the irony of this past season

[Anklebreaker702]

Hind sight is always 20/20. Farmer really didn't do anything truthfully. No defense & in last years Finals he had 1 stupid turnover in every game of the 1st 5 that either let Boston back in it or help them seal the deal.

Sasha was missed. I was one of the few guys that didn't want to see Sasha traded. Tenacious "D" but usually couldn't find his shot. We thought Blake would at least give us consistent outside shooting but it wasn't to be.

Barnes was a great pick up. His injury is all that slowed him. As far as Walton. He should have had some playing time simply because the offense at times got way to stagnant & 1 on 1 oriented. His ability to pass & especially feed the post would have made a difference but how much seeing as how his shot is never there & his defense is awful.

Blowing up the team is not the answer IMO I just think we need to get an above average PG. Another "hog" off the bench & switch Drew & Pau's roles. Maybe not even permanently, it may differ on a nightly basis. Pau is not not tough enough to endure on the court & apparently neither with off the court situations. To me those are signs that change is needed as far as responsibility goes.

[RiotSweetie]

Didn't read all of it, but Sasha and Farmar weren't stopping the penetration either.

It wasn't even about stopping penetration. Our guys seemed dead out there for the first half of the season and the entire playoffs, with the exception of Game 3 @ NOH. At least Sasha and Jordan provided an energy that Brown and Blake have lacked all year.

[snaquille oatmeal]

Didn't read all of it, but Sasha and Farmar weren't stopping the penetration either.

It wasn't even about stopping penetration. Our guys seemed dead out there for the first half of the season and the entire playoffs, with the exception of Game 3 @ NOH. At least Sasha and Jordan provided an energy that Brown and Blake have lacked all year.

shooting bricks, bad hyperactive defense, and bad decisions is not the kind of energy we needed.

[hermes]

i'm sure we missed Sasha

i know i did

[LApwnd]

aww hindsight indeed, I guess alot these "I Miss Sasha" types forgot about those fouls @ mid court or the blowby because he always played his man tight or the endless bricks even though most of his shots were wide open.

[hermes]

aww hindsight indeed, I guess alot these "I Miss Sasha" types forgot about those fouls @ mid court or the blowby because he always played his man tight or the endless bricks even though most of his shots were wide open.

yep those were the days

[barrettcg]

I was really glad when we simply got rid of Sasha. He couldn't play on the ball defense without fouling he was a really streaky shooter that didn't care if he was on or off he was going to get his. He was one dimensional on offense, and the list goes on and on. ( why couldn't we have found a team to just dump luke on? That would have been perfect)

This past season to me of course boiled down to the fact that the couple of people who could have pushed this team to play harder never did. Kobe wasn't out there in practice forcing the rest of the team to get better ( not really his fault because he was playing through injuries the entire season ). Fish played well every now and again but when you NEVER stay in front of your man that you are suppose to be guarding it makes the entire defense go into scramble mode. Lamar had to have been at least a little distracted with camera's in his face so much because of his wife and there show. Finally Ph11L the entire season never seemed to care about the ups and downs and simply allowed the team to use the excuse that "when you win two championships in a row, getting up for a regular season game is sometimes hard"

Hopefully next year the Sophmores on the team will get some burn and actually see some court time. Gasol's minutes will be a lot less, kobe can recover from his injuries, and fisher will come out and retire due to being hired as one of the teams special assistant coaches.

[ShowtimeFan]

Coming off the Championship against Boston, I felt pretty good about the additions of Barnes and Blake.

But somewhere along the way, the Lakers really lost their HUNGER for a Championship! You can see that hunger in the (4) Teams remaining in the playoffs...

Hopefully it can be reignited next year without too many player changes, although bringing Adelman in will be a step in the right direction as well.

There are a lot of players and possible trades out there, I trust Mitch to do his best to get the Lakers back to where they need to be, the rest will be on the players themselves...

[Kilroy]

I agree with those saying there were chemistry issues with this team that led to the poor showing down the stretch... I think Phil alluded to that too...

But I have a strong feeling that the issue was with the core of Kobe, Pau, LO and Bynum... I don't think any number of Arizas would have fixed an issue there... Maybe it could have masked the problem a little longer, but I think the core was fractured in some way... No evidence just a feeling based on how bad they withered and how they acted during and after.

I think your chemistry is only as strong as your core, and if there's a problem there, it pretty much takes them working it out or a trade to fix it... I don't think glue-guys can help that much.

Judging from Kobe's demeanor this post season, I think he knew something was off as well... He was sullen, humorless and purposeful the last 3 post seasons... This season he just didn't seem that focused. I have a hard time blaming it on him, so I think maybe he saw something that sort of took him out of it a bit too... I think he still expected to win, but maybe not as much as past seasons.