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True.
Lakers need Odom AND Ariza.
If they win it all this season then I think both will end up staying. Buss has said all along that he will pay the money if he thinks he has a real championship caliber team. The Lakers are proving that they really don't need to tweak their roster too much to remain at a high level next season.
Their top priorities should be to find a replacement PG for Fisher and a real 3pt sniper to bring in off the bench.
Farmar, Vujacic, and Powell are all expendable and should be dumped from the team next season.
True.
I think some of this multiple le talk is premature though.
(dont bring up my CLE predictions plz)
One trade or two can vault some teams into challenging the Lakers. The Cavs have some expiring contracts to dangle next year and if they can somehow turn it into a solid front court player they can challenge the Lakers IMO.
Healthy Boston... hhmm probably depends on how strong KG's knee is next year.
And then we have the Mavs, who will raid some franchises for star players and challenge the Lakers as well. But Kobe has always been a problem for us.
Houston has T-Mac's expiring. Although the durability of Yao causes me to wonder whether they can take the next step.
I'll wait until the player movement of the offseason before making predictions about next year. Although there doesn't appear to be a challenger in the West within the next 2-3 years (except for the Mavs).
I think Boston will go even further on their regression as their big 3 are getting older and more prone to injuries, though Rondo is still young and other young talents will still keep their team a compe ive contender in the East. The Cavs are craps without Crab, but Crab has definitely considered leaving Cleverland since quitting the ECF with a 2-4 series lose to Magic. Maybe the Cavs can still dominate the eastern conference in the regular season next season, but they will never be close to the finals if they can't get a scoring power in their paint, and that's the problem for many other teams including our beloved boys in blue.
Except for the Mavs in 06, no other jump shooting team has ever won a championship. A team consisting of jump shooters may be able to earn the top seed with the best records for regular season, but it's almost impossible for such a team to go far in the post season where the jump shooters will get as much restriction as they can get from tougher defensive pressure around the middle and long range, while a paint scorer can draw fouls if the defense comes too physical and continue to make consistent points at the line. With the beefy body and supreme size, Crab can also drop a lot of points in paint but his efforts will never make up the defiency of Varajoo and Ben, who are both incompe ive on the offensive end. Z used to be a decent scorer in paint when he was young, but his age and the pile of injury has made him even more unreliable. Hickson may be a savior for the Cavs, however, Mike Brown just somehow refuses to give him a chance.
Our boys in blue are gonne make surges next season only if Donnie Nelson redeems his former mistakes in this offseason by making some good moves, hopefully we can get a decent center from the moves he is about to make this summer, though that fool hasn't made such a good trade for a very long while.
The biggest reason why I think it's gonna be pretty much status quo next year is because teams are doing the 2010 plan.
Most teams stuck to their plan for this long, they'll ride out 2009/10 for the Free Agent Jackpot next summer. A GM would have to be really short-sighted to blow their wad now on 3rd tier stars like Boozer.
I think the Lakers still need to make some changes for next year even if they win the championship.
uhm. why?
LA is far from over the hill.
Well, we need to find a PG, Fisher is through. And our best three point shooter right now is Ariza, which is sketchy and the guy that is supposed to be our true three point shooter, Sasha, can't throw the ball in the ocean right now. So those two things would be nice but if we can find a way to resign Lamar, Shannon and Trevor I'll be a happy camper.
obviously powell will just be dropped but sasha and farmar will be tough to deal
Bump. GJ Lakers, better executed and physical team won this series. I hope you guys are ready to defend that le next year.
This guy knows what he is on about. I thought the Spurs needed to bring in Scola and add some youth after we won a couple of years ago, but Pop bought back the same team and we got beaten by a younger more athletic Lakers team (with the help of a Gasol trade and an injured Manu).
Poor comparison. The Lakers are clearly the best team this year, in 2007 it's debatable if we were. The Mavs had our number, beating them would have been a challenge.
The Lakers will make the right moves, they almost always do.
We weren't that far off of LA last season. Had they no have gotten Gasol and if Manu was not injured they may have already lost to us last season and blown up the team.
The Spurs definitely would have been better if they retooled after the Championship. Bringing in Scola and even Mason Jr last season could have helped us tremendously.
Plus the Lakers were not clearly the better team this season. How can you say that when Houston took them to 7 games with out Yao Ming, you know one of the best centers in the NBA.
Last edited by Ice009; 06-12-2009 at 11:33 PM.
At least they didn't lose in the 1st round to the Dallas Mavericks.Plus the Lakers were not clearly the better team this season. How can you say that when Houston took them to 7 games with out Yao Ming, you know one of the best centers in the NBA
You'd hope not when players are gifted to you - that would be almost as bad as being 50% in finals appearances.
But not nearly as bad as missing the playoffs/losing in the first round over 50% of the time.
And yeah, if Manu were healthy AND Bynum was injured AND we didnt have Gasol the Spurs might have won assuming they had HCA because Bynum was injured from midseason.
Congrats to the Lakers. The most talented team won it all. Props to the players, coaches, management and Jerry West for trading for Kobe Bryant, drafting Derek Fisher, etc.
The Lakers win this championship and the series without Fisher and his shot. But thanks Jerry.
Fisher is the veteran leader that keeps Kobe in check and doesn't allow any malignancy to grow. Laker Fan doesn't really understand a team concept but that's the way your team chemistry is aligned.
I understand team chemistry just fine. And Fisher didn't stop the malignancy to grow with Kobe/Shaq.
Fact is Fisher is a clutch a player but sucks the other 46 minutes of the game. He was outplayed by Farmar/Brown most of the playoffs and the Lakers would have won just as easily without him. Next year the Lakers main concern will be upgrading the PG position because Fisher isn't very good anymore. He can lead from the bench as a player or coach and come into the game whenever the Lakers need some miracle three pointer.
Not a surprising take.
I'll take that as a compliment from you. The guy who said this Lakers team would beat Orlando without Kobe.Fisher's veteran leadership would have lead them to victory of course.
Please don't tell me you are a Kobe Fan who is going to pretend everyone else on the Lakers sucks.I'll take that as a compliment from you. The guy who said this Lakers team would beat Orlando without Kobe.
Sorry timvp, but Fisher sucks ass.
Congrats to that POS Kobe on winning his first ring.
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