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Steve Blake's luck had to abandon him sometime. Like a man who repeatedly swipes an overdrawn credit card, Blake fired and chucked with that odd cross-body release of his and the rim refused to roll his attempts home.
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Barnes was fantastic. Artest wasn't. Is it too early to be asking who the rightful starter is? According to Basketball Value, Barnes figures prominently in the Lakers' best assortment in terms of both adj. +/- and overall rating. I am conducting a support group in the comments section of this blog for those of you reminded of Artest's pre-game 7 finals yakety-sax bricks.
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Kobe kept those daggers cloaked until the fourth. Paramedics were called because neighbors witnessed this turbid aging writer scream at his Macbook in the second and third quarters that Kobe needed to stop treating the glass like Eddy Curry treats his treadmill and use it.
His early lack of efficiency is still a bit troubling. I recommend the faithful observe his ability to convert from 10 feet in very carefully.
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The 2-5 pick and roll is and should be reserved only for instances in which the triangle proves to be an old, inflexible lover. And it should be abandoned during instances in which the defense seizes it as an opportunity to squeeze the daylight from Kobe's eyes. There was a key turnover in the 4th because Kobe, unless he's been exposed throughout the game, cannot handle an aggressive, elite double team. He can't get up like he used to to make those skip passes.
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The sentence "those who play it best" in the ihoops ad coincided perfectly with the slack jawed visage of the admittedly underrated Jason Kapono(vich).
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One of the little-discussed repercussions of instant replay is the rest it creates for both teams. The break in gameplay is the equivalent of a timeout on the floor (less kindly labeled as a tv timeout). The implications of this are subtle but worth considering. Lesser conditioned athletes, those who would curse God after running a wind sprint or two with Kobe, will surely be thankful.
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Not much to mock the Jazz broadcast team about. Harpring is generally excellent. At one point, he claimed that backup PG Ronnie Price was 5'7, 5'9 or 5'10. For a second, Nate Robinson's eyes lit up as he felt a little less alone in the NBA before the animus subsided in favor of reality.
They had a lot of fun with the fact that Ron Artest was a math major.
The play-by-play man seems like he lives his life by boilerplate. He almost enjoyed plugging that 50,000 dollar charitable contribution that dumb company made every time the Jazz made a three. It's not charity if you have to let a television audience know about it.
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Energy Solutions arena is an odd name for a place without a functioning shot clock. 13 seconds of this game evaporated, never to be experienced again. I can't say I much care for the reasons stated below.
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This game didn't and still doesn't feel like a loss so I won't treat as one. A two possession shortfall against a very talented team on a very raucous home court is not a predictor of future performance. It's funny how the bench is conveniently missing when the Lakers face a hostile hellhouse on the road. This loss was a coinflip and tells us nothing.
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