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the gasol/kobe lead version of the lakers is far more balanced and deeper than any of the championship teams in la this decade. while shaq and kobe overpowered defenses from 2000-2002they relied too heavily on their star players and were not very deep at all. outside robert horry they had little to no other quality players on what was a weak roster. they won more on star power than depth and each tittle became closer to an upset until finally in 2004 that lack of depth nearly got them swept in the finals. this is the best triangle version of the lakers ever. with quality shooters all around and a productive bench combined with two mobile 7 footers down low the "make everyone else beat you"game plan really will get you beat, unlike in 2004 when the lakers fate rested in the hands of devean george, slava medvedenko, kareem rush and a disgruntled gary payton. the reason why it's taken this long to come back to prominence in the first place is that other than shaq that team had no post options and no shot blocking and poor rebounding. what they are proving now is that
shaq only covered up those deficiencies. this team does not have them.

3 peat > 7-1 regular season record

please ....dont

so what you are saying is that this version is deeper than the shaq/kobe verion, but that the shaq/kobe version had more star power at the top

that is true actually. This new Lakers team is deeper, but guess what, its the star power that wins championships. Shaq and Kobe were the best combo by far in a long time.

Actually those 3 peat teams were quite deep. They had 10 players who played over 60 games and averaged over 4 points a game. Those 5 players off the bench combined for 28 points a game, which is a very solid bench.

Like i get that the Lakers are playing very good and everything, I just don't see the need for some of their fans to point it out everyday. We know and it just looks poorly upon some of the Laker fan base, not all of it, there are some very knowledgeable Laker fans on these boards, but just some of these are starting to get ridiculous. We know the Lakers are good, end of thread there.....

in 2000 wcf they barely overcame 14 pt deficit to a much deeper portland team in game 7. 2002 they squeaked out an overtime victory over a much deeper kings team which should have won that series except for postseason jitters from peja and christie and a ton of missed free throws
I know 3 titles > 7-1 record. what i'm saying is kobe will not have to completely carry this team like he and shaq had to before. if they didn't combine for 60 they usually lost.

its too early to compare this team to the three peat teams

How quickly people forget the complete and utter dominance of prime Shaq.

JIMBATT34 wrote:in 2000 wcf they barely overcame 14 pt deficit to a much deeper portland team in game 7. 2002 they squeaked out an overtime victory over a much deeper kings team which should have won that series except for postseason jitters from peja and christie and a ton of missed free throws
I know 3 titles > 7-1 record. what i'm saying is kobe will not have to completely carry this team like he and shaq had to before. if they didn't combine for 60 they usually lost.

Ok so basically your saying those teams got lucky and it had nothing to do with how good they were, alright, i get it now....

Ok so basically your saying those teams got lucky and it had nothing to do with how good they were, alright, i get it now....

the only thing I meant was that with two stars the likes of kobe and shaq they should never have been in those situations in the first place. A deeper team means less stress on the leadership. That is all. Shaq is top
3 c's all time.

NetsForce wrote:How quickly people forget the complete and utter dominance of prime Shaq.

No doubt.

We've even got one clown on our board (see below) who thinks this team is better than Showtime.

Well those Kings teams were one of the greatest teams of all time not to win a title, and championships aren't just handed to star power, so having Shaq and Kobe didn't guarantee anything, they still had to work for it. Same goes for the Lakers now. And I guarantee everyone on these boards would rather have a prime Shaq on the Lakers then Bynum and Gasol, he was just that good.

NetsForce wrote:How quickly people forget the complete and utter dominance of prime Shaq.

+1
Shaq was unstoppable, in and outside the buffet.

If we are talking about 8 game sample sizes, the rockets are gonna be the GOAT.

OMG, we're comparing today's Lakers to the 3-peat? We haven't won jack yet.

+1 on NetsForce post..Shaq was just a rare player that was completely unstoppable..

Pau Gasol isn't an unstoppable player..he isn't even in the top 5 at the PF position..he's an all-star caliber player, but if you had Kobe and Shaq in their primes with Bynum, Odom and the rest of them, we wouldn't even have to play the rest of the year, because LA would already have the title wrapped up..

A typical LA fan taking his homerism to a whole new level.

Let's prevent ourselves from comparing Shaq & Kobe to Gasol & Kobe. If Gasol and Kobe win a championship together, this thread might be worthy of consideration.

T-Mac United wrote:A typical LA fan taking his homerism to a whole new level.

and how do you know this is typical to Lakeshow fans ?


see you in the Playoffs, in the second round !

oh wait...