julio Cortazar. The title eludes to the fact that you can play around with the order of Cortazar’s narrative, reading it straight through or following his suggested skips at the end of each chapter. It reminds me of Pau’s recent play. He’s great one night. Skip ahead and he goes 5-14 and misses six free throws.
D.J. Mbenga – The Day of Creation by J.G. Ballard.
Ballard’s tale of a doctor who discovers a third Nile is hallucinatory read set in a fictional land that could be Mbenga’s native DRC. Not that he pines for his homeland.
Adam Morrison – Everything Ravaged, Everything Burned by Wells Tower
I actually gave Adam a book once (Greil Marcus’ Lipstick Traces). This time I'm giving him Tower's book of short stories to send him on his way to his next destination. Plus the title sounds a bit like a summation of AmMo’s career. Note: Nothing about Che. I know he’s exhausted the subject. Honorable Mention: Trotsky: Downfall of a Revolutionary by Bertrand M. Patenaude.
Lamar Odom – The Big Rock Candy Mountain by Wallace Stegner
Just looking at the title sitting on his shelf should make LO’s mouth water. Honorable Mention: Roald Dahl's Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.
Josh Powell – Edisto by Padgett Powell (no relation)
I don’t know much about JP other than he can roll out of bed and hit a fifteen footer. But he’s from Charleston, SC, a jumper away from the setting of Padgett’s best novel.
Sasha Vujacic – Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy
I’m going big guns here. The current Mr. Maria Sharapova needs to know how a Russian woman thinks and this classic offers the best insight.
Luke Walton – Wooden, A Lifetime of Observations and Reflections On and Off the Court by Coach John Wooden with Steve Jamison (Bill Walton autographed copy)
Learn from the master teachers, Luke. And no parties in Papa’s house.
Thursday, January 7, 2010
I like the Horns
Alabama barely beat Auburn, LSU, and Tennessee. I like Texas to win 17-10 and for Colt McCoy to have a big game. Texas had a couple of close calls as well and I know a lot of people in Austin even doubt the team. They're not a great team and not as good as the VY championship team. But Alabama is not great either and in the Battle of Macs, I'll go with the QB that has won more games than any in the modern history of college football.
Monday, January 4, 2010
Gil
Just before Christmas, as I was snaking my way along Sunset between Pacific Palisades and Santa Monica, I thought of Gilbert Arenas. Off to my right in the canyon below was Pali High (home of the Dolphins!) where we had conducted a photo shoot with Gil shortly after his last season with Golden State. Arenas had done some pretty crazy stuff his first two years in the league. Before he was actually given some decent burn he used to practice dunks jumping off the trampoline with the Golden State mascot (a feat he repeated at the 2007 All-Star Game weekend). He bought an Escalade for around 50 grand and then used another 50 Gs to trick it out even though he was the 31st pick in the 2001 Draft and making non-guranteed rookie money. During halftime of a game against San Antonio, Arenas was so upset with his play that he walked into the shower in full uniform and turned on the water. He supposedly played the second half in his wet uni.
The last exploit was the theme of our photo shoot. Gil stood in uniform on a Pali High handball court while the photographer's assistant threw bucket after bucket of lukewarm water on him. It was late afternoon and getting cool in the canyon, but Gil didn't care. He was a photographer's dream, putting up with being drenched for a good hour and a half. His girlfriend, Laura Govan was there as well.
Arenas' off-the-wall personality and his back story about growing up with his dad in LA and sleeping in the car when they first arrived from Florida made for a pretty good piece. And Gil was a good quote. When I interviewed him I went through the first round of the 2001 Draft naming all the guys who had been drafted before him. With the tape recorder running right in front of him he went off on several of the picks. He said a monkey could shoot better than Gerald Wallace and justifiably called Jeryl Sasser "terrible". He was especially miffed with the Celtics who had three first round picks and took Joe Johnson, Kendrick Brown and Joe Forte (ouch). "If I could pick one team to score 100 points against it would be Boston," he said.
