[InS0mNiAc]

If the lakers wanna win they need to pick up the god damn trash around the net. There were way too many offensive rebounds for the Celtics, 2nd and even 3rd chances.

I still think the Lakers will take the series in 6 but it's not going to be easy now...we need to head back to Boston with nothing but a freight train of momentum

[Brunotheboxer]

Originally Posted by InS0mNiAc

If the lakers wanna win they need to pick up the god damn trash around the net. There were way too many offensive rebounds for the Celtics, 2nd and even 3rd chances.

I still think the Lakers will take the series in 6 but it's not going to be easy now...we need to head back to Boston with nothing but a freight train of momentum

four straight.

[ArmyBimmerDude]

Originally Posted by mrwma237

I am very confused.

Kobe is definitely not Jordan. Kobe Braynt is Kobe Bryant.

So what's your point?

I didn't think this needed a lot of thought. Apparently it does. Most sports outlets are ranking Kobe alongside Jordan. In fact, they're saying that he'll eventually surpass him as the GOAT. Thats my point.

[ArmyBimmerDude]

Originally Posted by Brunotheboxer

I guess what he is trying to say is that Kobe is very good, just not Jordan good and if that Jordan was on this lakers team with the same teammates then maybe the Lakers wouldn't be down zero to two games. but what do i know, i'm from boston and loving it.

Exactly. Jordan would have lit into their asses in the first quarter. There's just no fire on that team besides Kobe and he's not good enough to carry them against the talent Boston has.

[TheAcAvenger]

I really don't understand why so many of you thought a 66 win team that had the best win % against the western conference of any nba team and that was ridiculously dominant at home was going to lose one of its first two home games. And now some of you think they'll lose 3 in a row!? They havent lost 3 in a row since last season. Yes, the Lakers have Gasol now, but how good is Gasol against Garnett. Garnett is bigger, faster, and stronger. At least Bynum could've banged around with him a bit, this is a no contest matchup. Add to the fact that Pierce seems to be doing a decent job of being as productive as Bryant and the Celtics are pretty hard to beat. Yes, we'rel ooking at Phil Jackson vs. Doc Rivers, but we're also looking at Phil Jackson vs. Tom Thibodeau, THE best defensive coordinator in the league bar-none. Unless Odom has a breakout game or Kobe starts being the superman that he is capable of being, the Lakers arent going to win.


And seriously, you'll never beat the Celtics if you give up 21 points to Leon Poe. Are you serious!?

[InS0mNiAc]

Originally Posted by TheAcAvenger

And seriously, you'll never beat the Celtics if you give up 21 points to Leon Poe. Are you serious!?

[darkphantom]

I think they've got a good chance to win the next 3 games at home, what do you think?

I think that 20 point ALMOST come-back was good too...

[JOSG328I]

This series is going 7 games, I am finally starting to see the way the NBA makes these things happen. I mean Refs or no refs there is no excuse for the Lakers lack of penetration and ball movement and rebounding. BUT 38 to 10 on the freethrow line I mean that is insane what a way to ruin a good series.

The ref's in all these playoffs have been terrible and I will say Lakers have benifited at times hint game 4 against the Spurs, Oh yeah what bout Radmonavich walk to the3 basket last night, Lebron's phantom 5 step drive and charge on Pierce. Oh yeah what bout the Piston Celtics series.

This is how the series will go from here game 3 Lakers get the benefit of the calls and the game turns out to be a blow out by say 12 or 15 points.

Game 4 becomes a little bit more highly contested with the Refs calling like game 1 and it goes down to the last 2 mins where the Lakers pull it out in the final minutes with a 5 point victory.

Game 5 the Celtics will come out swingin and Jump on the Lakers early but the Lakers will make a nice come back in the 3rd quarter only to have it fall in the end with the Celtics nailing som clutch 3's to take it back to Boston for game six.

Game 6 the Lakers and Celtics keep it close for most of the night but a couple of questionable calls going in the Lakers favor in the fourth quarter pretty much seal the deal for a game 7.

