Athanacropolis wrote:Interesting analysis. I have not had the chance to actually sit and watch Lakers/Spurs games this year, but from what you say it sounds like even at full strength, San Antonio had no hope against the Lakers. Not what I would have expected. I still think they're a dangerous team without Ginobli, but in my limited analysis, I think it's a long shot. It's akin to KG being out for good, as far as overall team impact.
And I'm so glad you got his reference:
Pod People.
I just watched Track Of The Moonbeast yesterday, believe it or not. That show is brilliant. (Mike > Joel, imo).
Not saying the Spurs aren't still a very good team, but I think the media needs to let go of them. They remind me of the 2003 Lakers. I started reading & posting at this site in the 2002 offseason (banned a few times)
If you recall, that year they started off so poorly that the majority of posters on the Gen Board had the Lakers out of the playoffs as late as Feb 2003. They managed to right the ship a bit, but their mileage and threadbare bench was blatantly obvious despite 50 wins. You could see them losing out to SA from a mile away. That's where SA is right now.
It's not only LA who has the magic sword, either. The same problems they have now started to become blatantly obvious against NO last year. They must be panicking at the thought of drawing the Hornets in the 1st round. As you would expect, they suffer big time with Bonner and quite a bit with Hill, Oberto, and Slowin Bowen. Manu being absent doesn't help either, puts more pressure on Parker to score. He certainly can, but he's more of a speedster than a stud (no homo) like CP. When you have the personnel to close the lane on him, he's also not a Kevin Johnson, he'll shy away. That's the strategy LA used with Malone and Shaq in 2004 because he was killing Payton prior to that defensive change.
At any rate, LA handles the Western teams many times better than a lot of the Eastern teams. The Bobcats winning 6-7 is not a fluke, they play tenacious D for 48 mins. LA doesn't like that, as you know. I'm not here to stroke your egos, but I gotta be honest that Boston still looks like the biggest threat from where I'm standing. I don't know just how bad Garnett's knee is, but still. I doubt Cleveland has enough outside of Bron to win in 7 against LA, and I'm not sold on Bron's greatness until I see him become transcendent in the Finals. He strikes me as a lunkhead, frankly. The nickname LBJ doesn't fit him well considering how shrewd Pres Johnson was. A nice twist of fate is that LA focuses all on him and on clogging the lane, same thing Boston did to Kobe. I'll be damned if the strategy hasn't worked so far.
