Karl Malone invites Kobe out back for a whoopin

[Kilroy]

Do you guys believe the Lakers would have won the title if Karl didn't get injured that year?

I don't know... I still can't believe they lost to the Pistons, and I don't think that had anything to do with one single injury/player.
That team was flawed. They tried too hard to make the 'super team' work and forgot about how to play good team basketball...

Everybody thought they'd won the championship already... Shaq, Malone, Payton, and to a lesser extent, Grant, Russel and Fox, all came in with little or no focus. Shaq and Malone were really out of shape, Payton took a while to get going too... And outside of Kobe, the rest of the team were super young and not that talented. We had no depth at all that year.

Add to that the fact that Bringing in Malone and Payton was like pouring nitro-glycerine on the already smouldering feud between Shaq and Kobe... Which, might I add, I believe is exactly what Phil wanted. I think they all wanted to humble Kobe, but instead they showed how little commitment Shaq had for the Lakers at that point. It was the spark that was going to either weld them all together, or blow it the hell up, but in retrospect, I don't know how they could have thought it was going to work out.

I was disappointed when we got Payton and Malone, to be honest. And up to that point, I was a HUGE Karl Malone fan... It just felt like a cop-out to me. Like we tried to take a short cut instead of doing everything we could to shore-up the team for the future. Kobe and Shaq were the most dominant 1-2 punch anyone had seen in the NBA for many years... Why take the focus off that, and turn it into a side show?

Bull.

You're over analyzing.

Malone and Payton are ball-players.

They were at the end of their ropes and simply wanted to win.

They would've definitely won if they had Malone or a decent backup. Like I said before, there was NO WAY IN HELL, they were going to beat the Pistons with Slava Medvedenko getting significant minutes against that Wallace frontline.

You're out your mind.

Did you even read my most?

[Slava]

It wasn't just Horry but we did not have proper replacements for Fox either, Luke Walton & Kareem Rush showed up out of nowhere for a game vs Minnesota but they weren't ready, playing Payton compromised a bit on spacing but that team still looked very good, may be even dominant for stretches until the finals.

You're right, but we lost not becuase we were exposed on the wing. The Lakers lost because Slava was abused in much the same way that Vujacic and Walton were abused by Pierce and Ray Allen many years later.

To put it simply, there was a chasm behind your 40-year old PF, and even though Karl had been an ironman up til that point, it was a remarkable strategic error to not resign Horry, who I believe was signed by the Spurs on the cheap (Fisher was overpaid by the Warriors).

I think Horry was pretty burnt out by the whole Kobe-Shaq power struggle by that time and wanted no part of it. I remember reading that it took a mid-season meeting orchestrated by Malone himself to actually make the situation tolerable between them.

[ALL HAIL]

Did you even read my most?

I did.

You intimidated that you had doubts they would've beat the Pistons with Malone and you thought it wasn't a "real" team--more of a patchwork conglomeration of stars.

I think you're wrong and I think you're over-analyzing the question.

I agree with Slav, when healthy, that team was dominant.

[Kilroy]

No, I didn't say it wasn't a real team, I said I didn't think they lost because Malone went down. And I disagree that they were a dominant team by Shaq+Kobe standards. I think the previous 3 teams were more dominant.

They imploded against the Pistons... There was no urgency and nobody was doing the little things they needed to to win. Shaq came up incredibly small in that series.

And I specifically mentioned our depth being a problem in my post.

[kblo247]

LA only lost. 5 of Karl's first 25 games before Williams fell on him

* yeah I ain't trusting the same doctors who forgot a screw in fishers foot, misdiagnosed Steve Blake and was letting him play with an injury that needed surgery, completely missed out on the fact Kobe had a fractured knee and let him go thru practice last year until he complained about more pain that just a hyper extension, or had Nash listed as day to day and set to return in a week or two and didn't discover nerve damage. Fact is LA and their doctors aren't exactly top notch at everything. Kobe ended up in Colorado because he didn't trust the **** to evaluate his knee and shoulder back then

Karl was essentially 15 and 8.5 with fisher and Payton averaging double digits and. Kobe and Shaq eating before injury while we won at ridiculous clip of 80%


When he returned from injury we won 14 of our last 18 to get the 2 seed. **** out of here to any bull ahit that ignores he helped this team win games, much the less that he was out of shape when he was in better shape than any player aside from Kobe and Fish that year. We ended the season with Karl winning at a 78% clip for **** sake

Karl's first round was 18 & 10 where he defended Yao when Shaq couldn't. He was the oldest player to score 30 and go for a 2x2 in the playoffs. He averaged 10 and 8 and played Tim straight up. 12 and 9 for a series vs the MVP KG, and he outright topped KG across the board in game 1 to set a tone. Again we won the west at a 75% clip in the playoffs with healthy Karl.

Where we **** up was not bringing Horry back. Also not retaining Shaw over bringing Russell in since Phil never used him

But 80%, 78%, and 75% winning clips with Karl speak for them fn selves

[Kilroy]

Malone only played 42 games that season and we were 8/10 before he came back and we "went 14/18"...

Saying Malone was in better shape than Shaq to start that season is like saying he's in better shape than Shaq now... Not sure there were too many players in worse shape than Shaq to start that season.

He played KG and Duncan, but KG and Duncan hand to help on Shaq... He had to defend Yao because Yao decided to step out and hit jumpers to negate Shaq's advantage inside... Yao always shot over Shaq. Even so, you're overstating the Yao/Malone matchup.

When you're options are Option A or Slava, of course Option A is going to be important.

Not sure you even know who the "LA Docs are" but most of what you state as fact is completely false, so not worth arguing... It's not Viti though... He's the trainer.

[PKABOOICU]

kaa malou'ne

[No Jumper]

Karl Malone Just go away...........

[MelosSoreWrist]

Mr. Malone did produce some hot daughters though.

eh.



bleh