I think it's time to accept that the "Basketball Gods" love the Los Angeles Lakers.

[cobbler]

I'm just glad Malone didn't get a ring.

Other than it cost the Lakers, I am too. I had a hard time dealing with him being on the team. Served us right. Payton and Malone? Arrrghhh.

[4>0rings]

I'm just glad Malone didn't get a ring.

Me too. If he did, there would be a lot more people siding with Malone being the best PF of all time over Timmy.

[midnightpulp]

Magic and Scott go down in 89
Malone in 04
Bynum & Ariza in 08


not to mention all the early years with Baylors many issues


Luck is definetly a factor in winning championships. The Lakers have had it go both ways many times.


...and here we are weeks before the playoffs and all you got left is wheelchair smack. God, it's great being a Laker fan!

Magic and Scott go down in 89: Toss up.
Malone in 04: Wouldn't have mattered. Pistons were clearly the better team.
Bynum & Ariza in 08: Toss up.

I'm not Hobbler for the record. Not me using the wheelchair smack.

[LkrFan]

Me too. If he did, there would be a lot more people siding with Malone being the best PF of all time over Timmy.

Not educated fans. Timmy D > Malone. He even went through Malone to get a few of his rings. Malone was a better scorer, but Timmy D beasted him on everything else. I hear what you are saying though.

[LkrFan]

Magic and Scott go down in 89: Toss up.

The Lakers just beat them WITH Magic and Scott the year before. Are you sure about this statement?

Malone in 04: Wouldn't have mattered. Pistons were clearly the better team.

Bull . Malone played really good defense that year and was a threat offensively. He went down and the Lakers had Slava Medvedenko against Sheed and Big Ben.

Bynum & Ariza in 08: Toss up.

Toss up my ass. No Ariza meant PP was being guarded by Vlad Rad and Luke. Results: Finals MVP. No Bynum meant Pau (who just got his Finals cherry popped) had to guard Porkins, KG, or PJ Brown. All 3 were tougher than Pau. Fast forward to 2010. Bynum (even on a gimpy leg) was enough to get the Lakers over the hump. If he were healthy in 2008, it would have been a different story. Remember the Laker blew a 24 point lead in game 2.

I'm not Hobbler for the record. Not me using the wheelchair smack.

For once you are being classy. Good job.

[Donkeybong]

The 2004 Finals were to go through. Divine intervention my ass. We just have an organization that knows what they are doing and blessed to be in one of the most desirable destinations in the world.

[cobbler]

Magic and Scott go down in 89: Toss up.
Malone in 04: Wouldn't have mattered. Pistons were clearly the better team.
Bynum & Ariza in 08: Toss up.

I'm not Hobbler for the record. Not me using the wheelchair smack.

Sure your not.

And regardless whether you call it a toss up or not, the Lakers were favored to win in all 3 and were right there in the thick of it when the injuries hit. They happen and they lost. It doesn't diminish the Celtics or Pistons championships. It's part of the game. It's that 17th that the boys are reclaiming shortly.

[TE]

And San Antonio won't understand what a Super Bowl or World Series championship is like. Get over it.

Cool and all. But an NBA championship is different from a Super Bowl and World Series. Hornets = Never have won a championship, this is a basketball discussion. Get out.

[LnGrrrR]

this thread, tbh. There's no "divine intervention". It's a mix of luck, good drafting, and good coaching.

Lakers are beatable, just like any other team. No excuses.

[Pelicans78]

Cool and all. But an NBA championship is different from a Super Bowl and World Series. Hornets = Never have won a championship, this is a basketball discussion. Get out.

A championship is a championship to me.

[LkrFan]

this thread, tbh. There's no "divine intervention". It's a mix of luck, good drafting, and good coaching.

The Lakers are unbeatable and I should have been a Laker fan. They are not just like any other team. They make no excuses for kicking the Celtics' ass.

I agree.

[LnGrrrR]

I agree.

