, or might go by history. This year is anything but typical. With as tightly compacted as the conference is, the likelihood of long playoff battles is raised. Anyone that doesn't want game seven on their floor is foolish.
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"Same ol' ," it sure is. What's up with these sportswriters, jumping up and down about the Lakers? Haven't they been paying attention these past few years? It's not the teams with the biggest stars that end up at the top, it's the teams with the strongest D and team-first mentality that are standing in the end. If individual star power and MVP-like stats made the difference, then it would have been teams like the Suns, Mavs, Nuggets and Timberwolves who would be hoisting up the trophies, not the Spurs and Pistons.
Hey, the Lakers are suddenly loaded. Big deal. It's what you do with the parts that count. If, by the end of the season, I see the Lakers playing with the same kind of chemistry that the Spurs and Pistons have been playing with these past four, five years (and which, by the way, we're obviously starting to see in the Jazz), then I'll change my tune.
Meanwhile, all this talk about Laker dominance does is remind me of all the talk about the Patriots before the last Super Bowl. To paraphrase Mike Tyson, everyone's a champion until they punched in the mouth. The NBA playoffs are not hospitable to teams with weak wills and me-me at udes. Kobe has some guts, and so does Phil Jackson (although he ain't on the floor). But until guys like Lamar Odom and Pau Gasol show me that they can play with any semblance of intensity, teamwork and D-mentality, the Lakers can't be favorites. This is not theory, it's fact. All you need do is look at the makeup of the most recent NBA champs.