The day the story went to print I got a phone call from Arenas while covering a tennis tourney in Indianapolis. Gil was pissed. He claimed that all the things he had said about the other players in his draft were off the record. Of course, he never said anything like during the interview and his girlfriend was there the entire time. He claimed that the next time he faced each player he dissed he was going to have to throw down with them. I tried to reason with him but he just wanted to vent and went off on what I thought was a very fair and positive story. The thing that really killed me was that he had just signed a 60 million dollar deal with the Wiz. He finally had all this respect. But as many people have said about Arenas, he's never trusted his success. As Mark Heisler suggested in his story on Arenas this past Sunday, Gil's always feared that everyone is going to discover that he's a fraud and abandon him just like his drug-addicted mom did when he was a little kid.
As Arenas went on to bigger and better things with Washington, became an All-Star and a cause celebre among the media (especially bloggers), I've always kept this idea of Gil in mind. Even now,in the wake of his gun trouble, I really don't think he's a bad guy. When I relayed my story to people who know him they said that Gil challenges everyone, even friends or teammates (look at his relationship with Deshawn Stevenson). He's got to know if you're on his side or not and even those that are in his court are perpetually tested. It's a matter of trust, is it not?
Occasionally people that have everything (fame, money, respect), if they want to go higher, they need to drum up controversy or sharpen their edge. That's what makes someone like Kobe so great. Maybe that's what MJ was looking to do with his HOF acceptance speech. Arenas isn't nearly the player those two are, but he's achieved some pretty big things in his NBA career and he's nobody's fool. While he does foolish things, deep down he's thinking 'Hey, it's just me, Gil, Hibachi, Agent Zero.' I'm not saying bringing guns to an NBA lockerroom was a totally calculated move, but on some level, how could it not be? His whole career, from his free throw routine to his use of the media, is defined by his ability to provoke and bewilder.
So what happens now? In the wake of Tiger mania, the press is quick to dole out advice and/or punishment. Jemele Hill thinks Arenas and Crittenton should be suspended for the season and that the Wiz can use this episode to void Arenas' hefty contract. I think he'll get a month suspension (Steven Jackson received 7 games for his gun going off in a nightclub). I doubt the Wiz can play a morality card with this and ax Arenas. I just don't see it happening. As Washington should have learned long ago, when ride with Gil you get the good and the bad.
The last exploit was the theme of our photo shoot. Gil stood in uniform on a Pali High handball court while the photographer's assistant threw bucket after bucket of lukewarm water on him. It was late afternoon and getting cool in the canyon, but Gil didn't care. He was a photographer's dream, putting up with being drenched for a good hour and a half. His girlfriend, Laura Govan was there as well.
Arenas' off-the-wall personality and his back story about growing up with his dad in LA and sleeping in the car when they first arrived from Florida made for a pretty good piece. And Gil was a good quote. When I interviewed him I went through the first round of the 2001 Draft naming all the guys who had been drafted before him. With the tape recorder running right in front of him he went off on several of the picks. He said a monkey could shoot better than Gerald Wallace and justifiably called Jeryl Sasser "terrible". He was especially miffed with the Celtics who had three first round picks and took Joe Johnson, Kendrick Brown and Joe Forte (ouch). "If I could pick one team to score 100 points against it would be Boston," he said.
The day the story went to print I got a phone call from Arenas while covering a tennis tourney in Indianapolis. Gil was pissed. He claimed that all the things he had said about the other players in his draft were off the record. Of course, he never said anything like during the interview and his girlfriend was there the entire time. He claimed that the next time he faced each player he dissed he was going to have to throw down with them. I tried to reason with him but he just wanted to vent and went off on what I thought was a very fair and positive story. The thing that really killed me was that he had just signed a 60 million dollar deal with the Wiz. He finally had all this respect. But as many people have said about Arenas, he's never trusted his success. As Mark Heisler suggested in his story on Arenas this past Sunday, Gil's always feared that everyone is going to discover that he's a fraud and abandon him just like his drug-addicted mom did when he was a little kid.
As Arenas went on to bigger and better things with Washington, became an All-Star and a cause celebre among the media (especially bloggers), I've always kept this idea of Gil in mind. Even now,in the wake of his gun trouble, I really don't think he's a bad guy. When I relayed my story to people who know him they said that Gil challenges everyone, even friends or teammates (look at his relationship with Deshawn Stevenson). He's got to know if you're on his side or not and even those that are in his court are perpetually tested. It's a matter of trust, is it not?
