Three Ways to (Beat / Lose) (the / to the) (Spurs / Lakers)

Haha…that’s how it goes, right?

Seem to remember you saying something similiar when the Hornets were up 2-0.

Nice to you know that you don’t mind repeating yourself or changing alliances when it comes to hating on the Spurs.

Aside from that, it’s a pleasure to have you on the site. Thanks for coming around.

Hey all,

Just got home from Staples Center. I don’t even know where to begin. The crowd was almost non-existent at times and absolutely crazy at others. The MVP chants late in the game were the loudest I have ever heard. There are a million ways to describe what happened. I feel like a genius in some ways and like an idiot in others. I thought the Lakers would win and that Kobe would play like and MVP. I guess I was right there. I also thought the X-Factors would be Odom and Fisher. Oops, ef’d that one up. As a Laker fan I have to say that Fisher sucked, Odom sucked, Walton sucked, we couldn’t hit a wide open shot to save our lives, we couldn’t guard Duncan to save our lives, and we still won. I wouldn’t expect some of those same thing to keep happening. However you can flip that and say that Parker can shut down Fisher, whoever took Odom can shut him down, etc. and that things look bad for the Lakers. Like I said I don’t really know what to think. I thought the Gasol/Duncan matchup played out about as I expected. Parker kind of disappeared in the second half. Ginobili did not play particularly well. According to the aftergame show here in LA on the radio, it was due to Vujacic playing good defense but it is hard to tell from my nosebleed seats. Flea from RHCP called in and that was great, he is a big Laker/Basketball fan and it is nice to see some celebrities aren’t above talking with the little people.

Refereeing seemed to be pretty decent/equal from my seats, but I am sure you have a different perspective on that one. I will watch Tivo’d TNT broadcast tomorrow and see how it looked on TV.

I think we can safely say this will probably go 5 games now. LOL.

Not sure why Trevor Ariza was in a suit tonight, but I guess I will find out later.

Didn’t mean to steal your thunder by making most of the same comments you did—but I do have one new thing to add, truthsquid isn’t a Laker fan; he’s an old angry bitter Suns fan/Spurs hater following us from series to series, wishing/praying that someone, anyone knocks off the Spurs since his team couldn’t.

Nixiack,

I kind of ripped one of your posts on the 2nd half game thread. (apologizing for the tone, not the content).

As for the sleepy fans, etc. like I said yesterday those aren’t really fans, they are all corporate seats, perks from movie studios, etc. They are there to be seen and look good. Did you see the face value on those tickets $3,300 (that’s face value!!!) I have sat in those seats and believe me most of them don’t know crap about basketball. Make you a deal. You don’t judge laker fans by the courtside sitting, rich, pampered celebrities that you see on TV and I wont judge spurs fans by some of the idiots crashing the Laker blog at LA Times. (One goes by Spurs4Life and I think he is from here). And yes I know some of our crashers are asses too, I am just saying…...........

As far as Phil Jackson’s strategy for Game 2. Don’t expect any changes. If I have one gripe about PJ (and I have many) it is that he is a bit stubborn/slow with making changes in-game or in-series. Maybe play Trevor Ariza, but other than that I don’t know. Funny thing is I think both teams fans think their team played like crap. (and I think both are right) So I don’t know if we really learned anything about the match-up. I do think we learned a little about the troops, but not necessarily the war.

As for what went right/wrong. Whew, where to start. The good: Kobe can and will score if he needs to and he seems to be committed to involving his teammates in the game. Vujacic seems like he is ready to play (although he is always good at Home and bad on the road). Pau looked decent after the first few minutes of confusion and apprehension. The bad: Duncan is going to kill us each and every game. Period. The Lakers played the first 2.5 quarters with no passion or sense of urgency (as usual) and that crap won’t cut it against the Spurs. Tony Parker will kill us each and every game as well. I knew he would but I thought Fisher would play better on the offensive end and cancel him out a little bit. (not totally of course.

There are just so many ways to view that game I am not sure what we learned. Like I said, I think both teams played well and bad at the same time. Maybe Game 2 will tell. I will not be at Game 2 so I hope I was not the good luck charm…..

See ya tomorrow. And sorry again for the tone of the other post, I just think your analysis was extremely myopic. (what a pathetic apology) LOL

By no excuses, is “Well, we weren’t at full strength because no Bynum” included? Or is that charge just for SPURS fans?

I was merely commenting on the fact that almost everywhere else, when you see an arena the people are glued/tuned into watching the court, what’s going on with it. When the team is doing great/holding things together, they cheer loud, when the team is down, they do the D-Fense! things, etc…when the team is up, they are rowdy.

The Staples Center crowd, through 3 1/2 quarters, were talking on cell phones, primping, taking pictures of things NOT on the court, talking to other people, ASLEEP!!! etc….anything but actually watching a basketball game. The only people I saw that consistently were cheering, are the poor people (literally, from what I saw from pslakerfan..ouch man!) that were in the nosebleed seats, desperately trying anything to help will their beloved team to a win. Even the annoucers were like “wow, it’s like the Spurs are playing at home…or in a backyard!” The NO crowd had on the same things(sea of yellow or white, it looked cool), didn’t sit until the Hornets scored thier first bucket, cheered like mad, booed the Spurs relentlessly every time they touched the ball (Games 2, 5 and 7) and it just generally felt like a hostile place. Compared to that, Staples Center was a breeze to play in.

That’s why I was commenting like I did. No harm mate, no harm :)

Then why were they booing their own team when the Spurs had a big lead?