Phil: "Kobe had to screw up the game by going one on one"

[tsherkin]

A couple of people said it, but the words Phil used don't sound like he was ripping on Kobe.

You'll notice that he said that Kobe energized the time by going one on one... that's not something you usually look at as a negative. I mean, yeah he took too many threes and didn't accomplish much else apart from his scoring but he was isolating and trying to do something. The Lakers were down 9 at the half and Kobe scored 17 of 23 points in the third. The team only scored 85 points the whole game, right? In the second quarter, almost everything was from outside and they weren't getting it into the post or to the rim and same in the fourth and really, the end of the first, as well. The Lakers did a bad job of looking for high-efficiency shots. Pau and Bynum combined for 4 shots in the second quarter. Out of 16 shots. They looked a little better in the 3rd because they were almost all short jumpers and layups, not tons of threes or long 2-pointers, they just didn't get up enough shots or get to the line enough. The Lakers were 9/16 or something close to it in the 4th, and 6 of those shots were from 19 feet or farther out (though they mostly made them in a bunch at the end of the quarter). They had little runs and bursts but they couldn't keep it up and they didn't dominate in any capacity. They shot about 51% under the arc, 33% beyond the arc, didn't dominate at the line, got smoked on the glass and had more than twice as many turnovers as Memphis. Sloppy, sloppy stuff.

And for everyone pushing on Gasol to have more shots, he had 5 of L.A.'s 21 (!) turnovers. Kobe had 3, but he also had 22 shots in 31 minutes, so it's not all that surprising (although what does that say about the approach to the game L.A. brought). The team's starters didn't play starter's minutes, they definitely gave up on this one. Fisher, Odom and Shannon Brown combined to go 8/22 and Artest didn't score and Memphis MURDERED them on both points in the paint and fast break points.

This game wasn't just on Kobe, this game was on L.A. as a whole just sucking.

So when Phil says Kobe HAD to isolate to energize the team, I don't necessarily look at that as only a criticism of Kobe's play but definitely a comment about the state of the rest of the team.

[Slava]

Gasol could have been playing with Shannon Brown in there last night and he still would take no more than 10 shots.

Its happened before against Memphis. This isn't something totally new to any Lakers fans who watch all the games. Blaming KObe is a nice short term solution to saying we couldn't stop them on transition.

Transition points 20 -3 was a bigger stat than Kobe's 20 or so shots.

Getting out rebounded is another stat that we can conveniently ignore and use the age old criticism of Kobe.

[tsherkin]

Speaking of which, here's the full quote:

“We get behind early on in the third quarter on some stupid plays — poor passing, poor transition defense — and then Kobe has to screw up the game and start energizing the team by going one-on-one and that takes the rest of the guys out as a consequence,” Jackson said. “That didn’t bring us back in, but it did give us a little run, we got the game back a little bit but we couldn’t sustain it and we just went right back and made the same mistakes again.”

[Gus McCrae]

Lmfao Kobe teabaggers in full force. Phil said what he said, stop **** insinuating something when all you have to do is take the damn quote at face value. Assume he's not speaking in code and his message is clear as day. Clearly, you cannot take the things that have been said about Kobe and think, "hmm, maybe he is a tad selfish at times" instead you want to make something up to support Kobe.

Kobe is one of the greatest players ever. He is a bit selfish, so what? You need to be a bit selfish to amass the numbers that he's had over his long successful career. Why is it difficult to accept that he might have cost the team a game by being selfish? He might be the best player we've seen this last decade but he's not a perfect basketball player.

Stfu and criticize away you damn Kobe nutgarglers. He's **** due.

let it out man. let it out. I'm a big fan of Kobe and acknowledge he's selfish at times. The team is losing games and he thinks he needs to go out and win them for us so he's taking too many shots. That is WHY he's taking too many shots .

Ok? Regardless of how he feels its still a fact that he's taking too many shots. Are you trying to counter what i'm saying or just providing some sort of reasoning? Cuz that's exactly what I pointed out in my post.

I'll start over. Your post is that kobe is selfish and costed us the game and anyone who gives reasoning for why he shot so much is a kobe nutgarglers who need to STFU.

I said, yes, he's being selfish, because he's trying to snap a skid we're on. And as another poster said below, Shannon Brown could've played the full game and Gasol wouldn't have scored much more. Here's my shocker special of the week: The lakers cast outside of Kobe is very passive

[andrewww]

A couple of people said it, but the words Phil used don't sound like he was ripping on Kobe.

