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Kobe was subtly declining already and Bynum/Dwight still would have fallen off, they'd have made whoever won the championship look slightly better. If there's some chance we see peak Kobe again with Chris Paul, yeah they probably win a ring.

I remember not wanting to give up Pau Gasol, and I remember being okay with the trade not going through. Most Lakers fans were not okay with the veto, but quite a few of us didnt mind.
In hindsight, that trade may have eeked out 1 last championship out of Kobe. Pau was done after that. And Lamar Odom's life dwindled out of control. Steve Nash didnt have his Phoenix medical staff, and Dwight broke us down by not resigning.

Someone mentioned Kobe's injury in 2013. I guess it doesn't happen if Paul is on the roster. But who knows? Injuries can happen to anyone at anytime.

For some reason I think if the Paul trade had went through then maybe the Lakers probably don't trade for Dwight the upcoming offseason.

Someone else brought up Kobe not being willing to take a backseat to Chris Paul at some point. Which is a factor. Even in Kobe's last few years in the league after the injury, I don't think he wouldve been willing to take a backseat to anyone even if it meant winning another title before he retired.

This could have been amazing if the Lakers followed it up by taking the Philly package for Bynum rather than include Orlando and get Howard.

The starting line up could have been something like this:

Vucevic
Artest
Iguodola
Kobe
Paul

with Barnes, Blake etc off the bench.

It easy to speculate they would have won a title but reality suggests it would have been much more difficult than some people want to believe.
First of all, relying on Chris Paul to stay healthy throughout a lengthy playoff run is shaky at best. I'm a huge CP fan but at this point it is what it is.

Second, ideally the CP/D12 should have been a lethal weapon for that team but it wouldn't have. At that time Howard still thought he was the next Olajuwon and insisted on post touches.
They tried it in Houston and it wasn't efficient then when they tried to get Howard to play the role of a modern big he refused. It's crazy because the things they wanted him to do (P&R, rim protector, lob threat) are exactly the things he was great at, but Dwight still had his post up fantasies. We see how quickly that wore out in Atlanta too.

Chris Paul, Mr. Overrated, wasn’t winning a ring no matter which team he played for.

people here are hilarious.

all of a sudden prime cp3 and dwight are not good enough.

and kobe who averaged 27-5-5 prior achilles is garbage....GTFO LMAO

Hate the similar what-if threads. Articles like this one shouldn't have been written either.

They would have had only two years to win a chip as Kobe would have still fallen off after 2013 due to injuries.

They would have been a great team, but I don't think they win the chip. Dallas still would have been tough to get through in 2011 especially with the size they had and I don't see them beating the Thunder, Spurs or the Heat in 2012.

But they definitely would be in the mix and would have had a chance if healthy.

Kobe would have ruined CP3, and both would have suffered tons of injuries together. It would have been a disaster.