Dwyane Wade may have tricked LeBron James and Chris Bosh into joining him with the Miami Heat, but even if he is on a team with three superstars he still knows the Los Angeles Lakers are clearly the team to beat.
“The Lakers are the champions and we know the Lakers are very good,” Wade said. “That’s the team that everyone’s shooting for and they should be. Not the Miami Heat. The Los Angeles Lakers.”
As the old saying goes, to be the man you have to beat the mean. Miami may look loaded now, but nobody knows if these guys will actually be able to produce together on the basketball court. Have some patience before crowning them as the best team the NBA has ever seen.
The Zen Master, Phil Jackson, has decided to return as the coach of Kobe Bryant and the Los Angeles Lakers for one final season in hoped of winning his fourth three-peat.
“Count me in,” Jackson said in a statement. “After a couple weeks of deliberation, it is time to get back to the challenge of putting together a team that can defend its title in the 2010-11 season. It’ll be the last stand for me, and I hope a grand one.”
As talented as the Lakers roster is, they wouldn’t be able to win another championship without Phil Jackson running the show and calling all of the shots.
“We’re extremely pleased that Phil has decided to return,” Lakers general manager Mitch Kupchak said. “With this most recent championship, we’ve now won five titles in the 10 years he’s been our head coach and have been to the Finals in seven of those 10 years, which is amazing. He’s not only the best coach for this team, but quite simply the best coach in the history of the NBA.”
Kobe Bryant should be the happiest guy in Los Angeles today!
The Zen Master Phil Jackson laid a bombshell on the Los Angeles Lakers on Wednesday when he announced that he was leaning towards retirement but wants to have a few more tests done by doctors.
“I’m leaning towards retiring but I have not made up my mind,” Jackson said. “I’ll take a week after the medical tests are done. Some of it’s about health, some of it’s about that’s the way I feel right now. I’ve had vacillating feelings about it. It’s hard not to feel like coming back when you’re speaking to these players and have an opportunity to coach a team that’s this good. But, it’s what I feel like right now and what I feel like in the process that’s gone through. It’s just something I’m going to sit with and feel out and after I’m through talking about all the rest of it with the doctors, then I’ll make the final decision.”
To me, that sounds like a guy that has already made his mind up. He’s not coming back next season. And why should he? He has accomplished more than any other NBA coach ever will and the Lakers are an old team. Sure they’re probably good enough to make at least one more title run, but there are no guarantees.
One thing is certain, without Phil Jackson, the Lakers will not win another Championship next season.
The Boston Celtics led for most of Thursday’s epic game 7, but when it came down to the closing minutes, they choked away their chance at a title and let the Los Angeles Lakers make a comeback to win, 83-79.
“We were scratching and clawing, trying to do everything we could to try to pull this out,” Ray Allen said. “We had an opportunity to win, but it just didn’t go our way down the stretch. I don’t think we ran out of steam. Lady Luck just didn’t bounce in our corner. … There were a lot of tears, a lot of tears.”
Technically the game wasn’t pretty to watch. Offensively both teams played like crap, but bother teams were beat up physically at the end. Including Lakers coach Phil Jackson who was immediately asked about his future.
“I’ve got to take a deep breath. I’ve got to take some time to think about this,” Jackson said. “This was great. I’ll wait to make that decision in a week.”
As for that rapist Kobe Bryant, he was pretty happy to win another title.
“This one is by far the sweetest, because it’s them,” Bryant said. “This was the hardest one by far. I wanted it so bad, and sometimes when you want it so bad, it slips away from you. My guys picked me up.”
Congratulations Los Angeles! You definitely didn’t deserve to win with the way you played, but at the end of the day the scoreboard doesn’t lie.
The odds of the Boston Celtics taking game 7 against the Lakers in Los Angeles were low to begin with, but now they barely have a chance at all when they learned center Kendrick Perkins will have to sit out after suffering two torn ligaments in his right knee.
“Physically, I’m in pain,” Perkins said. “I hurt my knee pretty badly. I’m out for tomorrow. There’s nothing I could do about it. It’s a torn MCL and torn PCL, so I gotta watch from the sideline.”
Coach Doc Rivers tried to remain confident for the sake of his team, but he’s not fooling me.
“Listen, we’re going to do whatever it takes to win,” Rivers said. “Scalabrine can spread the floor for us. He can do things for us. There’s a lot of options for us. They may not look like there’s a lot, but there’s more than you’d think in some of the rotations or lineups that we can create, that we may have to create. We’re going to work on some of those today.”