You'll notice that he said that Kobe energized the time by going one on one... that's not something you usually look at as a negative. I mean, yeah he took too many threes and didn't accomplish much else apart from his scoring but he was isolating and trying to do something. The Lakers were down 9 at the half and Kobe scored 17 of 23 points in the third. The team only scored 85 points the whole game, right? In the second quarter, almost everything was from outside and they weren't getting it into the post or to the rim and same in the fourth and really, the end of the first, as well. The Lakers did a bad job of looking for high-efficiency shots. Pau and Bynum combined for 4 shots in the second quarter. Out of 16 shots. They looked a little better in the 3rd because they were almost all short jumpers and layups, not tons of threes or long 2-pointers, they just didn't get up enough shots or get to the line enough. The Lakers were 9/16 or something close to it in the 4th, and 6 of those shots were from 19 feet or farther out (though they mostly made them in a bunch at the end of the quarter). They had little runs and bursts but they couldn't keep it up and they didn't dominate in any capacity. They shot about 51% under the arc, 33% beyond the arc, didn't dominate at the line, got smoked on the glass and had more than twice as many turnovers as Memphis. Sloppy, sloppy stuff.

And for everyone pushing on Gasol to have more shots, he had 5 of L.A.'s 21 (!) turnovers. Kobe had 3, but he also had 22 shots in 31 minutes, so it's not all that surprising (although what does that say about the approach to the game L.A. brought). The team's starters didn't play starter's minutes, they definitely gave up on this one. Fisher, Odom and Shannon Brown combined to go 8/22 and Artest didn't score and Memphis MURDERED them on both points in the paint and fast break points.

This game wasn't just on Kobe, this game was on L.A. as a whole just sucking.

So when Phil says Kobe HAD to isolate to energize the team, I don't necessarily look at that as only a criticism of Kobe's play but definitely a comment about the state of the rest of the team.

thank you for speaking the truth. at times i will admit kobe's gunning does affect the team's offensive flow as a whole, but when you have no rhythm going kobe will (and rightfully so imo) try to get us back into the game by looking for his shot.

people also have to look at the context of the way the lakeshow have been playing for a while. it's not as simple as saying "get pau 20 shots and make kobe take less" approach. for starters, pau simply doesnt have the aggressive mindset where he plays through contact and get his shots in regardless of what the defense is trying to do. like phil has said, he hasnt had "good base" on his shots for the better part of a month at least, and when you have 5 turnovers in relatively quick succession, anyone would naturally be less inclined to give you the ball if you're not producing. also, pau has never been a high volume scorer that puts up a lot of shots so you can't simply say kobe's the culprit, etc.

[Slava]

Speaking of which, here's the full quote:

“We get behind early on in the third quarter on some stupid plays — poor passing, poor transition defense — and then Kobe has to screw up the game and start energizing the team by going one-on-one and that takes the rest of the guys out as a consequence,” Jackson said. “That didn’t bring us back in, but it did give us a little run, we got the game back a little bit but we couldn’t sustain it and we just went right back and made the same mistakes again.”

Yeah "screw up" is the wrong word. "Having to improvise" is the correct term there.

[tsherkin]

Remember that Kobe didn't really assert himself until the third, but even before then, the Lakers weren't passing the ball well, they weren't dominating inside except in short bursts, they were getting outhustled on the boards, beaten in transition, out-passed... Memphis played way better, they deserved to win because they did what they needed to and the Lakers did not. That's not all on Kobe. And like I said, 8/22 from three guys, 8/24 if you include Artest, right? It wasn't just Kobe flailing and not getting his teammates involved, he saw well enough that Bynum was pretty much the only guy going and he tried to do something about it. I'm not the biggest fan of Kobe's approach to the game at times, but this one... it's really hard to look at this objectively and see all the peripheral factors and then lay this one on Kobe's shoulders when the rest of the team stank so much.

[re49gb_2gho32fp]

Please explain how a team having the best Big man in the game needs to improvise.

[Slava]

Please explain how a team having the best Big man in the game needs to improvise.

Because we were playing like dog crap and I didn't know we had Dirk Nowitzki.

[tsherkin]

Please explain how a team having the best Big man in the game needs to improvise.

