Game #49 Grizzlies @ Lakers Sunday 3/25/12 7:30 PM

[Kilroy]

No way Andrew Bynum should have 4 rebounds in 40+ min... Ever.

Even with the 30pts that seems like a failure to me. We need a 20/10 guy, not a 30/5 guy.

His rotations were slow as hell... I liked when McRoberts got on him about it... He needs more of that.

[Father Time]

It seems we just don't have the personnel to play great defense. If MB can't get this team playing elite defense then no one will. I think people are starting to understand just why Dwight is such a bad ass, at least compared to all the other centers out there. You can always count on him to hit the glass hard and play great defense, and he covers for his wing defenders when they get burned. He's strong as an ox and super quick, which allows him to be a great man defender as well as provide great weak side defense. Not that we could have had him or anything. Bynum is a poor defensive anchor, and that's never going to change. He's lazy.

Pau spends more time whining than he does playing defense as well. How many times have we seen MB yelling at him (and others) to run back on defense? These guys are just not willing to put in the effort. Hell, they put in plenty of effort talking about playing defense after each loss, but that's about it.

Kobe also sucks on defense, and he's been a very big part of the problem. As much as I like Metta's defense at times he alone can't make our perimeter defense great. Our PG defense is lowsy as always. We just don't have the personnel.

Anyway, this game was over from the start. You could see our lack of energy as soon as the game started, and Memphis definitely wanted this one badly considering their recent slump.

Fortunately we're still 2.5 up on the Clippers with less road games to play, so we're still sitting pretty for a top 4 seed. The ship has pretty much sailed on catching the Spurs though.


BTW, I hope everyone is happy now that Sessions is starting! Look at how awful our bench has been the past 2 games. They had 22 points COMBINED, whereas with Sessions coming off the bench they scored 31, 30, 29, and 36 points. But oh, he's starting ahead of Blake so everything is peachy, right? The bench absolutely needs a guy like Sessions creating for them. We have no one else to do it. Anyone who campaigned for Sessions to become a starter shouldn't be complaining about how poorly our bench performed, because that's exactly what you were asking for. This is where MB really screwed up. He could have still given the bulk of the minutes to Sessions (30 at least) while having Blake out there with the starters for limited periods of time. The only one that really needed to buy in fully was Kobe, who if you think about it completely negated all the great things that Sessions did against the Jazz and Rockets.

Of all the things that have gone wrong tonight Drew's lack of interest in rebounding really pisses me off. If he had exerted himself half as much in rebounding as on offense maybe we wouldn't be getting our asses kicked.

This has been the story of Bynum for years now. It's not going to change. He wants to be a scorer, not a defensive anchor. He bought in for a few weeks after the All-Star break last season, but that's the only time I've seen him commit to defense for a lengthy period of time. We were downright nasty when he did.

His defense on Allen and Mayo is abysmal, and that hand clap on that 10 footer Allen attempted was just childish.

That might have been the only play from Kobe that made me smile tonight... haha.

Pretty much what I've been thinking. A great defensive system does not equal great defense unless the players are capable of executing said system. We just have bad defensive players. Troy Murphy??? Steve Blake??? Two terrible defensive players getting significant minutes. Kobe??? One of our worst defenders at this stage of his career. Who the hell knows what kind of defense Andrew will give us from night to night, and Pau is just a slightly below average to average defender.

I actually feel like a large part of our defensive "prowess" can be credited to how slow we play. Of course teams are going to score less points the less possessions they get. PPP is what to look at, and I think Memphis scored 116 last night. 116! That's abysmal defense.

I've also been advocating Sessions playing with the second unit. Like someone else said last night, Blake with the starters allows us to HIDE how sucky Blake is. It's clear as day how much he sucks when he plays with the bench, but at least when he's playing with the starters he doesn't hurt us as much.

[semi-sentient]

I can't help but wonder when fans are going to boo Steve Blake off the court, Kwame-style. At least Kwame played good defense and scored efficiently. Blake just flat out doesn't do ****. I think Walton did more than his ass while he was sitting on the bench.

[Jajwanda]

Another question: Why does the team play P and R with McRoberts while Gasol sits in the paint? Wouldn't it be more productive to play P and P with Gasol while McRoberts sits in the paint?

[KB24TBOTB]

Does anyone remember that play when Bynum volleyball spiked the ball instead of grabbing the rebound and then followed with piss poor body language like it was someone else's fault?

[Anklebreaker702]

Does anyone remember that play when Bynum volleyball spiked the ball instead of grabbing the rebound and then followed with piss poor body language like it was someone else's fault?

The pods poor body language to me looked like he was mad at himself for being stupid on that play.

[Anklebreaker702]

@ Semi, you don't get to be the 3rd leading rebounder & top 5 in blocks by being lazy. You guys really make me laugh because once a guy gets a stigma its over. Drew has been great defensively all year & has 3 or 4 bad games & now its back to the same old same o lol

[KB24TBOTB]

Does anyone remember that play when Bynum volleyball spiked the ball instead of grabbing the rebound and then followed with piss poor body language like it was someone else's fault?