Game seven I will leave open I think the Refs will finally let them play and it will be a physical blood bath. Winner. I am hoping Lakers take it but I think it will be the Celtics in 7 because two in row in Boston seems like damn near impossible.

[RenaultOne]

One has to admit the officiating in the game was absolutely atrocious. So many no-calls going against the Lakers. Gasol getting hacked by Garnett. The unnecessary technical foul against Kobe. Leon Powe shooting 13 FTs in 21 minutes. I still believe the Lakers can win it all but the refs need to do a better job. I think the refs should allow the game to be more physical. Man I was pissed at the refs last night.

[JOSG328I]

Originally Posted by RenaultOne

One has to admit the officiating in the game was absolutely atrocious. So many no-calls going against the Lakers. Gasol getting hacked by Garnett. The unnecessary technical foul against Kobe. Leon Powe shooting 13 FTs in 21 minutes. I still believe the Lakers can win it all but the refs need to do a better job. I think the refs should allow the game to be more physical. Man I was pissed at the refs last night.

amen

[ironjw]

i wanna bitch slap the refs ... Boston is gonna get their ass handed to them in LA!!

[tryangles]

Originally Posted by ironjw

i wanna bitch slap the refs ... Boston is gonna get their ass handed to them in LA!!

Before the Boston homers kick you while you are down here is a very well though post that puts the Refs biased calling into perspective:

The problem was that the Lakers weren't playing significantly less aggressively than the Celtics, and still got hosed. It's one thing to see teams get the short end of the stick and retreat into a shell. The Lakers, though, continued to go to the rack. Check the shot charts for Lamar Odom and Pau Gasol:

http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/shotch...meId=280608002

Pretty much every shot is in the paint or just outside it - between the two of them, they took 23 shots. 18 of them were within 5 feet of the hoop. They shot 1 foul between them. Look at the comparable shot chart for KG - 2 shots in the paint. 4 free throws. There's getting hosed, and then there's inexplicable.

Don't like ESPN? How about CBS: http://www.sportsline.com/nba/gamece...080608_LAL@BOS

30 shots by LA were layups or dunks. Boston had 18. Let's amend that somewhat by noting that the Celtics were the recipients of a number of 2-shot shooting fouls. They were credited with SEVENTEEN shooting fouls - LA got THREE. If we were to give every one of Boston's 2-shot fouls to the Celtics as a 'layup' or 'dunk' attempt (they had 14), that gives them 32 shots at the rim. Both of LA's two-shot attempts were on layups, I believe (one by Fisher, one by Bryant). That gives LA 32 shots at the rim. Gasol and Odom had 16 of them, and received, again, one foul shot for their troubles.

I'll reiterate simply because it bears repeating: Exactly even at the rim in shot attempts. Seventeen shooting fouls to three. On a night when the two teams took the exact same number of shots at the rim. That's not bad, that's borderline absurd. You pretend like the officiating got better in the second half? First half: 19-2, Boston. Second half: 19-8, Boston. Oh good, the Lakers got 6 extra free throws. "Fouls at the end of the game" don't hold water, because LA only fouled once on Posey - let's take that out. 17-8 in the second half, despite long stretches that saw LA play more at being matadors than at defenders because they were trying to avoid getting called for fouls!

I don't expect LA necessarily be -ahead- in free throws. But one expects them to be within, oh, I don't know, twenty? Fifteen too much to ask, perhaps? You're calling out Odom - maybe he struggled because every time he tried to go in the lane, he got hammered or called for an offensive foul? The same is true of Gasol, who admittedly allowed the officiating to take him out of the game - but it took him out of the game because it was so egregiously bad that he attempted 11 shots right in the paint amidst a significant amount of contact, and was rewarded with one foul shot.

Lost in all of this is the fact that Kobe actually played really well against the "Kobe stopper" Boston defense. 30 points on 23 shots is plenty efficient (that's just as efficient as 39 points on 30 shots, which was how he played in game 5 against the Spurs, when everybody couldn't stop talking about how well he played). He tossed in 8 assists to boot. All this despite being saddled with 3 fouls early, all of which were on the floor. I don't know that being "MVP" is worth the 20 or so FTAs it seemed to be against Utah, but, really, Kobe gets called for ticky-tack stuff 3x in the first half while Leon Powe spends his first 10 minutes in the game shoving Pau Gasol half into the stanchion every time down the court!

