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Pau can be the franchise if we let him be.
Generally, Kobe and Pau are 5 and 6 in PER (it's handy if immensely flawed, adj. +/- is favoring Gasol by a pretty wide margin right now although historically Kobe, Artest, Odom and Walton are the biggest stars) and it's beautiful.
Kobe is clearly a 3rd quarter savant. Think the legendary Game 5 2010 Finals v Celtics. Coming out of halftime, he has a clear conception of what he wants to do and Phil gives him the burn to ignite.
4th quarters are pretty good too. The Goatee must have something to do with it.
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Does anyone else discern a racial subtext every time the white broadcasters for some mid western team calls them "a traveling circus." Who among them contributes to the circus? Pau Gasol, who could pass for a lost, very tall U.N. ambassador? Kobe, who, at this point, just hangs out with his kids, wears pilgrim hats and likes to bullshit with Obama? Lamar Odom, who puts traditional notions of selflessness to shame?
I'll give you Artest, but you made him this way Indiana. If you want to see wild creatures look at the press corps (excepting Trudell, Teaford, Ding, Markazi and the McTen bro) who seize upon the smallest sarcastic remark to trace fissures at the team's seams.
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Andrew Bynum is a psychological boon at this point. Like a soldier cured of a nasty case of phantom limb through hypnosis, the Lakers simply have to believe that Bynum is there to have their collective backs and his atrocious plus/minus is quickly absolved and the team gets ready to clobber.
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Ron Artest has clearly been drinking the other Ron's Ron Ron Juice.
Steals, lay-ups, assists. Please God. Give him his threes back. I will ask no more.
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To use a crude Simmons-ian metric Gasol will chew up MMA-bro Hibbert in retaliation even though he's not the type to retaliate.
The Lakers have a secret toughness. They're the Paul Dano to the Celtics' Daniel Day Lewis. Each team is insane/tough in their own way. The Celtics beat you up. The Lakers make you think you're playing the game wrong.
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Woe is Dahntay Jones. Gone is an overrated Kobe-stopper. In his place is a Sundiata Gaines look-a-like who gets slightly less playing time.
His Indiana team should be a good story. Shockingly deep for what they are. Possible cap space in the future. A 1,3,5 and some bench players who need not be sacrificed to the gods of mediocre basketball.
But the league is perverse. The Pacers will make the playoffs, draft a player in the early 20s who will not put them over the top and they will be left squeezing out narrow wins against the Raptors for all eternity.
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As the futility wears on, I begin to wonder how Kobe/Chuck Person crack each other up.
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Mark these pixels: Steve Blake will eventually bury a dagger three in the playoffs. This man is for real. He's got Zen like focus that I'm sure one old man, an old 1 and an aging 2 on the bench saw right away.
Matt Barnes. Thank god Orlando doesn't understand adj. +/-, so we have this fiesty super glue guy.
Shannon Brown. You can not only jump and shoot when set. You can run. Please use your speed accordingly.
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Keep your emotions in check, Denver. Revenge doesn't show up in the Hollinger Computer Elf Generated Rankings.
But that voluptuous scoring margin sure does.
Also, triangle sets with Kobe, Pau and Luke. Blake and Lamar on the weakside. I cannot forsake it and neither can the Maverick.
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