This Should Be Our Focus

[JimMurray]

First post out of the box after being a long time reader, and I'd like to throw in my two cents

I'm not sure what the Lakers are planning to do with the MLE. I'm not sure that if we resign Sasha, Ronny, or both, that we are even going to use it, based on how deep we are into the luxury tax. So I'm writing this post on the assumption that the MLE and Vet Min are going to be used.

I'm also writing with the assumption that our starting SF will be either Odom, or Artest, due to the speculation that we might swap Odom for Artest and a bad contract.

Our number one priority is to sure up the defense and toughness of this team. So these are the ONLY players we should be targeting

Kwame Brown - We don't need his offense, we just need him to throw some people around and grab rebounds for 10-15 minutes a night as Bynum's backup. He can be had for the vet min.

Kurt Thomas - Possibly a vet min player, and should be our 2nd choice behind Kwame Brown. Despite his age he's a terrific physical defender who can rebound.

James Posey - I know that we are already log jammed at the three, but Posey is needed for his toughness and defense. He can guard any position 1-5. We don't necessarily need to play him at the three. Matter of fact, for a lock down defensive lineup we can have Bynum, Brown, Posey, Ariza, and Kobe on the floor at the same time and suffocate just about anybody. He's a full mid level player, and I doubt we'll be able to sign him.

I'm content with Odom at the three, although I have to be honest, I'd rather have Artest. If we acquire Artest and Kenny Thomas (as has been the speculation) for Odom, we get a perennial defensive player of the candidate, with a toughness and tenacity that you'll never, ever, ever, find in Lamar Odom, a player who can score, penetrate, who would be perfect under Phil Jackson. Kenny Thomas will be our equivalent of Brian Grant, but we can use his expiring after this upcoming season as trade bate, the same way that we used Kwame's.

Now, not only do we have all the same pieces, we've added exactly what we need to beat the Celtics next season

C - Bynum / Brown / Mihm
PF - Gasol / Brown / Thomas?
SF - Artest or Odom / Ariza / Posey? / Walton / Radmanovic
SG - Kobe / Vujacic (we have to resign him)
PG - Fish / Farmar

There are 4 all-stars in this starting lineup (with artest, not odom) and a bunch of vets, bruisers, and defenders on the bench. We still have sasha and his scoring along with Farmar. I'm assuming that we won't bring back Turiaf.

[DEEP3CL]

You envisioned the same team I see in my mind. Good hit on the first swing JM.

Oh yeah I can tell your a "30 vet", these youngsters don't know jack about Jim Murry the great writer.

Chime in a lot more we need all the strong pull we can get against the youngins !

[*Lakers*]

The lakers main focus should be not to upset the team chemistry. We will be losing turiaf the biggest cheerleader on the court...literally . Anyways, Kobe loves odom...and I think the FO will need to think really hard before they act...we have the mle and we will resign Vujacic and that will leave us with the same team that went to the finals, cept for Ronny. So we get Bynum back and pick up some dude perhaps Landry (houston) and we'll be set.

[Rox_Nix_Nox]

Losing ronny isn't that bad. He brings energy but that doesn't mean he produces consistently. I'd be angry if we lost Sasha we cannot lose him.

I disagree with bringing kwame back though because he brings mediocre attitude and play to a championship contending team.

[LAKERLAW]

would you guys rather have odom over marion? If i was the Lakers Front Office, i would be pushing for that.

[crazyeights]

JimMurray, good post. Question: would you rather have Kwame than say Alonzo Mourning?

I understand that Kwame would be familiar with the program, but he lacks the professionalism and confidence to really be trusted with crunch time minutes. Though I wouldn't be opposed to resigning him, I actually thought at one point last year Kwame was our x-factor. That year he was defensively a game changer. After his injury he never returned to form, I don't know, maybe he will be back this year.

Just wondered if there was a reason Zo wasn't on your list. Let's hope whoever we get, we can get for cheap.

[crazyeights]

would you guys rather have odom over marion? If i was the Lakers Front Office, i would be pushing for that.