The 'comeback' almost buries the story more than it should, because the fact is that the officiating killed the Lakers. It pulled Kobe out of the game early, and as soon as he left the early LA lead evaporated (Lakers were up by 1 when he left, were down by 8 when he returned). When he got his 3rd on yet another nonsense call (I was unaware that being shoved into Paul Pierce by PJ Brown was considered a foul, but hey, I'm not an NBA ref - on the flipside, I can see better than Stevie Wonder, which seems to be something they all lack), the Celtics extended a 7-point lead to 12 at the half. And you're fooling yourself if you don't think that the tight officiating (at the Lakers' end, and ONLY at the Lakers' end, for the 2nd quarter) didn't affect how LA played defense for the remainder of the game.

I got this from this blog here, second comment below

[Sneeze]

I remember when Miami beats Dallas...
Will see how Celtics play here in LA...
Lakers haven't been in crucial game 7 so will see...

[ArmyBimmerDude]

Originally Posted by thr33fivei

I remember when Miami beats Dallas...
Will see how Celtics play here in LA...
Lakers haven't been in crucial game 7 so will see...

You should. It was 2 years ago!

[Mondolemite]

Originally Posted by RenaultOne

One has to admit the officiating in the game was absolutely atrocious. So many no-calls going against the Lakers. Gasol getting hacked by Garnett. The unnecessary technical foul against Kobe. Leon Powe shooting 13 FTs in 21 minutes. I still believe the Lakers can win it all but the refs need to do a better job. I think the refs should allow the game to be more physical. Man I was pissed at the refs last night.

It's nice to blame the refs, that way you don't blame have to players (who played with zero passion/emotion in the most important games of their lives) or the coach (playing Vlad for as long as he did when Pierce can score 30 on him with one arm tied behind his back). I've been watching the Lakers for almost 30 years so I have a pretty good feel for game flow, especially in the playoffs. At no point did the Lakers look like they had control of either game. And, believe it or not, Phil is getting outcoached.

[Brunotheboxer]

I think the Celtics will lose game 3 tonight but all they have to do is win one game of the three in LA. This 2-3-2 format really favors the Celtics right now, because I just cant see them losing three straight games.

[tryangles]

Originally Posted by Mondolemite

It's nice to blame the refs, that way you don't blame have to players (who played with zero passion/emotion in the most important games of their lives) or the coach (playing Vlad for as long as he did when Pierce can score 30 on him with one arm tied behind his back). I've been watching the Lakers for almost 30 years so I have a pretty good feel for game flow, especially in the playoffs. At no point did the Lakers look like they had control of either game. And, believe it or not, Phil is getting outcoached.

- I guess you did not read my post above. Try rebutting any points I put above before putting out a very short sighted non analytical statement. First off, have you seen Doc Rivers coaching record? The guy barely put away Cleveland and ATL! Without the Celts the guy would still be a sub .500 coach. It's one thing to put a whole bunch of talent on a team and watch that talent and home court 'emotion' carry them (See 2007 Dallas Team, 2003 Laker Team and 2000 Portland Team). It's another to actually be 'out coached' by a historically sub .500 coach. These guys have played 2 damn games and all of a sudden they are being 'out coached'? Considering Boston has had a shitty playoff record thus far and has had help to win the last game, there is a financial / controversial stake in taking this series as far as it can go you can sure as bet that BOS will probably not win in LA.

It is way too easy to pick out the guys that actually know and watch basketball on this thread.

