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What a crock of crap article.
The Gasol collusion and Derek Swisher for free were 95% of what propelled the .500 Kobees to make the playoffs and advance.
Now Bynum, props to Buss Jr. for that.
Dunno if D228 posted this before, but looks like a great article.
http://sports.yahoo.com/nba/news?slu...yhoo&type=lgns
PHOENIX – Shaquille O’Neal walked off the Phoenix Suns’ practice court and into the arms of Phil Jackson, wrapping his old coach in a hug. He whispered a few words in Jackson’s ear then gave him a kiss that left sweat pooling on Jackson’s cheek and brow. “You know I wouldn’t do you like that,” O’Neal cooed.
This is how it goes with Shaq. He raps about Kobe Bryant smelling his ass. He calls San Antonio Spurs coach Gregg Popovich a coward. He says Jackson orchestrated the riff between him and Kobe. And then he says he was joking or taken out of context, or both. He’s forever 36 going on 13, and that’s what makes him so lovable. The Big Eraser, making history then deleting it as he sees fit.
By the time Kobe and Phil arrived at US Airways Center Thursday evening, Shaq had already waxed nostalgic about his time with the Los Angeles Lakers. Kobe? He and Kobe never had problems. Kobe called him fat and he called Kobe selfish, but evidently those were just terms of endearment. Phil? How could he ever say anything bad about Phil? Phil always took care of him. Had the three of them stayed together, Shaq guesses they would have won several more championships.
Bryant didn’t spend nearly as much time reminiscing, and there’s a reason for that: Why waste time dwelling on the past when your future looks so bright?
After Thursday’s 105-92 rout of the Phoenix Suns, the biggest question facing the Lakers is whether they’ll find someone in the Western Conference to challenge them. Extending the search into Utah’s Wasatch Mountains might be the last hope for locating a worthy rival.
“I was telling Luke [Walton] that this might be the first season I average 31 minutes because we’ve been blowing people out,” Bryant said. “I’ve been sitting the whole fourth quarter. That’s pretty amazing.”
The Lakers can thank O’Neal for that. His departure gave them the flexibility to create this impressive roster. O’Neal has the one championship he added to his résumé since leaving Los Angeles, but the Lakers aren’t exactly crying about the terms of their breakup.
The popular theory suggests that had the Lakers kept O’Neal they would have won at least one more le. But even that might be a stretch. Their last championship came in 2002 and making the ’04 NBA Finals required Derek Fisher’s .4 miracle. By then, the Lakers’ supporting cast had begun to show its age.
On Thursday, Jackson said the decision to trade O’Neal was “purely an economic situation with our owner.” Had O’Neal lowered his asking price for a contract extension, Jackson said, he would likely still be a Laker, regardless of his ongoing feud with Bryant.
“It wasn’t anything about their personalities,” Jackson said.
Few people believe that. Bryant was a free agent that summer, and despite his assertion otherwise, it was widely assumed he would have left had O’Neal stayed. As it was, he almost left anyway, flirting with both the Chicago Bulls and the neighboring Clippers.
With O’Neal’s salary no longer clogging their salary cap, the Lakers set about building the league’s deepest roster. They missed the playoffs their first season without Shaq, but that netted them the lottery pick to use on Andrew Bynum. Give credit to Lakers GM Mitch Kupchak and his front-office staff. Kupchak made one mistake, trading Caron Butler to the Washington Wizards for Kwame Brown, and he cleaned that up last season when Brown helped land Pau Gasol. After Bryant chafed at the length of the rebuilding process, Kupchak brought back Fisher – who had left in the summer of 2004 for a lucrative contract with the Golden State Warriors – to give the team another veteran guide.
“We were all at different places in our careers and it’s very difficult to try and keep that together,” Fisher said. “Think about where we are now compared to then …
“The three years I was away from the Lakers just gave me a greater appreciation for where we are now and the value that you feel as an athlete when you are a winner. Nothing replaces that. There’s no contract, no amount of money that replaces the feeling of being the best.”
O’Neal knows the feeling. Now he finds himself staring up at the Lakers. With eight victories in their first 12 games, the Suns had hoped to measure themselves against the conference’s defending champs. Turns out they needed an odometer rather than a yardstick.
While most West teams would be happy to own an 8-5 record, the Suns admit they’re still searching for an iden y, caught between their seven-seconds-or-less past and new coach Terry Porter’s insistence they pound the ball into O’Neal. In the process, they have marginalized Steve Nash. On Thursday, he didn’t score his first points until midway through the third quarter. Raja Bell, who has previously questioned the new inside-out philosophy, politely declined to answer any questions about the Suns’ offense, adhering to the age-old wisdom that if you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all.
O’Neal naturally has no problem with the ball going to him, claiming the only thing separating him from his Lakers days is “lesser shots.” “For an old man,” he said, “I still demand a double- and triple-team.”
O’Neal does do that on occasion. But as well as he’s played this season, the Suns can’t depend on him to be a game-changing force every night, at least not until they learn to better space their offense around him. The Lakers swarmed O’Neal often Thursday and the Suns didn’t make them pay. Afterward, O’Neal gave a gracious nod to his opponent.
“They’re the best team,” O’Neal said.
That says something about how far the Lakers have come. For now, Shaq can answer the what-ifs. Kobe doesn’t need to look back on his glory days. Not with so many more seemingly still ahead of him.
What a crock of crap article.
