Henry Abbot: Lakers FO can't wait for Kobe to retire

[Frosty]

Kobe is the one that generates Lakers most of jersey sales and is the face of the franchise. Even not playing he makes more money for his team than 95% of league players.

How much of those jersey sales do the Lakers get? You might want to look into it.

[Yoshun]

Easily could have been 5 or 6 though........

lol

So tell me a better inside/outside game than Kobe and Shaq in the early 2000's ???

There wasn't one, but that doesn't mean they would have won 5 or 6 more titles. Especially because Shaq started declining just a few seasons later. Which, btw, is the real reason why the Lakers chose Kobe over Shaq. Shaq was coming out of his prime, Kobe was jist entering his.

[JesusHCoxMd]

Kobe is the one that generates Lakers most of jersey sales and is the face of the franchise. Even not playing he makes more money for his team than 95% of league players.

How much of those jersey sales do the Lakers get? You might want to look into it.

Ok, maybe not the jerseys, but you can't deny the fact that he has played a major part in Lakers TV contracts and merch sales. He has the same, if not bigger effect than LeBron, which was apparent when he left Cleveland. It was estimated that he brought a few hundred million dollars per year. I'm sure Kobe brings quite a dollar to LA, but there's also the Clippers now.

[Rosque]

Easily could have been 5 or 6 though........

lol

So tell me a better inside/outside game than Kobe and Shaq in the early 2000's ???

Shaq ran himself out of town. Wanted big ass extension, was on the decline and Lakers refused that and chose Kobe. Kobe's not the one to blame for Shaq leaving. Even with Heat, Shaq was second fiddle to young Wade.

[LLcoleJ]

Easily could have been 5 or 6 though........

lol

So tell me a better inside/outside game than Kobe and Shaq in the early 2000's ???

Well, there wasn't' one. Unfortunately, more money is needed and age catches up to some.

After the Lakers won 3 straight they struggled that 4th year. Finishing 5th in the West and getting bounced in the 2nd round. Then they retooled with Payton and Malone and lost to the Pistons. This is when Kobe chucking and Ben Wallace was playing Shaq straight up.

Now after that ass kickign by the Pistons, Shaq then went on to demand a trade as he wanted his 25 million a year contract extension. Had they resigned him they would have had Kobe, Shaq on the books with Luke Walton and Brian Cook with no way to add more talent outside of the MLE.

Interestingly enough the stats show that since that last finals appearance against the Pistons, Shaq'a playoff numbers and dominance were never the same. He did go on to win a title in MIA with Dwade as the captain, while Kobe went on to win 2 more rings.

I really don't see how they could have " easily won 5 or 6' after 2003, but I would sat that both Shaq and Kobe and Lakers fans are fairly happy with the outcomes, all things considered. Rings and Money for all...

[primecougar]

Didn't Kobe put up 27-6-6 46% in his last healthy season? He was dunking over young guys like josh smith/hump/Thompson. That year Kobe was a top 3 player.

It's funny all this talk about him not deferring or being hard to play with when the evidence is always against it.

With mike brown, everyone said he won't run the Princeton offense, yet he did and the team was terrible
When they got Nash/dantoni, the Narative was kobe won't buy into the system but he did and the team was 9-15 then the put the ball in Nashs hand.... Once again it failed.
They wanted to play his system and they went to have one of the best records in the second half of the season.
They ran the man to the ground.

Who are these stars that could've went to the lakers? Lbj no chance in hell, melo wanted money, love was traded.

The only player that left that you can attrtube to Kobe is probably Dwight. That's not even 100% because when he left the team was terrible and Kobe was out for the year.

I just want someone to tell me one player that the lakers could've signed but they couldn't because of Kobe or a player kobe should've deferred to and passed the torch on to. The lakers suck.

The man has put up with mike brown, dantoni, played different systems, chased around other guards etc and didn't even complain once. He has backed up every coach and protected all his teammates from the media.

[skywalker33]

lol

So tell me a better inside/outside game than Kobe and Shaq in the early 2000's ???

There wasn't one, but that doesn't mean they would have won 5 or 6 more titles. Especially because Shaq started declining just a few seasons later. Which, btw, is the real reason why the Lakers chose Kobe over Shaq. Shaq was coming out of his prime, Kobe was jist entering his.

The Lakers dropped from a 56 win season to a 34 win season the year Shaq left, who went on to win the NBA title with MIA the following year. The Lakers were out of the playoffs that year and were the 7th seed the following year, so two lost chances. Nobody outside of SA, DAL and possibly the Suns realistically had a chance to take the West IMO, and none of those had as strong of an inside game as LAL would have had with Shaq in there.