If the Celtics somehow pull off the upset and win game 7, I will believe anything is possible. There’s no way Boston leaves Los Angeles on Thursday night as NBA Champs.
The Boston Celtics may be on the verge of beating the Los Angeles Lakers yet again in the NBA finals after they held on to win game 5 and take a 3-2 series lead.
“It was our biggest game of the year,” Paul Pierce said. “We’re in a good spot. We have two games in L.A.; now we have to get one.”
The Celtics completely shut down the Lakers for most of the game, but at the end of the fourth quarter they allowed the Los Angeles to get back in the game and make some Boston fans nervous. But they were able to hold on and win, 92-86.
Game Six in on Tuesday and Doc Rivers knows Kobe Bryant will be determined to win.
“He’s the best shot-maker in the game. There’s probably better athletes and all that, but there’s no better shot-maker than Kobe Bryant,” Rivers said. “You’ve just got to live with it and play through it.”
Sorry Kobe, but you’re not good enough to carry your entire team. If you don’t get some help on Tuesday night, you have no chance at winning.
The Boston Celtics have managed to tie their series with the Los Angeles Lakers after a great performance by Big Baby who helped them win on Thursday night, 96-89.
After the game, Big Baby said it was his willpower that made the difference, and then he compared himself to legends.
Just will, that’s all it is,” he said. “This is what legends are made of, this is where you grasp the moment. … Just play in the moment.”
You did good, but don’t get carried away Big Baby! Don’t ever compare yourself to the legends of basketball. You’re no where near being great, but you did come through big for your team tonight. Keep doing that and maybe the Celtics have a chance at winning it all.
Derek Fisher led the Los Angles Lakers to a 91-84 over the Boston Celtics in game three of the NBA Finals, taking a 2-1 lead in the series.
“Derek Fisher was the difference in the game,” Celtics Coach Doc Rivers said. “He’s just a gutty, gritty player and he gutted the game out for them. I thought Kobe was struggling a little bit, and Fisher — he basically took the game over. … I don’t know what he had in the fourth quarter … but most of them were down the stretch.”
Way too many people forget about how great of a clutch player Derek Fisher has been throughout the years. He always steps up in the big games and usually becomes a difference maker. Game three was no different.
“I think as you grow in this game and you put in the work that’s required to still be around 14 years later, you start to recognize that being in this moment, on this stage, it’s not a given. It’s not something that happens every season,” Fisher said. “Five or 10 years from now, when I’m long gone, I would have hated to feel like I didn’t just do everything I could have to help my team. Things have worked out well, and we have two more wins to get to really put a nice cap on it.”
Derek Fisher may be one of the most underrated players in NBA history. He’s a stud come playoff time.
The Boston Celtics proved their critics wrong on Sunday night, went into the Staples Center and beat up the Los Angeles Lakers in their own house.
“There’s no better place, moment, time … to win a game, and to win in a great fashion,” Ray Allen said. “I don’t know what record it is that people are telling me that I got, but it’s great to have, great to be able to look back on it and say I did that. This is definitely our time.”
Somehow Ray Allen must have found the fountain of youth before this game. He looked 10 years younger while putting up 32-points and leading his team to a 103-94 win. Rajon Rondo also played a huge part in the victory with 12 rebounds and 10 assists.
“He just did a lot of things — the blocked shots, the steals,” Boston coach Doc Rivers said. “He’s our quarterback, and he does a lot of stuff for us. He was special tonight.”
Let the series begin!!!
If game one of the NBA Finals was any indication, this is going to be a very short series. The Lakers made the Celtics look old, washed-up and completely overmatched, winning convincingly by a score of, 102-89.
“They were the more physical team by far,” Celtics coach Doc Rivers said. “They were more aggressive. They attacked us the entire night. I didn’t think we handled it very well.”
The most alarming thing about the Celtics play in game one was their determination. The Lakers looked and played like they wanted it way more than the Boston players.
“You can’t ease into the game, especially in the finals,” Paul Pierce said. “That’s one of the better rebounding teams in the NBA. We’ve just got to do a better job rebounding the ball, eliminating easy opportunities. When I look up and we’ve given up 100 points, I haven’t seen that in a while.”
Game two will be on Sunday night and if the Celtics don’t bring their A-game, they might as wel forfeit on the spot.
