If Gasol went down for the season with an injury.....

[HarlemHeat37]

They're the best team in the West easily, with or without Gasol.

lol spurfan's only hope is an injury of another team

so ing optimistic every ing year

Good chance the Lakers would come out of the West even without Gasol. Mitch has done a great job of rebuilding the team. The Lakers struggles for a few years were because they were rebuilding like all teams do at some point and were starting garbage like Smush Parker, Chucky Atkins and Kwame Brown. In 2008, prior to the Gasol trade the Lakers were 29-16. They had a good team that year even without Gasol and the Lakers would have an even better team now without him.

The Celtics won 24 games in 2007 with Paul Pierce, Al Jefferson, Rondo, Perkins, Delonte West etc. Sometimes the team just isn't ready to win yet for various reasons including lack of experience issues and rebuilding.

If the Lakers lost Pau prior to the playoffs and had a health Bynum they could still make noise, but wouldn't be a lock to get to the finals.

Fail.

First off, Kobe is our biggest advantage on this team. He is still the best player on the planet and would still be an advantage against every team in the league (even the Hype ). Kobe lead a team that started Kwame, Cook, Odom, Luke Walton and Smush Parker to the playoffs. Matter of fact, the Lakers were one lucky rebound away from taking down the 2006 Suns - who were a powerhouse that year. Just about every player he has on this year's team is better than that bunch.

Anyway, here are all of the advantages the Lakers pose against every team in the league:

1. Kobe. There is no other 2-guard in the league that is better than him. No other player is better than him. There are no "Kobe stoppers" out there that could stop him from doing whatever he wants.
2. 3-headed monster front line. "No rebounds, no rings" is Riley's mantra. Well, we are 0.3 rpg from being the top rebounding team in the league. I've stated this before, you can't get out and run if you don't have the rebound (I'm talking to you Miami Hype ). They are versatile, agile, and can hit jumpers to boot. Even Drew has a 12 foot jumper to go along with Lamar's 3pt range - Pau can shoot them too but PJ won't let him. We start two 7-footers that both boast 7'6" wingspans. Nuff said
3. Continuity. The core of this team has been together at least 3 years. There is no need to learn each others' tendencies, strengths, or weaknesses. It's a given.
4. Championship experience. We've faced a game 7 in the Finals, staring at a 13 point deficit, and came out on top. That builds on the confidence we already have.
5. Bench play. Barnes, Blake, Brown - and soon to be Lamar Odom - is clearly the best bench in the league. Brown has improved and Blake/Barnes have proven to have better hoops IQ than I thought. Blake is the pass first PG the bench needed. Barnes hustle, tenacious defense and rebounding ability has been nothing short of spectacular. Their play will allow us to cut down on Kobe and Fisher's minutes all year. That means they will be fresh. Quick fact: Kobe's high in mpg all year has been 37 minutes. That means we are 5-0 even when our best player misses a whole quarter of every game this year.
6. Perimeter defense. The top scorers in the league are perimeter players (primarily). We have improved in that department boasting Artest, Kobe, Barnes, Blake, LO (for perimeter bigs like Bosh and _irk), and Brown. They are anchored by #2 on this list in case they get by our perimeter defenders. Now granted you will see an occasional good game from some perimeter players, but those days will be much fewer than in years past.

There are more advantages, but you get what I'm saying. It's good to see that Kobe is still our best advantage, but there are other factors we can use to our advantage to cut the nets down.

So if Gasol went down, and Bynum got the same shot attempts that he gets, I don't think the Lakers are as bad off as you think. Bynum's advantage at the center position is almost as good as Pau's average over ever PF in the league. The center position is weak. Low post defense as a whole is weak. A Bynum/LO frontline is probably better defensively than Bynum/Pau too. Bynum is the anchor that Pau isn't and LO is a very underrated defender.

The Hype will have to play balls to the wall all year while playing their big 3 big minutes to build continuity and familiarity to yield the same results. I mean, we're coasting yet we have the best record in the league. I'm yet to see a game whereas at least 3 of our starters played 40+ minutes in the same game. We haven't needed it. Even that come from behind win against the Rockets saw Kobe play only 37 minutes. This Laker team is stacked.

ty thread, by the way.

Best team in the West, with or without Gasol..