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After the Gasol trade, looks like the rivalry's back. If both teams meet in the finals, who wins the best of 7? Who's the better team? Which team do you like?

Derek Fisher
Kobe Bryant
Lamar Odom
Pau Gasol
Andrew Bynum
Key Bench Players: Luke Walton, Jordan Farmar, Vlad Rad, Vujacic, Turiaf
Coach: Phil Jackson

VS

Rajon Rondo
Ray Allen
Paul Pierce
Kevin Garnett
Kendrick Perkins
Key Bench Players: Eddie House, James Posey, Tony Allen, Glen Davis
Coach: Doc Rivers

Who you got?

This question will not be answered until the Lakers get fully healthy.

Fisher
Kobe
Odom
Gasol
Bynum

Let's see how this line up does first.

One has the best record in the League while the other has yet to play a game together. Way too early for this. Besides Pau Gasol isn't going to slow down KG.

Albanian Damien wrote:One has the best record in the League while the other has yet to play a game together. Way too early for this. Besides Pau Gasol isn't going to slow down KG.

Funny how a Boston fan is saying this when during the summer everyone was saying that the Celtics won't be that great and aren't proven.

Anyways, remember Boston blew out the Lakers twice this year. That being said Gasol is a guy who gets double teams and takes alot of pressure off of everyone.

I think the Lakers have a better bench for sure. Anytime a rookie Glen Davis is a key bench player you're not deep.

Lakers have Luke, Ariza, Radmonovic, Farmar, Vujacic, and Turiaf off the bench.

It'd be an awesome Finals series, that's for sure.

you got the bench messed up..

Until further notice the Celtics are better than the Lakers. Like I said when the Celtics made their trades you have to let them play some games together before you start declaring them anything, just like at this point in time the Lakers with Gasol have yet to play a game together so there is really nothing to base any predictions on...

I'm interested to see the Laker's defense with Gasol. He's not as bad a defender as people make him out to be, but he's still not as good a post defender as Kwame.

Doubt the Laker's defense changes much- but IMO, if they want to contend with the best of the west, then they'll have to take it to another notch defensively in the post season.

Their offense has the potential to be very good- Bynum and Gasol downlow is scary, Kobe on the perimeter, and Odom with his all-around game. Plus their bench players.

Should be fun to watch.

CB4MiamiHeat wrote:you got the bench messed up..

My bad switched them around. Looks like the Lakers are deeper but I guess it's all about chemistry.

What's scary is that at one point the Lakers were first in the West, now adding Gasol to the mix..

Well, for starters I'd expect Odom to remain at PF and play in a 3-man rotation with Gasol and Bynum, as opposed to moving him to SF like everyone appears to be expecting. Remember Gasol can play both PF and Center, and I can imagine no reason why the Lakers wouldn't use him at both spots, thereby allowing Odom to stay at PF for at least 32 mins per game. But anyway.....

I'll stick with the Celtics. They're still the more talented team by a lot (it's easy to forget, for example, how good our friend Jesus Shuttlesworth truly is when he's the Celts' third option), and with Rondo/Perkins have a nice overall balance. For me you always have to pick the most talented team, until the less talented team definitively proves that you are wrong. Though I will admit, the Lakers' near infinite edge in coach quality does make me a 'bit nervous for my prediction.

Well Kobe is the best player on the planet, and now has a legit second option, so I'm going with the Lakers.

I'll take the better defensive team and the team who will have the homecourt.

I gotta agree with JordanBulls, boston had heavily home court advantage and hasn't performed as expected on away teams (thats because they get bloated homer calls on their floor to the point its not even funny) but defensively as a team they probably have an edge over lakers we don't know yet.

here is before gasol trade

kobe > KG,Pierce,Allen but
Boston > LA

after trade
kobe>>KG,PierceAllen
LA > Boston

Lakers definitely appear better on paper and have more talent, but I still think the Celtics are better as they have been far and away the best defensive team in basketball.

Not to mention, if we are talking about a potential finals series, Pierce has always stepped his game up big time against LA (28 ppg and extremely efficient). Now you are going to have Odom guard him? Pierce might average 35 if you keep Odom on him all series and more importantly, he'd get Bynum in serious foul trouble.

Now if LA trades Odom for Artest+crap contracts, I'd fear them a lot more and think they matchup with the Celtics much better than they currently do.

And to Kobay, the Celtics are 16-4 (with one loss being without KG, on a buzzer beater by Hedo) on the road and a very good road team. I think it's pretty safe to assume Boston is a better defensive team as well. The Lakers just added a pretty average defender in Gasol and they weren't close to as good defensively prior to the trade, so I don't see why they'd suddenly become as good or better.

This is too close to call. I guess I'll go with the Celtics for now. They also have a better shot at winning the championship because they are in the East.

Since the Celtics will probably get home court and just waltz through their Conference, I go with them. The Lakers will be pretty beaten up after disposing of (just as an example) Utah, Dallas and San Antonio.

kobeSTOPkobeDONT wrote:Lakers definitely appear better on paper and have more talent, but I still think the Celtics are better as they have been far and away the best defensive team in basketball.

Not to mention, if we are talking about a potential finals series, Pierce has always stepped his game up big time against LA (28 ppg and extremely efficient). Now you are going to have Odom guard him? Pierce might average 35 if you keep Odom on him all series and more importantly, he'd get Bynum in serious foul trouble.

Now if LA trades Odom for Artest+crap contracts, I'd fear them a lot more and think they matchup with the Celtics much better than they currently do.

And to Kobay, the Celtics are 16-4 (with one loss being without KG, on a buzzer beater by Hedo) on the road and a very good road team. I think it's pretty safe to assume Boston is a better defensive team as well. The Lakers just added a pretty average defender in Gasol and they weren't close to as good defensively prior to the trade, so I don't see why they'd suddenly become as good or better.

We were a good defensive team before Bynum went down. Pau makes us better defensively because he's a better defender at the 4 than Odom and Odom is a better defender at the 3 than the other guys we had playing there (Vlad and Luke). Not to mention our rebounding should improve a lot (we were already one of the best rebounding teams) and adding another shot blocker (Pau) makes our perimeter defenders just that much better.

Offensively Pau is perfect for the triangle and Kwame was the absolute opposite.

[quote="Taiwan Killa"][/quote]And I thought it was too earl to compare us to the Spurs back then also. You have no idea how this team might play. People had know idea how Boston would play. I mean no one expected us to play the best D in the NBA. I however don't know if the Lakers can play that D that separates Championship teams from great teams.

Lakers for me.

They have the best player on the planet, a deeper bench and a WAY better coach.

And they're younger.

PG:
Fisher/Farmar vs Rondo/House

Advantage Lakers


SG:
Kobe/Sasha vs Allen/Allen

Advantage Lakers

SF:
Odom/Walton/Ariza vs Pierce/Posey

Advantage Celtics

PF:
Gasol/Turiaf vs KG/Davis

Advantage Celtics

C:
Bynum/Mihm vs Perkins/Pollard

Advantage Lakers

Bench: Lakers
Coach: Lakers

_______________________________________

That said I pick the Celtics to win due to cemistry, however if they were to meet next year with Kobe/Gasol/Bynum having an entire year to gel I'd pick the Lakers easily