Russ whooping it up with the reporters in the presser. When you’ve got his money and $40m+ coming next year I suppose it’s easier to take losing basketball games.Credit to russ every game just eating shit in the post game and having to wear it while ad and lebron are ducking in and out of the season.
I get the sentiment, but he's the 3rd highest paid player in the league this year (and next). He's the only one whose been consistently healthy and playing, but the Lakers still do better when he's on the bench. Eating shit in post game press conferences is the least that he can do.Credit to russ every game just eating shit in the post game and having to wear it while ad and lebron are ducking in and out of the season.
No kidding. Most outlets still seem him as borderline top 10, but even in games that he played this year (most of them with Lebron), the Lakers were just 17-23. It's a ridiculous joke that he made the NBA 75th anniversary team.Incredible to think ESPN had AD ranked as the #2 player in the league like 5 seconds ago. He looks like a dime store late-career LaMarcus Aldridge right now.
The Lakers have the second worst record in the league since the ASB, only ahead of Portland. It's incredible.As recently a couple weeks ago, if you had told me the Spurs and Pels would bounce the Lakers from the *play in* with three games left in the season, I would have said, no effin way. This has really been an epic collapse (assuming the Suns close this out...)
The top ten in the east all have winning records.Teams with bad losing records who don't deserve a spot that's why. It's getting like the NHL or how at times Hockey used to have bad teams make the playoffs and upset the No.1 seed. Makes the regular season mean little.
Thanks for that, made my morning!
This is lebron's team. It's not on him to eat every night while lebron's wore the whole "he's old and still putting up amazing numbers every night" train for like 6 months.I get the sentiment, but he's the 3rd highest paid player in the league this year (and next). He's the only one whose been consistently healthy and playing, but the Lakers still do better when he's on the bench. Eating shit in post game press conferences is the least that he can do.
Really reminiscent of the Nash-Kobe-Howard Lakers, even if fundamentally it's a different group of players with a different group of talents. At the end of the day, you put too many injured guys and guys on the downside of their career together and you're just not going to be able to be competitive, no matter how impressive their pedigrees are.The Lakers broadcast is talking about all of the injuries, but old players and always injured players get injured. The roster construction was crap and the pieces were never going to fit.
I really just don’t understand why those people can’t play the National Anthem the traditional way it was intended. Such a lovely song, no need to make it all ethnic like that.Best moment of their 2021-22 season: View: https://twitter.com/espnlosangeles/status/1510707218248699905?s=21&t=CGNS8mDUlNb5MlTToqe6GA
Uh...I really just don’t understand why those people can’t play the National Anthem the traditional way it was intended. Such a lovely song, no need to make it all ethnic like that.
Regardless of whether you posted this twice, I fully support efforts to legitimatize it.Regardless of whether the mickey mouse title was legitimate, I fully support all efforts to de-legitimatize it.
Indeed. It was well done (the post and the rendition of the song)Pretty sure that one was a tsunami of sarcasm.
Everyone will remember. It's like the St. Louis Browns' pennant during The War Years.The thing about the bubble was that a few of the better teams (most notably the Clippers) basically didn't want to be there and gave up during the playoffs. The Lakers did win a title under difficult circumstances in a lot of ways, but at the same time it was also undoubtedly easier in a lot of ways. They won a title after they had a couple of months to get healthy and did it entirely on neutral courts. The fact that it was the only season with LeBron that they were ever any good makes it stand out even more.
In retrospect, having a big softie like KAT show you up like that on the court with no repercussions whatsoever was probably the official time of death for this team according to the medical examiner.That KAT face gets me every time.
…for the Pelicans. They don’t own the pickThese bastards are winning the lottery arent they
It’s like they’ve erased the 2004-05 season from their memories.I did enjoy some Laker fan calling a radio show today to say this proves that Kobe was better than LeBron.
I mean, Kobe obviously wasn’t better than LeBron, but I sort of enjoy the fact that LeBron has chosen and decided to live in the one city on the planet where lots of fans don’t think he’s a top three player of all-time; a lot of them would probably put him about eighth.
These bastards don’t have their pick this year no matter where it falls, so that would be great for the Pelicans.These bastards are winning the lottery arent they
NO is 12-8 since the ASB, and theoretically Zion is coming back next year. Zion/Ingram/McCollum isn't a top 3 I'd want (theoretically you want at least one of your top guys to be an average defender), but all that and adding a top lottery pick is mildly interesting, and their expectations should be the highest they've been since at least 2018 when they had Boogie and AD, and actually won a playoff series.It’s like they’ve erased the 2004-05 season from their memories.
These bastards don’t have their pick this year no matter where it falls, so that would be great for the Pelicans.
I think this is exactly right. Lebron the GM has put the team in a terrible hole as far as age, injuries and lack of depth, and Lebron the player cannot overcome it. Have to question whether or not he (and more likely AD) can ever win another title without some long breaks during the season (certainly didnt work this year).I think that is a legit title, but also one can ask (in assessing the Lebron era) whether it was fluky given schedule.
Many people raised the question of Laker depth and health as the biggest risk of a Lebron-AD combo given Lebron's age and AD's fragility. The only time the Lakers managed through that was the unique, unforeseeable bubble dynamics where guys got a long time off to rest/heal, then played a relatively short mini-season in the bubble for the title. It counts---all teams had the same benefits from that---but the Laker team profile, including as well Rondo, uniquely benefitted from the structure. That wasn't part of the roster construction theory, it was just blind 'luck' from a Laker season perspective.
Forced to play anything close to a full season, the laker health/depth problems have been precisely what many predicted they would be at the start.
“Steph Curry. Steph Curry’s the one that I want to play with, for sure, in today’s game,” James said.
Too soonIf we're modeling this after YED, then I wonder which Laker will take an ill-fated helicopter ride this off-season
Not quite. It's a pick swap in 2023 and an unprotected first in 2024 that the Pelicans can roll over to 2025 if they want to.Not only do they not own their draft pick for this coming draft, the Pelicans also own the Lakers' first round pick unprotected in 2024, as well as unprotected pick swaps in 2023 and 2025. They aren't drafting in the lottery any time soon unless the Pelicans also suck in one of the swap years.
Can we get an MS Paint of Big Baby throwing an errant pass bringing down Kobe’s copter?If we're modeling this after YED, then I wonder which Laker will take an ill-fated helicopter ride this off-season
Covid is Kobe's fault. The only chance we had to get in front of it was wasted elevating him into the GOAT conversation.If we're modeling this after YED, then I wonder which Laker will take an ill-fated helicopter ride this off-season
You might even say that Russ LED the way.The Russ trade absolutely killed them.
Ah, thanks. I was looking at an older article that had wrong info. I found a newer article that backs up what you said.Not quite. It's a pick swap in 2023 and an unprotected first in 2024 that the Pelicans can roll over to 2025 if they want to.
John Kiley on organ will always be the best.I really just don’t understand why those people can’t play the National Anthem the traditional way it was intended. Such a lovely song, no need to make it all ethnic like that.