The Gasol collusion and Derek Swisher for free were 95% of what propelled the .500 Kobees to make the playoffs and advance.
Now Bynum, props to Buss Jr. for that.
^^^ hate much!!!! savor that 1 point victory all you can
Hate to agree with you, but it's inevitable man (for some people).
Deal with reality much. Shaq had two years left on his Laker contract. The following two years Miami did the EC Finals and then won it all vs Dallas. Meanwhile the Kobees were .500 three years in a row.
Fabricate all you want.
You Laker sheep will swill whatever it takes to believe it was some *great front office move(s)*.
It's not shaq's trade that makes lakers have a brighter future. what that trade brought lakers were just odom/caron butler/grant and a 1st rounder, now odom is the only thing left on lakers team but he is gonna become free this summer. butler didn't show his talent in LA so that he was traded to D.C for Kwame brown who has already left LA for Detroit, grant has retired and Odom is gonna leave lakers before long.
I'm afraid the spurs wouldn't have won 4rings if shaq had remained in LA, Kobe can't do that without shaq as shaq said. Trading shaq makes spurs' future brighter, not the lakers'.
shaq + kobe were unstoppable
too bad egos got the better of them
Imagine where the Lakers would be right now if they demanded Dwayne Wade coming back instead of LO and Caron. Riley is on record as saying he would have done it had the Lakers held out long enough.
Kobe Bryant. Dwayne Wade. Do you really need much of a team beyond this?
shaq of his prime = TD n Webber
shaq of today < yao and me
So Odom is left. You mentioned that Caron was traded for Kwame. Did you forget that Kwame was traded for Pau Gasol?
About Spurs not wining 4 rings if Shaq stayed...did you guys forget that Shaq and Kobe LOST 2 years in a row before Shaq was traded. You guys act like the Lakers won a championship then traded Shaq. Both guys wanted a big contract. How would the Lakers get any better with a salary like that. The Lakers lost to the Spurs, then to got owned by Detroit...a shake up was gonna happen eventually, and to be honest, im impressed that it only took 3 years for us to rebuild.
shaq brought three championships to the lakers and revitalized the franchise after years of mediocrity. he was voted mvp along with three finals mvp while bringing home to los angeles three championship trophies. the lakers then rewarded shaq by trading him.
damn, kobe and wade huh. thats just not fair (good thing it didnt happen!)
I've never seen such idiotic revisionist history in my life. I shouldn't expect any better from misinformed Spurs fans though. They've only been following the NBA since 1999.
Shaq was a cancer. He managed to piss of the owner Jerry Buss and publicly called him out during a pre-season game saying "pay me my ing money". If there's one thing you don't do, you don't piss off Buss. He's a reasonable guy but he'd had enough of Shaq and his primadonna ways. Shaq wanted to be payed $30 million a year, Kobe wanted $20.....that doesn't leave much room to build a team.
Letting Shaq go was the right move to make. Letting him go for Caron+LO was the wrong move to make. Kupchak should have demanded Wade.
did i revise history? did shaq not really bring los angeles three trophies? did lakers really not suck before the arrival of shaq? did shaq not win mvp and 3 finals mvp as a laker? did he not revitalize the lakers franchise and bring back the team's relevance?
Fixed.Trading for Shaq brightened future for Heat
What exactly have the Lakers done since trading Shaq?
"Are you ing kidding me? [The Lakers] should ship out Bynum." - Kobe
Yeah, I see your point.
Last edited by Cry Havoc; 01-18-2009 at 04:37 AM.
It's called rebuilding you stupid . And they bounced your sorry ass team last season without Bynum or Ariza.
I swear to God people hold the Lakers to some ungodly standards. They apparently aren't allowed to rebuild, miss the playoffs, or lose in the Finals.
You should be worrying about your own franchise because in a few years the show will be over (if it isn't already) and you will have to cheer for a cellar-dwellar until you can tank a season in hopes of drafting the next Tim Duncan. We'll see how long it takes for your team to get back on top, if they ever.
Calling the owner of this site a "stupid " has to make you a super, super-intelligent person. And if Gasol hadn't been gifted to you, all this rebuilding would have been good for about 6th place in the Western Conference and the Lakers would still be a doormat in the playoffs.
The audacity of some Lakers fans is beyond comprehension.
I've never seen someone on one of their legends the way s bag Laker fans do. You put any player other than Duncan in Shaq's place on those Laker teams of 1998-2004 and they never sniff a Finals, much less a le. About the only thing the Shaq trade did was get them Bynum when they went into the lottery.
Actually it was called collusion and Derek Fisher throwing his own sick kid under the bus to get back to the Lakers.
Didn't see that one coming.
The Spurs will eventually suck. Great take. Never thought of that.
Luckily for you, at that point you will be justifying the Lakers trading Kobe by saying he never was any good. Or you'll just become a Cavs fan.
Lie. Trading Shaq was dumb and the Lakers knew it. Blame your superstar, Kobe Bryant for being such an asshole.
Here's a couple of posts that relate to things in this current discussion that I made in another thread. they didn't get any replies:
http://www.spurstalk.com/forums/show...0&postcount=27
http://www.spurstalk.com/forums/show...6&postcount=29
Reminder, Kobe can and will win without Shaq, the only question to be answered is when.
I wanted to keep Shaq. I think LA could have had two more les by now if they kept Shaq.
Shaq left the lakers after that dominating performance TD put on him. Couldn't stand the embarrassment so he went to the east.
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