The pods poor body language to me looked like he was mad at himself for being stupid on that play.

Oh I wasn't sure of that AB, thanks for clearing it up. I though he was mad at the guards for not being there. One thing that made me happy was that Bynum owned up to his short comings on the defensive end. In his post game interview he said he needs to rebound and defend better, which is a good sign. At least he owns up to his mistakes unlike Kobe

[Anklebreaker702]

Does anyone remember that play when Bynum volleyball spiked the ball instead of grabbing the rebound and then followed with piss poor body language like it was someone else's fault?

The pods poor body language to me looked like he was mad at himself for being stupid on that play.

Oh I wasn't sure of that AB, thanks for clearing it up. I though he was mad at the guards for not being there. One thing that made me happy was that Bynum owned up to his short comings on the defensive end. In his post game interview he said he needs to rebound and defend better, which is a good sign. At least he owns up to his mistakes unlike Kobe

He owned up last game too but I need to see change. Actions speak louder than words.

[Sedale Threatt]

It's just frustrating that we brought in a quality player to fill our biggest need, and it doesn't seem to have made any impact -- 3-3 since we picked him up, including two losses at home. I'm NOT blaming Sessions for that at all, just expressing my disappointment that we're still floundering even after picking up a good player for nothing.

[RamonSessions7]

It's just frustrating that we brought in a quality player to fill our biggest need, and it doesn't seem to have made any impact -- 3-3 since we picked him up, including two losses at home. I'm NOT blaming Sessions for that at all, just expressing my disappointment that we're still floundering even after picking up a good player for nothing.

Yep, and it's not even adapting to a new player which is mainly to blame. He's come in and produced immediately, we're finding ways to lose in spite of our upgrade.

[poorboy]

While I agree there is no reason to be losing games to the middle of the pack teams, something people are forgetting to realize is that although we have adopted a new coach, it does not necessarilly mean we are gonna adopt his philosiphy to go with it.

This is pretty much the same core group that played under Phil and if you remember correctly it was the same thing with him. Alwyays playing down to the level of the comp, and getting up for the big games. Although we all wish it wasn't that way, there is no reason to expect any different.

[DrewBynum77]

@ankle, Bynum's PnR defense still crap. If we want to win we need the bynum that played 20 or so great games after the ASB last season. If he wants to be brooke lopez then we are **** up, no matter how many points he scores... He wastes too much of energy battling on the offensive end then sucks on the defensive end.

Another question: Why does the team play P and R with McRoberts while Gasol sits in the paint? Wouldn't it be more productive to play P and P with Gasol while McRoberts sits in the paint?

mcroberts screens are like TEN TIMES BETTER than any of our bigs.

gasol sets weak-ass/pussylike screens and bynum can't be aggressive because he's too big so refs call the foul on him. that's why.

I like when mcrambis' screens for bryant, he created some dunks for kobe with his screens already, especially on semi-transition when kobe gets the rebound and the D is not completely set.

[DrewBynum77]

It's just frustrating that we brought in a quality player to fill our biggest need, and it doesn't seem to have made any impact -- 3-3 since we picked him up, including two losses at home. I'm NOT blaming Sessions for that at all, just expressing my disappointment that we're still floundering even after picking up a good player for nothing.

nah, sedale. That 3-3 stats is meaningless.

Kobe LOST US TWO GAMES. We were close thanks to sessions when kobe was shooting 6 / 40. Kobe knows this, everyone knows this. He have those kinda of games.

So we are really 3-1 and the sunday loss was on **** matt **** brown for playing blake extended minutes and putting him at SG to guard **** o j mayo.

I'm glad warriors traded Monta, so brown wont put blake to guard monta today. **** idiot.

[semi-sentient]

Yep, Kobe lost us the Jazz and Rockets game. Sessions did his job, as did the bench, but he straight up blew it.

MB screwed up the last one, and I still think it's a mistake moving Blake to the bench. We're not going to win consistently with a bench that scores 10-15 points a game, and our starters are going to be worn down before the playoffs even start.

[DrewBynum77]

we can play a 8 men rotation in the playoffs and we'll be fine.

brown is playing kobe on his 16th season after 50 thousand minutes playing nba basketball near 40min per game so why not play sessions as much as our veteran players?

Minutes distribution in the playoffs:

1 - Sessions: 38~40 + 10~8 minutes for Blake
2 - Kobe: 38~40 + 10~8 for minutes Barnes
3 - Artest 30 + 18 minutes for Barnes
4 - Gasol 28~30 + 20~18 minutes for McBob/Murphy (this is where the failed Beas trade hurt us)
5 - Bynum 36~38 + 12~10 minutes for Gasol (bynum can't play more than 36 efficiently)

That's why, even not being one of the biggest gasol's fan I really didn't want to move him for "pieces".

With him we have 48 minutes of top caliber centers...

[DrewBynum77]

beas is not a great player but he would make our rotation much better

sincerely I trully believe he could be the missing piece after fixing our PG situation in regards to winning another title... Too bad the wolves are idiots. Now he leaves for nothing... idiots...