[Mondolemite]

Originally Posted by tryangles

- I guess you did not read my post above. Try rebutting any points I put above before putting out a very short sighted non analytical statement. First off, have you seen Doc Rivers coaching record? The guy barely put away Cleveland and ATL! Without the Celts the guy would still be a sub .500 coach. It's one thing to put a whole bunch of talent on a team and watch that talent and home court 'emotion' carry them (See 2007 Dallas Team, 2003 Laker Team and 2000 Portland Team). It's another to actually be 'out coached' by a historically sub .500 coach. These guys have played 2 damn games and all of a sudden they are being 'out coached'? Considering Boston has had a shitty playoff record thus far and has had help to win the last game, there is a financial / controversial stake in taking this series as far as it can go you can sure as bet that BOS will probably not win in LA.

It is way too easy to pick out the guys that actually know and watch basketball on this thread.

First of all, you don't know anything about me so don't comment about how much I know or watch basketball. I've watched all 82 regular season and all post season Laker games for 5 straight years (I missed a couple of games before that) despite going through residency and despite living on the East Coast for 2 years (DirecTV charges extra for Fox Sports). Be mature and keep the discussion non-personal.

Second, saying someone is getting outcoached has nothing to do with what either one of the coaches did in the past. The present is what matters. Besides, I didn't say Doc outcoached Phil, just that Phil is getting outcoached. Someone mentioned Thibodeaux's defensive coaching which was an excellent point.

Phil has done a few uncharacteristic things in the first 2 games in which he has been outcoached (which is NOT to say he will continue to be outcoached). One, not getting the team emotionally prepared to handle this type of series. Two, not making (or sticking with) appropriate defensive adjustments. Three, calling time outs when he would usually let the team play through (this could be either a good or bad change). 4th, getting out of the routine of how Kobe's minutes are distributed (he normally rests at end of the half and beginning of 4th). 5th and most glaring are lack of defensive adjustments combined with poor offensive execution at critical times (maybe Phil's fault, maybe not).

This whole body of work leads to a conclusion of poor coaching FOR THE FIRST 2 GAMES ONLY. Maybe Doc will be exposed for the atrocious coach that he is (and I do believe he is atrocious) but we haven't seen it yet.

What's non-analytical is an assumption that the games are rigged and the vehicle for this conspiracy is the referee. There's a simple statistical concept called "regression to the mean". In this context it means that in all likelihood the Lakers will get more calls than the Celtics in the next couple of games. This is, of course, assuming the Lakers and the Celtics are being equally aggressive which your comment mentioned they have been and I agree with.

As a Laker fan I would root for the Lakers even if they were down 3-0 and 30 points in the 4th quarter. Heck, I was rooting for them when Nick ("the Quick") van Exel and Ceballos were the headliners. But, since I'm not a "fanboy" I can admit when they have played poorly and hope that will change. Here's to game three and some home cookin'.

[mrwma237]

Originally Posted by Brunotheboxer

I guess what he is trying to say is that Kobe is very good, just not Jordan good and if that Jordan was on this lakers team with the same teammates then maybe the Lakers wouldn't be down zero to two games. but what do i know, i'm from boston and loving it.

We would never know how Jordan with do with the current Laker squad. Kobe is very good, just not Jordan good...well that's very debatable, we'd have to define what's 'good'.

Originally Posted by ArmyBimmerDude

I didn't think this needed a lot of thought. Apparently it does. Most sports outlets are ranking Kobe alongside Jordan. In fact, they're saying that he'll eventually surpass him as the GOAT. Thats my point.

Well, it doesn't require much thought. They are two different people. It's just that you're bringing up something so obvious confuses ppl. I actually thought you had a deeper reasoning, I guess not. I think sports outlets are doing comparisons between KB and MJ from a statistical standpoint. It's kind of redundant to think one can not have exact stats as another player in the NBA.

[mrwma237]

Originally Posted by Mondolemite

First of all, you don't know anything about me so don't comment about how much I know or watch basketball. I've watched all 82 regular season and all post season Laker games for 5 straight years (I missed a couple of games before that) despite going through residency and despite living on the East Coast for 2 years (DirecTV charges extra for Fox Sports). Be mature and keep the discussion non-personal.

Second, saying someone is getting outcoached has nothing to do with what either one of the coaches did in the past. The present is what matters. Besides, I didn't say Doc outcoached Phil, just that Phil is getting outcoached. Someone mentioned Thibodeaux's defensive coaching which was an excellent point.