Occasionally people that have everything (fame, money, respect), if they want to go higher, they need to drum up controversy or sharpen their edge. That's what makes someone like Kobe so great. Maybe that's what MJ was looking to do with his HOF acceptance speech. Arenas isn't nearly the player those two are, but he's achieved some pretty big things in his NBA career and he's nobody's fool. While he does foolish things, deep down he's thinking 'Hey, it's just me, Gil, Hibachi, Agent Zero.' I'm not saying bringing guns to an NBA lockerroom was a totally calculated move, but on some level, how could it not be? His whole career, from his free throw routine to his use of the media, is defined by his ability to provoke and bewilder.
So what happens now? In the wake of Tiger mania, the press is quick to dole out advice and/or punishment. Jemele Hill thinks Arenas and Crittenton should be suspended for the season and that the Wiz can use this episode to void Arenas' hefty contract. I think he'll get a month suspension (Steven Jackson received 7 games for his gun going off in a nightclub). I doubt the Wiz can play a morality card with this and ax Arenas. I just don't see it happening. As Washington should have learned long ago, when ride with Gil you get the good and the bad.
Saturday, January 2, 2010
Hurry Back Ron Artest
The Lakers knew that signing Ron Artest meant they'd encounter a few bumps and bruises along the way. They just never imagined it would be Ron Ron's own bumped head and a bruised elbow that would keep him out of the lineup for what has been four games now. For the most part, Artest has been a model Angelino. He's embraced the city, giving out his phone number on more than one occasion and keeping his tweeps well versed. He gets frustrated with opposing players from time to time, but he almost never has a problem with a referee. He even mixes in the old school raising of the hand when whistled for a foul.
As a player, he is still trying to find his role within the triangle. But if the last five games are any indication, the Lakers are lost without his defense. In the first of LA's four games in five nights, Artest had a so-so game against Cleveland and LeBron. LBJ had a solid all-around game (he missed a triple-double by one assist) and Artest fouled out, but James didn't dominate scoring-wise. Yeah, it's odd to say since he scored 26, but he mostly killed the Lakes as a facilitator. Overall, the Lakers D was terrible and they missed their own share of bunnies (see Gasol). Then Ron fell down some stairs and blacked out. The Lakers have struggled to wake up in his absence. In the four games Artest has missed, LA has given up 103, 118, 118, and 108 points.
Were it not for the heroics of the Kobester, they could be riding a five-game losing streak. Seriously. In the first game in Sacramento, they blew a six-point lead in the last three minutes and they were down by seven in the first OT. They were blown out in Phoenix and they followed that up by yielding 118 to a Golden State team playing the second of a back-to-back. The first game for the Warriors was a win over the Celtics! In fact, GS played Phoenix, Boston and LA in consecutive games (who made up that sked?) Joel and Stu kept marveling at how the Warriors were shooting close to 60 percent. "It's easy," I screamed at my TV, "when you give up layup after layup." Then, of course, last night the Lakers went down by 20 against the Kings at Staples and won on Kobe's third game-winner in a month.
Maybe that's an omen. Like I've said before, there's a tendency for decent teams who lose close games one year to come back and win a majority of those the next season (assuming most of the personnel is the same). The Lakers were great in close games last season. In fact, they were rarely blown out. So one wonders if the pendulum will swing the other way this season. For every blowout (Cleveland, Phoenix) which you think will serve as a wakeup call, recently there have been even more alarming near-catastrophes against GS and Sac-town. Will this team win 60 games? Are they good enough on defense to repeat? Heaven knows when they move the ball on O, they can be scary good.
I thought it was refreshing though to hear Artest say recently he thought that despite their record he felt the Lakers have played well as a unit in less than ten games this year. To repeat as champs, you need to generate hunger. To their advantage, the Lakes have not only the NBA's best player but the league's hungriest in Kobe. Even Artest is amazed by how much Kobe wants to win every night. But if this recent spell of poor play means anything it's that LA needs Artest. They need his shot, his hustle, his defense. Maybe, Trevor Ariza will end up having a better season stat-wise than Ron Ron, but Trevor can't guard guys like Carmelo or LBJ. It may be difficult to sum up just how much Artest means to this team. The past week has been a pretty good testament to his value, but ultimately it will be whether or not the Lakers are holding the trophy in June.
