LO is such a big part of this team right now. He may not always have the grestest stats but he is playing with 10 X's more fire than Gasol, especially on D, most of the time and doing all the things that are helping this team win.
Luke in the starting line up is jus a disaster though. He's a lesser version of LO and we need Rad back to give us someone who can knock down an open shot. Since the Portland game every teams game plan is swarm everybody else and leave Walton open to force him to take the shot - which he will almost certainly miss.
Ugly win but was never really too worried about them pulling it out even without our bench showing up.
Game 61: Lakers @ Sacramento 7:00pm KCAL
Moderators: Kilroy, Danny Darko, TyCobb
- 8'sReverse
- Veteran
- Posts: 2,868
- And1: 3
- Joined: Mar 03, 2006
- Location: Southern California~ Watching the only LA NBA team, the Lakers!
-
- JellosJigglin
- RealGM
- Posts: 15,493
- And1: 9,520
- Joined: Jul 14, 2004
I would only be in favor of acquiring Artest if it doesn't cost us Odom. Odom is the ultimate team guy. He could be the third, fourth, fifth option and he'll never complain. We could bring him off the bench and he'd be fine with it. Gasol and Bynum could explode and Odom could have a bad game, but he'd be happy as long as the team wins. Players with that kind of attitude, with Lamar's talent, are hard to find.
I read a quote from Phil Jackson's book"Maverick" where he says to be a great team you have to have a few selfless players. Odom is that guy. And I know Phil appreciates his talents and attitude.
If we were playing 2k8, where we can just plug players in and their talents blend perfectly, I wouldn't even give it a second thought (adding Artest). But you have to take the human (i.e. chemistry) aspect into consideration when building a team.
Artest is not that kind of guy. He wants recognition. He is like Marion. He first needs to have his ego stroked, and have team success second.
So like I said, if we can hold onto Odom, and still sign Artest with the MLE, then I would be open to it. But if it's one or the other, then I'm sticking with Lamar. In a perfect world, we re-sign Lamar at around $8M per year, and pick up Artest with the MLE. Make Odom our 6th man, and say hello to another championship.
I read a quote from Phil Jackson's book"Maverick" where he says to be a great team you have to have a few selfless players. Odom is that guy. And I know Phil appreciates his talents and attitude.
If we were playing 2k8, where we can just plug players in and their talents blend perfectly, I wouldn't even give it a second thought (adding Artest). But you have to take the human (i.e. chemistry) aspect into consideration when building a team.
Artest is not that kind of guy. He wants recognition. He is like Marion. He first needs to have his ego stroked, and have team success second.
So like I said, if we can hold onto Odom, and still sign Artest with the MLE, then I would be open to it. But if it's one or the other, then I'm sticking with Lamar. In a perfect world, we re-sign Lamar at around $8M per year, and pick up Artest with the MLE. Make Odom our 6th man, and say hello to another championship.