(The Spurs beat the Jazz – move on to the Finals. Bleh.)
We don’t care what he said on Dan Patrick’s show (or various other shows) about reconsidering or how many times he goes back and forth on this – now that he’s officially on the record as saying he wants out, Kobe Bryant has to be considered in any and all trade scenarios.
The exciting thing about this for all fans outside of Lakerdom is you have to consider your team in the mix.
Everyone from the Spurs to the Pistons to the Magic to the Hawks has to look in the mirror and wonder whether they could and/or should get Kobe Bryant for their franchise. That doesn’t happen too often.
Bill Simmons has laid out all the probable/possible trade scenarios over at ESPN, and they all stink, pretty much for both sides. (He makes PHX then trade for Kevin Garnett to get a workable team.)
Therefore, our conclusion is that this whole thing gets worked out so that Kobe stays, albeit with a trade or two to get Kobe composed.
Rumors have a deal for Jermaine O’Neal on the table, as well as a deal for Jason Kidd ready to go. (Obviously, these can’t both happen.)
The former may work out okay in terms of making the team more competitive, but the latter is awful, especially if they have to give up Lamar Odom.
Jason Kidd and Kobe Bryant is a phenomenal backcourt, but who the heck gets a rebound on that team? Doesn’t this just make the Lakers a little better version of the Nets, only minus Richard Jefferson, meaning they’re probably worse? And playing in the West?
We’re not sure how to wrap this up, or even if we should, because this is likely to go on all through June. Plus, Jerry Buss and the entire Laker organization apparently don’t have phones anymore, because on one of those interviews, Kobe said a good start to reconciliation would be a phone call from anyone at all.
UPDATE: Our read on Kobe all day was that he never took back the trade request anyway. It wasn’t that he wants to be traded, it’s that he needs to be. He can still say he doesn’t want to be traded without taking back the demand. The LA Times talked to him, and that seem to be the case.
(There were no jokes in this post.)
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dampier and shawn “the MANTIS” bradley for kobe… deal
The USA will be represented in the NBA Finals this year.
From Windhorst:
Cavs coach Mike Brown needs just one win to tie Lenny Wilkens for most career playoff wins. Brown is 17-10 in two seasons.
wow … and I don’t mean wow as in “that is impressive” I mean wow as in I would have guessed Lenny had more wins with the Cavs than that. Were the playoffs expanded at some point?
and to think The Cavalier… if the CLE Cavs came out and laid an egg this series, I was going to post my comparison list of how LeBron James is Richard Jefferson (they both can dunk, both have questionable mid-long range shooting ability, play limited defense, etc) only a little less gay… but since he’s single handedly beating my boys, I can’t, nor will I, talk trash about your boy Bron. Doesn’t mean I like his dunks and crouch n’ scowl move (Sheed would have gotten a T for that by the way, especially with Danny Crawford in there)…
When Wilkens was coaching the Cavs the first round was a best of five format. Also, the Cavs had the “Bad Boys” and MJ in their division. Mike Brown can’t hold Lenny’s jock
Thank you commentors for bringing it back to the Cavs-Lasers as opposed to Mamba.
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