As a player, he is still trying to find his role within the triangle. But if the last five games are any indication, the Lakers are lost without his defense. In the first of LA's four games in five nights, Artest had a so-so game against Cleveland and LeBron. LBJ had a solid all-around game (he missed a triple-double by one assist) and Artest fouled out, but James didn't dominate scoring-wise. Yeah, it's odd to say since he scored 26, but he mostly killed the Lakes as a facilitator. Overall, the Lakers D was terrible and they missed their own share of bunnies (see Gasol). Then Ron fell down some stairs and blacked out. The Lakers have struggled to wake up in his absence. In the four games Artest has missed, LA has given up 103, 118, 118, and 108 points.
Were it not for the heroics of the Kobester, they could be riding a five-game losing streak. Seriously. In the first game in Sacramento, they blew a six-point lead in the last three minutes and they were down by seven in the first OT. They were blown out in Phoenix and they followed that up by yielding 118 to a Golden State team playing the second of a back-to-back. The first game for the Warriors was a win over the Celtics! In fact, GS played Phoenix, Boston and LA in consecutive games (who made up that sked?) Joel and Stu kept marveling at how the Warriors were shooting close to 60 percent. "It's easy," I screamed at my TV, "when you give up layup after layup." Then, of course, last night the Lakers went down by 20 against the Kings at Staples and won on Kobe's third game-winner in a month.
Maybe that's an omen. Like I've said before, there's a tendency for decent teams who lose close games one year to come back and win a majority of those the next season (assuming most of the personnel is the same). The Lakers were great in close games last season. In fact, they were rarely blown out. So one wonders if the pendulum will swing the other way this season. For every blowout (Cleveland, Phoenix) which you think will serve as a wakeup call, recently there have been even more alarming near-catastrophes against GS and Sac-town. Will this team win 60 games? Are they good enough on defense to repeat? Heaven knows when they move the ball on O, they can be scary good.
I thought it was refreshing though to hear Artest say recently he thought that despite their record he felt the Lakers have played well as a unit in less than ten games this year. To repeat as champs, you need to generate hunger. To their advantage, the Lakes have not only the NBA's best player but the league's hungriest in Kobe. Even Artest is amazed by how much Kobe wants to win every night. But if this recent spell of poor play means anything it's that LA needs Artest. They need his shot, his hustle, his defense. Maybe, Trevor Ariza will end up having a better season stat-wise than Ron Ron, but Trevor can't guard guys like Carmelo or LBJ. It may be difficult to sum up just how much Artest means to this team. The past week has been a pretty good testament to his value, but ultimately it will be whether or not the Lakers are holding the trophy in June.
Tuesday, December 8, 2009
Donaghy
I was watching a replay of Game 6 of the 1991 Western Conference finals the other night, the game where Magic throws the ball away to try and drain the clock in the final seconds. Essentially, it was Magic’s last stand as Magic. Before HIV and the comebacks and the coaching. Sad, really when I think about it.
It was interesting though because late in the game, Portland’s Clyde Drexler is called for a couple of seriously cheap fouls. I had the sound down so I’m not sure, but I think Jake O’Donnell was one of the officials.
The history between O’Donnell and Drexler is well known. O’Donnell’s quick, two-tech hook of Clyde in a 1995 Western Conference final game pretty much cost him his job. He never worked another game. O’Donnell was also thought to hold a grudge with Buck Williams, one of Drexler’s teammates in both 1991 and 1995.
Many NBA fans assume referees have biases and hold grudges toward certain players. When I was younger, I would cringe when I heard Mike Mathis or Steve Fucking Javie (as my friends and I called him) was assigned a Laker playoff game. After New Jersey’s 1984 playoff series with Philadelphia, we referred to Jess Kersey, Kess Jersey because we felt he was favoring the Nets. Referee bias, whether it means superstars like Dwyane Wade getting all the calls or players like Allen Iverson getting none, has always been acknowledged as part of the game. Just ask the 1994 Chicago Bulls about Hue Hollins or Tim Duncan about Joey Crawford.