Subtle, you .

[Cane]

Laker fans have known this for a long time ( , Jerry Buss even said, "God is a Lakers fan"), and it's something us fans of rival teams always intuited but never really accepted. Timvp was the first one on Spurstalk to throw his hands up in the air, proclaiming, "God loves Kobe Bryant," and by extension, the Lakers.

Consider this thread my Timvp moment. Ever since the Lakers hijacked the draft rights to Magic Johnson, (itself the result of a lucky chain of events) things just continue to fall into place for this team year after year after year. It doesn't matter what moves other teams make, who their rosters are, how good they're playing, etc. Lebron James and Dwight Howard could suddenly defect to the Celtics, Spurs, or Mavs, and you can guarantee that they'll get injured before the Finals.

Here the Mavs were arguably the best team in the league, playing very good defense and rolling. And with the addition of Chandler, many believed they were the Lakers biggest threat out West. So what happens? Caron Butler, their best perimeter defender goes down with a season ending injury.

Then there's the Celtics. The only team to defeat the Gasol-era Lakers in the past 3 years. Many believed with the addition of Shaq and Jermaine O'Neal, they were the Lakers primary threat to dethrone the reigning back-to-back champs. So what happens? Both injured. Then, in a move that leaves many Celtics fans scratching their heads, Ainge decides to trade away the team's best interior defender. You can attribute this to Ainge's stupidity or impetuousness or the FO's unwilling to pay, but it's simply the basketball gods looking out for their number one team again.

Moving on to the Spurs. I'm not a blind a homer, so I believed the Spurs had about a 20% to 30% chance to knock off the Lakers if they meet in the playoffs, provided the Spurs have HCA and everyone's healthy. Now with Duncan's injury, I don't see him being 100% for that series, which all but wipes out any chance the Spurs had, not to mention there's now a likely possibility that the Lakers could steal the number one overall seed.

Meanwhile in stick land, the Lakers are 100% healthy.

Now Lakers homers will definitely cite Bynum and Ariza's '08 injuries as an example of some of their own bad luck. Horse . If Bynum doesn't get injured in '08, I don't see Mitch trading for Gasol. They were first in the West (after playing the softest schedule in the league up to that point, with all of their losses coming to contending teams, so I don't wanna hear any Lakers homers saying, "We were good before the Gasol trade. He didn't take us over the top!!!11"), so I don't see the Lakers FO mashing the panic button at that point and making any significant moves.

Consider this my retirement post from Laker and Laker fan hating. It's futile to hate and wish defeat for something that has divine intervention on its side. It can't be beaten, no matter how much you protest. It's more prudent to accept certainty (Death, Taxes, and Laker Luck) than it is to expend the energy fighting it.

And I don't even believe in the divine.

Lakers are not currently 100% healthy . Bynum's still taking meds for his knee and just a week or so ago Bryant was reeling in pain over his ankle and is probably dealing with all sorts of nagging injuries.

But the Lakers can be seen as the NBA's favored son starting all the way from Jerry West winning the Finals MVP even though he was on the losing team to this current NBA squad that has faced the fewest amount of back to back games in the league. But they did run into a pretty rough stretch in the 90's (especially Magic)

[LkrFan]

Subtle, you .

[Baron Davιs]

OP obviously bitter and uses this bull to justify the inevitable of Lakers winning another ship.


PATHETIC

[TheManFromAcme]

And I don't even believe in the divine.

wtf?

How can you believe in divine intervention when you don't even believe in the divine?

[rayjayjohnson]

God must love to forgive rapists then

[Koolaid_Man]

Laker fans have known this for a long time ( , Jerry Buss even said, "God is a Lakers fan"), and it's something us fans of rival teams always intuited but never really accepted. Timvp was the first one on Spurstalk to throw his hands up in the air, proclaiming, "God loves Kobe Bryant," and by extension, the Lakers.