[Louie_Ruckuz]

All this Kobe bashing is kind of disgusting and entertaining at the same time. Now that Kobe is older, the media is bashing him more and more when in reality the front office offered Kobe the extension. Kobe earned his contract, after all the scrutiny he got for Shaq leaving or as the media puts it, "forced Shaq out", and also that whole rape case, he went on to tally up 5 rings and 7 final appearances, homeboy paid his dues.

The funniest thing of it all is that they say Kobe gets all the credit when they win but doesn't get any flack when they lose. WRONG!!! Shaq till this day get the credit for the first 3 rings but any unbiased person knows that Kobe deserves as much as credit as Shaq does.

[LLcoleJ]

The Lakers dropped from a 56 win season to a 34 win season the year Shaq left, who went on to win the NBA title with MIA the following year. The Lakers were out of the playoffs that year and were the 7th seed the following year, so two lost chances. Nobody outside of SA, DAL and possibly the Suns realistically had a chance to take the West IMO, and none of those had as strong of an inside game as LAL would have had with Shaq in there.

Not true. Actually they lost to the same Pistons the following year. Then in 2006 after a tougher start and Shaq missing 20 games with an injury is when they called up Riley and Stan Stepped down.

[Yoshun]

So tell me a better inside/outside game than Kobe and Shaq in the early 2000's ???

There wasn't one, but that doesn't mean they would have won 5 or 6 more titles. Especially because Shaq started declining just a few seasons later. Which, btw, is the real reason why the Lakers chose Kobe over Shaq. Shaq was coming out of his prime, Kobe was jist entering his.

The Lakers dropped from a 56 win season to a 34 win season the year Shaq left, who went on to win the NBA title with MIA the following year. The Lakers were out of the playoffs that year and were the 7th seed the following year, so two lost chances. Nobody outside of SA, DAL and possibly the Suns realistically had a chance to take the West IMO, and none of those had as strong of an inside game as LAL would have had with Shaq in there.

See John Black's post as to why this is incorrect. In addition, I was wrong with when Shaq started declining. In my initial post I said he started his decline a few seasons later. Statistically, he actually started his decline when he was still with the Lakers. Shaq basically gave them a choice, "Kobe or me." They chose the younger guy.

[aIvin adams]

i **** despise the Lakers and my schadenfreude over their sixth pick going to the Suns in the 2015 draft will give me more pleasure than i could possibly imagine short of the next Suns championship (one for the thumb! then we will put our next four on the fingers).

but damn i love Kobe. i have ever since 2006 game four of the suns-lakers series. Kobe is sui generis

haters gonna hate tho.

Spoiler:

[Perkele]

Kobe Bryant is the only reason the Lakers will be relevant and profitable this season, bottom line. Any article that fails to mention this fact is either negligent or willfully ignorant of the facts.

I guess, theoretically, Kobe could hold the team back from a personnel standpoint, if circumstances were different. He does clearly want to be the alpha male, and he is pretty clearly either declining or will be at that point very soon. Ideally it would be best for Kobe to take a backseat and let young talent carry the banner forward...except they don't have any. Moreover, none was available this year in free agency. So it's sort of pointless to say "Kobe can't be moved, he's not good for the team" when no "good" option has been passed up in his favor.

What move, realistically, did LA pass up to keep Kobe Bryant? Did the Lakers really want to outbid Dallas/Houston for Parsons? Or offer Bosh/Hayward the max? If they did, nothing was stopping them. Lebron wasn't signing there, and Love was clearly approached about going to Cleveland, so that's a big negative on both those possibilities. Melo considered LA, but there's no reason to think he passed it up because of Kobe. It's not like his Knicks teammates are any better, and by all accounts Melo and Kobe get along pretty well. Melo chose Phil, a bigger contract and New York City, Kobe had zero impact on that decision.

Kobe has made a lot of enemies through the years, obviously, and he's an easy guy to hate. Now he's weakened, aged, and likely never to be even close to what he once was as a player. If you want to throw hate at Kobe Bryant by all means analyze his play, surely there will be a lot to dissect and criticize there. But don't act like Kobe is the primary reason the 2014-2015 Lakers are going to be a bad team, or somehow preventing them from adding talent, because that is simply untrue.

While I often agree to your comments, on the first paragraph there is one slight disagreement The Lakers will be for sure profitable with him, but they won't be relevant with or without Kobe as in my understanding being relevant means to make the playoffs or at least fight for the spots. And that won't happen this season. I do of course agree though that Lakers would be much worse without him.

[Shaqsquatch]

Karma for his constant attempts at usurping his former team captain Shaq. Now the would be king is older and the enemies are coming out of the wood work.
If he didn't respect the MDE in his prime- wouldn't listen to the goat coach ( Jackson labeled him uncoachable) wouldn't take advice from GM West - lesser guys wonder how Kobe will treat them. As another poster stated earlier, Kobe wants to win- as long as it's through him. Most star players don't want to put up with that.