Over the past several days, former NBA ref Tim Donaghy has adamantly denied fixing games, saying he bet, for the most part, according to referee tendencies. The folks at TrueHoop and economist Joe Price have done a great job in debunking some of Donaghy’s claims (Price runs into the problem that which of three refs makes a call in a game is not quantifiable. Not even watching the game on tape can always reveal that.) But what exactly is the point in doing this? Is it to establish Donaghy as a liar? Is it to call into question whether or not he fixed games? Maybe, as Price postulates, Donaghy’s claim that betting on blowouts when Dick Bavetta is calling a game, does not make for a winning formula. Although to be clear, one can fix a game by not making calls as well. That's something I haven't heard anyone bring up, probably because it's nearly impossible to quantify non-calls.
But refuting Donaghy’s claims how he won money doesn’t erase the fact that he won. This has been established not just by Donaghy, but by his money source, James Battista. According to Battista and Donaghy, they won between 70-80 percent of the time. This, of course, is an incredible number for any professional gambler. And they weren’t the only ones. In a piece by ESPN’s Wayne Drehs, R.J. Bell, the president of Pregame.com, a sports betting info site, cited 10 straight games in 2007 that Donaghy refereed where the line moved by 1.5 points or more, a clear tipoff that a lot of money was being bet, and conceivably won.
The example of Donaghy is not necessarily proof that referee bias does exist, but the fact that he and Battista won money seems to prove the former did indeed fix games. Battista won't come out and say it. But he doesn't have to. When Battista states he won money only on the games Donaghy called and not as a result of Donaghy's theories on various refs, one can only draw one conclusion: The fix was in.
It was interesting though because late in the game, Portland’s Clyde Drexler is called for a couple of seriously cheap fouls. I had the sound down so I’m not sure, but I think Jake O’Donnell was one of the officials.
The history between O’Donnell and Drexler is well known. O’Donnell’s quick, two-tech hook of Clyde in a 1995 Western Conference final game pretty much cost him his job. He never worked another game. O’Donnell was also thought to hold a grudge with Buck Williams, one of Drexler’s teammates in both 1991 and 1995.
Many NBA fans assume referees have biases and hold grudges toward certain players. When I was younger, I would cringe when I heard Mike Mathis or Steve Fucking Javie (as my friends and I called him) was assigned a Laker playoff game. After New Jersey’s 1984 playoff series with Philadelphia, we referred to Jess Kersey, Kess Jersey because we felt he was favoring the Nets. Referee bias, whether it means superstars like Dwyane Wade getting all the calls or players like Allen Iverson getting none, has always been acknowledged as part of the game. Just ask the 1994 Chicago Bulls about Hue Hollins or Tim Duncan about Joey Crawford.
Over the past several days, former NBA ref Tim Donaghy has adamantly denied fixing games, saying he bet, for the most part, according to referee tendencies. The folks at TrueHoop and economist Joe Price have done a great job in debunking some of Donaghy’s claims (Price runs into the problem that which of three refs makes a call in a game is not quantifiable. Not even watching the game on tape can always reveal that.) But what exactly is the point in doing this? Is it to establish Donaghy as a liar? Is it to call into question whether or not he fixed games? Maybe, as Price postulates, Donaghy’s claim that betting on blowouts when Dick Bavetta is calling a game, does not make for a winning formula. Although to be clear, one can fix a game by not making calls as well. That's something I haven't heard anyone bring up, probably because it's nearly impossible to quantify non-calls.
But refuting Donaghy’s claims how he won money doesn’t erase the fact that he won. This has been established not just by Donaghy, but by his money source, James Battista. According to Battista and Donaghy, they won between 70-80 percent of the time. This, of course, is an incredible number for any professional gambler. And they weren’t the only ones. In a piece by ESPN’s Wayne Drehs, R.J. Bell, the president of Pregame.com, a sports betting info site, cited 10 straight games in 2007 that Donaghy refereed where the line moved by 1.5 points or more, a clear tipoff that a lot of money was being bet, and conceivably won.
The example of Donaghy is not necessarily proof that referee bias does exist, but the fact that he and Battista won money seems to prove the former did indeed fix games. Battista won't come out and say it. But he doesn't have to. When Battista states he won money only on the games Donaghy called and not as a result of Donaghy's theories on various refs, one can only draw one conclusion: The fix was in.
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