That's a good point. I was hoping last year we would pull off the Marion deal with Phoenix, but it didn't happen. This is especially important now, since Marion can play SF and not lose that rebounding that Lamar gives. Also I think Marion can play off the ball better than Odom, he's more of a slasher.

Though I thought Marion was well-received in Miami...but remembering Lamar's conversation with Wade and Riley...it seems like they want him to come back. Might as well call them up and try to make it happen, I'm guessing they'd want more than Lamar, what do we have that the Heat would need?

[That Nicka]

Kurt Thomas is most likely returning to the Spurs
viewtopic.php?t=823118

Kwame Brown has received interest from the Bucks and Heat

The Celtics have shown that they would like to keep James Posey, and the Hornets have been trying to pick him up as well

IMO it would not be the most reasonable thing to believe that Zo will leave the Heat

The bottom line is there are 29 teams that would like to add players as well and they have the same amount of money (if not significantly more) to offer.... We should look to re-sign our own players before trying to steal others and, if worse comes to worse, we can ship out our re-signed players later

[Dexmor]

Kwame was the X-factor, To win he must be on the floor but playing for the other team.
Did you guys watch the same games I did?
Commen sence says Kwame sucks. Every anaylist says he sucks. When Laker fans said they liked him I figured they were bias. Now he is gone and you guys still like him so I ask what the hell is up with you guys?

[LAKERLAW]

would you guys rather have odom over marion? If i was the Lakers Front Office, i would be pushing for that.

That's a good point. I was hoping last year we would pull off the Marion deal with Phoenix, but it didn't happen. This is especially important now, since Marion can play SF and not lose that rebounding that Lamar gives. Also I think Marion can play off the ball better than Odom, he's more of a slasher.

Though I thought Marion was well-received in Miami...but remembering Lamar's conversation with Wade and Riley...it seems like they want him to come back. Might as well call them up and try to make it happen, I'm guessing they'd want more than Lamar, what do we have that the Heat would need?

Artest is a great player, solid defender, aggressive and plays to post very well - but i think marion is a better all around player and more versatile. I am not an odom fan, but i think we give up a lot on defensive boards, marion played PF for a few seasons, so he is used to crashing a bit more, either player id be happy with.

We probably wont end up with either...

[Luxury]

Hell no to Kwame. Kurt Thomas will most likely stay with the Spurs, and have a bigger role next year. Same with Posey. No logical reason to leave Boston if they're the team to beat while Boston matches any salary and still give him important playing time.

Marion at the 3 is better than Odom at the 3, but Odom at the 4 is better than Marion at the 4. Don't want to go into details with this though.

Artest is the only realistic choice right now, but I am absolutely hesitant to trade Odom. The Vlad signing is starting to show now, wished we signed Tim Thomas instead.

[crazyeights]

Kwame was the X-factor, To win he must be on the floor but playing for the other team.
Did you guys watch the same games I did?
Commen sence says Kwame sucks. Every anaylist says he sucks. When Laker fans said they liked him I figured they were bias. Now he is gone and you guys still like him so I ask what the hell is up with you guys?

No we weren't watching the same games. Because I was actually there when Kwame came into the game against Chicago in the 2006-2007 season and completely changed the dynamic. This culminated in that monster dunk on Nocioni. That happened to be the best game of the year for him...he had 18 pts 12 rbs 2 blks shooting 57%.

Rag on Kwame all you want, but in early 2006-2007 he had more confidence than I've ever seen him have. The dude was the difference between our team being marginal and our team being nasty.

According to 82games.com he had the third highest PER for our team that year at 4.5, and excluding McKie he led our team in fg% at 59.1 ... also Kwame was in every single one of our top 5-man units. Every single one. Which is interesting because he played in only half of the games that season. Unfortunately, he was badly injured (out for 2 months) and never recovered from it.

Kwame is never going to be the number 1 draft pick that people wanted. Boo-hoo. But he can still be an effective player on our team when healthy.

By the way, what about the only playoff game we won that year? Oh yeah, that was the one where Kwame scored 19 pts on 8 for 14 shooting. So tell me Star24, how was he not the x-factor that year?