[TrueStoryGSW]

Why this isn't locked yet?

[skywalker33]

The Lakers dropped from a 56 win season to a 34 win season the year Shaq left, who went on to win the NBA title with MIA the following year. The Lakers were out of the playoffs that year and were the 7th seed the following year, so two lost chances. Nobody outside of SA, DAL and possibly the Suns realistically had a chance to take the West IMO, and none of those had as strong of an inside game as LAL would have had with Shaq in there.

Not true. Actually they lost to the same Pistons the following year. Then in 2006 after a tougher start and Shaq missing 20 games with an injury is when they called up Riley and Stan Stepped down.

I stand corrected, I was one year off. However, I am not incorrect about what the loss of O'Neil meant to the Lakers. True, finances were a big part, but so was Kobe. He wasn't leaving the decision to the Lakers FO, it was put to them as either he's gone or I am. And I still maintain they were the biggest duo in the West at the time and could have easily won two-3 more titles there.

Personally, I LOVE Kobe's ego, it IS crippling the Lakers, they won't see they playoffs until he retires, and maybe even a bit lokger than that.

[Zeitgeister]

To be realistic, Kobe has a cripple on the team.

Is that Bill Nye the Science Guy?

[Slava]

The Lakers dropped from a 56 win season to a 34 win season the year Shaq left, who went on to win the NBA title with MIA the following year. The Lakers were out of the playoffs that year and were the 7th seed the following year, so two lost chances. Nobody outside of SA, DAL and possibly the Suns realistically had a chance to take the West IMO, and none of those had as strong of an inside game as LAL would have had with Shaq in there.

Not true. Actually they lost to the same Pistons the following year. Then in 2006 after a tougher start and Shaq missing 20 games with an injury is when they called up Riley and Stan Stepped down.

I stand corrected, I was one year off. However, I am not incorrect about what the loss of O'Neil meant to the Lakers. True, finances were a big part, but so was Kobe. He wasn't leaving the decision to the Lakers FO, it was put to them as either he's gone or I am. And I still maintain they were the biggest duo in the West at the time and could have easily won two-3 more titles there.

Personally, I LOVE Kobe's ego, it IS crippling the Lakers, they won't see they playoffs until he retires, and maybe even a bit lokger than that.

I know in the long run this won't matter much but Lakers were already having issues putting together supporting cast around Shaq/Kobe since 2003. They lost to the Spurs before they even made the finals again and in the finals the injury to Malone made them so thin that they had to play Stanislav Medvdenko for significant minutes in a playoff game against prime Rasheed Wallace.

Shaq demanded $30 mil/season and Kobe was making like $12 mil around that time and was due for a new contract. The team would have gotten worse paying Shaq to rehab on company time and having Kobe drag terrible rosters to the playoffs before Shaq would show up. Even Miami got one prime season of Shaq and another passable one, that might help you stay afloat in the East but you'd be looking at 5th - 7th seed in the West.

[Slava]

Karma for his constant attempts at usurping his former team captain Shaq. Now the would be king is older and the enemies are coming out of the wood work.
If he didn't respect the MDE in his prime- wouldn't listen to the goat coach ( Jackson labeled him uncoachable) wouldn't take advice from GM West - lesser guys wonder how Kobe will treat them. As another poster stated earlier, Kobe wants to win- as long as it's through him. Most star players don't want to put up with that.

Go back to 2006.

[LLcoleJ]

I stand corrected, I was one year off. However, I am not incorrect about what the loss of O'Neil meant to the Lakers. True, finances were a big part, but so was Kobe. He wasn't leaving the decision to the Lakers FO, it was put to them as either he's gone or I am. And I still maintain they were the biggest duo in the West at the time and could have easily won two-3 more titles there.

Personally, I LOVE Kobe's ego, it IS crippling the Lakers, they won't see they playoffs until he retires, and maybe even a bit lokger than that.

2 Things :

1) 1 a day after the Lakers lost to the Pistons in the finals Shaq was on TV asking to be traded. ( There was also the preseason live rant pointed toward Dr Buss saying.. " are you going to pay me Mother F'er?" ) and the surgery on Toe, we will call that : Toe-gate).

2) Shaq's stat's declined steadily in the year going into the his last with the Lakers and for the remainder of his career.


So how would they be better had Shaq stayed? The previous 2 years were a failure and that was with FA help and moving forward with Shaq/Kobe and Walton and Cook ... how would they get better? and or get back to their dominance 3 years earlier?

[Sixteen]

To be realistic, Kobe has a cripple on the team.

Is that Bill Nye the Science Guy?