Who is the real team of destiny here?
Posted: Sat Apr 19, 2008 8:50 pm
This is not about a time warp, or the NBA days of yore when Lakers Jerry West and Elgin Baylor were annually stuck in a maze of futility against Bill Russell's Celtics.
It isn't about the storied Magic Johnson-Larry Bird rivalry either -- a time when the Lakers finally broke through against the Celtics to win an NBA title in Los Angeles (for the record, they won five in Minneapolis before moving to the West Coast in 1961).
That was then. This is now.
We're talking about the Kevin Garnett's Celtics and Kobe Bryant's Lakers, circa 2008.
There is a sense of destiny for them to meet in the Finals come June, even if there is a real possibility neither will even win their respective conferences. But both teams earned their No. 1 seeds, and are eminently capable of carrying that all the way to a championship trophy.
Deciding on which team will come away with the trophy is the unenviable task here.
Whereas nobody is surprised with the way the Celtics have performed this season, few, if any, anticipated the Lakers coming out of the West with the top seed. Coming into training camp, Bryant had been demanding a trade, owner Jerry Buss got angry in the media, and there seemed little chance that the Lakers would coalesce.
Instead, coach Phil Jackson's steady hand developed the bench into one of the best in the league, 20-year-old center Andrew Bynum turned into a double-double machine, and Derek Fisher returned as a free agent for veteran leadership and the dead-eye 3-pointer as the starting point guard. And Lamar Odom continued his uneven role of flashing greatness then disappearing. It was good enough to contend amid the incredibly close top nine teams in the West until Bynum went down with a knee injury in January.
That changed everything.
That's when general manager Mitch Kupchak waved his magic wand to come up with Pau Gasol from Memphis to man the low post. Dealing Kwame Brown, Javaris Crittenton and two first-round draft picks didn't put a dent in the rotation and Gasol fit in as if he'd been there for years. It gave Bryant more options and opened an entirely new pathway for Odom to play the best ball of his career. And the Lakers took off. With Luke Walton, Jordan Farmar, Sasha Vujacic, Ronny Turiaf and Vladimir Radmanovic contributing in various degrees to the success, the sailing has been surprisingly smooth.
Invariably, it comes down to Bryant, but because of Gasol's presence and ability to feed both Bryant and Odom out of the post, pressure has been relieved from all three. It has created a special chemistry. Bynum still hasn't returned and isn't likely to, but why should he? At his age, the uncertainty of returning from a dislocated and severely bruised kneecap could cause more harm than good at this point. (Next season, however, the front line of Gasol, Odom and Bynum should be unstoppable, but that's a different story). Consequently, Bryant has emerged as a virtual lock to win his first MVP award.
Meanwhile, the Celtics have breezed through the Eastern Conference, just as anticipated once Danny Ainge ended his plight of building a team of teenagers.
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