Phil has done a few uncharacteristic things in the first 2 games in which he has been outcoached (which is NOT to say he will continue to be outcoached). One, not getting the team emotionally prepared to handle this type of series. Two, not making (or sticking with) appropriate defensive adjustments. Three, calling time outs when he would usually let the team play through (this could be either a good or bad change). 4th, getting out of the routine of how Kobe's minutes are distributed (he normally rests at end of the half and beginning of 4th). 5th and most glaring are lack of defensive adjustments combined with poor offensive execution at critical times (maybe Phil's fault, maybe not).

This whole body of work leads to a conclusion of poor coaching FOR THE FIRST 2 GAMES ONLY. Maybe Doc will be exposed for the atrocious coach that he is (and I do believe he is atrocious) but we haven't seen it yet.

What's non-analytical is an assumption that the games are rigged and the vehicle for this conspiracy is the referee. There's a simple statistical concept called "regression to the mean". In this context it means that in all likelihood the Lakers will get more calls than the Celtics in the next couple of games. This is, of course, assuming the Lakers and the Celtics are being equally aggressive which your comment mentioned they have been and I agree with.

As a Laker fan I would root for the Lakers even if they were down 3-0 and 30 points in the 4th quarter. Heck, I was rooting for them when Nick ("the Quick") van Exel and Ceballos were the headliners. But, since I'm not a "fanboy" I can admit when they have played poorly and hope that will change. Here's to game three and some home cookin'.

[tryangles]

Originally Posted by Mondolemite

First of all, you don't know anything about me so don't comment about how much I know or watch basketball. I've watched all 82 regular season and all post season Laker games for 5 straight years (I missed a couple of games before that) despite going through residency and despite living on the East Coast for 2 years (DirecTV charges extra for Fox Sports). Be mature and keep the discussion non-personal.

Second, saying someone is getting outcoached has nothing to do with what either one of the coaches did in the past. The present is what matters. Besides, I didn't say Doc outcoached Phil, just that Phil is getting outcoached. Someone mentioned Thibodeaux's defensive coaching which was an excellent point.

Phil has done a few uncharacteristic things in the first 2 games in which he has been outcoached (which is NOT to say he will continue to be outcoached). One, not getting the team emotionally prepared to handle this type of series. Two, not making (or sticking with) appropriate defensive adjustments. Three, calling time outs when he would usually let the team play through (this could be either a good or bad change). 4th, getting out of the routine of how Kobe's minutes are distributed (he normally rests at end of the half and beginning of 4th). 5th and most glaring are lack of defensive adjustments combined with poor offensive execution at critical times (maybe Phil's fault, maybe not).

This whole body of work leads to a conclusion of poor coaching FOR THE FIRST 2 GAMES ONLY. Maybe Doc will be exposed for the atrocious coach that he is (and I do believe he is atrocious) but we haven't seen it yet.

What's non-analytical is an assumption that the games are rigged and the vehicle for this conspiracy is the referee. There's a simple statistical concept called "regression to the mean". In this context it means that in all likelihood the Lakers will get more calls than the Celtics in the next couple of games. This is, of course, assuming the Lakers and the Celtics are being equally aggressive which your comment mentioned they have been and I agree with.

As a Laker fan I would root for the Lakers even if they were down 3-0 and 30 points in the 4th quarter. Heck, I was rooting for them when Nick ("the Quick") van Exel and Ceballos were the headliners. But, since I'm not a "fanboy" I can admit when they have played poorly and hope that will change. Here's to game three and some home cookin'.

Point taken. Here is to the Lakers taking these home games.

[1cleanm6]

Guys i was real confident in the lakers winning atleast one of the first two games and bringing it back 1-1. However i dont know, the lakers team besides Kobe is not stepping up. Kobe and fisher and maybe sasha. However i love it when Kobe gets very mad. Like he did in the 4th quarter, Kobe can definately not be stopped by the Celtics when he is mad. I wish they get him mad for the rest of the games, because he is a good threat that cant be stopped!!

GO LAKERS!!