Mostly by making smarter passes and taking better care of the ball, playing better defense and then taking better shots. Nothing was happening for the team up to that point, what they were doing wasn't working so Kobe tried to put a run together to help dig the team out of the hole it was in. And it was helpful. We're over-focusing on the third quarter, as if it that lost the game for the team.

Kobe got the team within 6 on a free throw with 3:45 remaining in the period, 66-60.

L.A. would go on to score only 2 more points in the quarter. Non-Kobe players in that time produced 2 shooting fouls, a turnover and went 1/6. Kobe went 0/2 in that same stretch, then left the game and was replaced by Shannon Brown.

Are we really going to look at Kobe and blame him in that instance?

Non-Kobe players before that in the third produced 4 points on 2/4 shooting with 2 turnovers and a bunch of rebounds. It's not like they were lighting it up and Kobe was ignoring them.

[andrewww]

@tsherkin

with the way the media has spun phil's quotes, it becomes increasingly apparent that people will always look for ways to criticize kobe when things are or arent going well. you really cant reason with people like this... the same people who always say that nothing that went wrong in cleveland was ever lebron's fault.

[Chris435]

Phil's just butthurt that his team is in a slump.

[tsherkin]

Also a point... Memphis took 19 more shots than did the Lakers. Their transition defense, which is a big part of why that was possible, absolutely sunk them in this game.

[Manocad]

Maybe its just me, but I dont think hes calling out Kobe at all.

Read it again: We got behind early because of stupid plays, and then Kobe HAS to screw up the game and START ENERGIZING THE TEAM.

That's how I read it as well. Translation:

"We got down early therefore Kobe had to deviate from our normal game plan in order to make some buckets and get the team going."

[D Nice]

Anybody watch the interview? Or the game. Not only was Phil mumbling like a scared catholic schoolgirl when he said it (it's almost like he caught himself mid-sentence), but there's really no reason to lay this game at Kobe's feet. There are tons of nights where him shooting too much is a problem. Tonight wasn't one of them. Him, Drew, and Blake were the only players who bothered to show up.

And can we please bench Ron Artest. Or trade him. Or SOMETHING? I say this because I've already given up on Fisher being removed from the starting 5.

[Day in the Life]

double post

[tsherkin]

I should point out that Kobe shot a little over 45% from the field and while he blew from downtown, he got to the line effectively. He had an efficient night. Yeah, he didn't rack up the assists, but that was just the nature of the game tonight, he definitely tried to save the game when nothing else was working. It's worth noting that Rudy Gay and Zach Randolph MURDERED the Lakers (as did Mayo off of the bench) and yeah, it was a whole team thing. Kobe's not the reason L.A. got slaughtered in transition or the only guy on the team with a few of the nearly two-dozen turnovers they had...

[Day in the Life]

This is by far Phil's worst coaching job. Best team in terms of talent last five years and he's done a horrible job meshing these players together and giving them incentive. He's still worried about how the offense is run when defense is a much higher concern. It's nice to place certain players like Kobe to roam the paint from the perimeter at times, but literally all of the Lakers losses have been due to their poorly planned "scramble to the perimeter" defensive schemes. They're so worried about penetration into the paint and trying to get steals off the passing lane that they're scrambling and getting burned through wide open jumpers. Every possession.

It's nice to continue that scheme when the Lakers had Ariza to watch the passing lanes, but when you have a slow and lumbering lineup of Fisher Kobe Artest roaming every possession...offense is not even a concern.

[ThreeYearPlan]

Please explain how a team having the best Big man in the game needs to improvise.

Because the best big man in the game was getting outplayed by Randolph and I think made one basket after the 1st 5 minutes of the game

[andrewww]

This is by far Phil's worst coaching job. Best team in terms of talent last five years and he's done a horrible job meshing these players together and giving them incentive. He's still worried about how the offense is run when defense is a much higher concern. It's nice to place certain players like Kobe to roam the paint from the perimeter at times, but literally all of the Lakers losses have been due to their poorly planned "scramble to the perimeter" defensive schemes. They're so worried about penetration into the paint and trying to get steals off the passing lane that they're scrambling and getting burned through wide open jumpers. Every possession.

It's nice to continue that scheme when the Lakers had Ariza to watch the passing lanes, but when you have a slow and lumbering lineup of Fisher Kobe Artest roaming every possession...offense is not even a concern.

we've played extremely poor defense, if you can call it defense. and that is everyone's responsibility, although it begins with namely the guards from preventing dribble pentration. that's caused all sort of problems leading to too much over helping and wide open 3s.