Consider this thread my Timvp moment. Ever since the Lakers hijacked the draft rights to Magic Johnson, (itself the result of a lucky chain of events) things just continue to fall into place for this team year after year after year. It doesn't matter what moves other teams make, who their rosters are, how good they're playing, etc. Lebron James and Dwight Howard could suddenly defect to the Celtics, Spurs, or Mavs, and you can guarantee that they'll get injured before the Finals.

Here the Mavs were arguably the best team in the league, playing very good defense and rolling. And with the addition of Chandler, many believed they were the Lakers biggest threat out West. So what happens? Caron Butler, their best perimeter defender goes down with a season ending injury.

Then there's the Celtics. The only team to defeat the Gasol-era Lakers in the past 3 years. Many believed with the addition of Shaq and Jermaine O'Neal, they were the Lakers primary threat to dethrone the reigning back-to-back champs. So what happens? Both injured. Then, in a move that leaves many Celtics fans scratching their heads, Ainge decides to trade away the team's best interior defender. You can attribute this to Ainge's stupidity or impetuousness or the FO's unwilling to pay, but it's simply the basketball gods looking out for their number one team again.

Moving on to the Spurs. I'm not a blind a homer, so I believed the Spurs had about a 20% to 30% chance to knock off the Lakers if they meet in the playoffs, provided the Spurs have HCA and everyone's healthy. Now with Duncan's injury, I don't see him being 100% for that series, which all but wipes out any chance the Spurs had, not to mention there's now a likely possibility that the Lakers could steal the number one overall seed.

Meanwhile in stick land, the Lakers are 100% healthy.

Now Lakers homers will definitely cite Bynum and Ariza's '08 injuries as an example of some of their own bad luck. Horse . If Bynum doesn't get injured in '08, I don't see Mitch trading for Gasol. They were first in the West (after playing the softest schedule in the league up to that point, with all of their losses coming to contending teams, so I don't wanna hear any Lakers homers saying, "We were good before the Gasol trade. He didn't take us over the top!!!11"), so I don't see the Lakers FO mashing the panic button at that point and making any significant moves.

Consider this my retirement post from Laker and Laker fan hating. It's futile to hate and wish defeat for something that has divine intervention on its side. It can't be beaten, no matter how much you protest. It's more prudent to accept certainty (Death, Taxes, and Laker Luck) than it is to expend the energy fighting it.

And I don't even believe in the divine.

what you really want to say is:

[Giuseppe]

God must love to forgive rapists then

& the men who seek them out & hire 'em, i.e., Pop.

tee, hee.

[redzero]

what you really want to say is:

using ######## because I started using it.

[LnGrrrR]

That Beck clip is really weird. On multiple levels.

[TE]

The is this?

[Lakers999]

the OP is a moron... there is no divine intervention or as Buss jokingly states "god is a laker fan" if that was the case the lakers would be winning the finals year after year after year.

what the OP did was just show his jealousy plain and simple. jealous that his team cannot make the moves a well organized NBA team like the lakers can. There is no divine intervention this was just good business practices weather they were "cahootzed" or not. He is just mad becuase his team failed to make the right moves to repeat as champions.

Also... this is just the natural flow of basketball evolution..... different teams will go through different dynasties.... the spurs had theirs and shared it with the lakers... Chicago had theirs in the 90's and shared it with Houston and Detroit. and Now it seems like OKC and Miami will have theirs in the coming years.....

so please OP stop ing because your aging team is coming up short against defending champs...

[Ashy Larry]

Spurs will have the number one seed and Pop knows what he's doing..... no way in the Spurs are going to lose six of the last ten and the Lakers win ten or eleven in a row ..... the real battle is between Dallas and Los Angeles for that two spot.

With that said, time to beat up on the nets

[Roddy Beaubois]

So what happens? Caron Butler, their best perimeter defender goes down with a season ending injury.

Thats a weird way to say Shawn Marion harharhar.





But for real that injury really hurt.