[Luxury]

Getting rid of garbage players like Smush, Kwame, and Brian Cook by getting competent and reliable players is the difference between 1st round and NBA Finals for us.

[crazyeights]

Hell no to Kwame. Kurt Thomas will most likely stay with the Spurs, and have a bigger role next year. Same with Posey. No logical reason to leave Boston if they're the team to beat while Boston matches any salary and still give him important playing time.

Marion at the 3 is better than Odom at the 3, but Odom at the 4 is better than Marion at the 4. Don't want to go into details with this though.

Artest is the only realistic choice right now, but I am absolutely hesitant to trade Odom. The Vlad signing is starting to show now, wished we signed Tim Thomas instead.

Isn't it more realistic to pull off a trade with a GM and franchise player that love Lamar, rather than the Kings who would do nothing to help the Lakers?

Also, the point of trading for Artest or Marion is for them to play at the 3...so why does it matter if Odom is better at the 4? Gasol is our 4 now.

[Luxury]

Hell no to Kwame. Kurt Thomas will most likely stay with the Spurs, and have a bigger role next year. Same with Posey. No logical reason to leave Boston if they're the team to beat while Boston matches any salary and still give him important playing time.

Marion at the 3 is better than Odom at the 3, but Odom at the 4 is better than Marion at the 4. Don't want to go into details with this though.

Artest is the only realistic choice right now, but I am absolutely hesitant to trade Odom. The Vlad signing is starting to show now, wished we signed Tim Thomas instead.

Isn't it more realistic to pull off a trade with a GM and franchise player that love Lamar, rather than the Kings who would do nothing to help the Lakers?

Also, the point of trading for Artest or Marion is for them to play at the 3...so why does it matter if Odom is better at the 4? Gasol is our 4 now.

The answer to your first question is on the wiretap, and I guess we'll have to see if Marion for Odom + filler ever pops up.

Next, I could have sworn I put "Don't want to go into details with this tough" because I discussed it in past threads, but whatever.

To me at least, I'm not a believer of the Gasol/Bynum frontcourt while Odom at SF. With that said, Odom in the frontcourt paired up with Bynum or Pau was extremely efficient, and that is why I don't want to have Odom reverting back to his old ways by changing his role again.

There's too many unknown variables at the moment, and I don't feel comfortable breaking the pieces that got us this far. I'm going to hold my tongue till the ASB, but I hope the Gasol/Bynum makes me a believer by then.

[MikeyMike]

Kwame sucks as a starter playing major minutes, absolutely.


But coming off the bench for 15 mins a night? Getting paid the vet's min? You'd be crazy to pass that up.

[Luxury]

Ofcourse for vet's min, but lets be real: it's just wishful thinking at best. Some teams willing to pay Kwame a good portion of their MLE.

[joe.linnen]

Lets not over think this you guys, if wewant James Posey offer him MLE 3-4 years and a starting role.
He'll come herefor sure if you give him a starting job and the minutes togowith it (Luke and Vlad's minutes).
SF:Posey/Ariza/Walton
PF:Gasol/Odom/Radmanoic
C:Bynum/Brown/Mihm1
SG:Bryant/Vujacic
PG:Fisher/Farmar

Our first unit
SF:Posey
PF:Gasol
C:Bynum
SG:Bryant
PG:Fisher

Second unit
SF:Ariza
PF:Odom(Odom will still get his minutes
C:Brown???( The reason Iwould got after him is because he's fast for a center and can run with the second unit)
SG:Vijacic???
PG:Farmar

Well do fine with this roster

[hermes]

Kwame Brown - We don't need his offense

thats good because he doesn't have any

but he lacks the professionalism and confidence to really be trusted with crunch time minutes

so don't give him any crunch time mintues

[Chubby Chaser]

Kwame was the X-factor, To win he must be on the floor but playing for the other team.
Did you guys watch the same games I did?
Commen sence says Kwame sucks. Every anaylist says he sucks. When Laker fans said they liked him I figured they were bias. Now he is gone and you guys still like him so I ask what the hell is up with you guys?