The Official Los Angeles Lakers thread

[Juronimo]

I had never seen Farmar play until yesterday but dude is the truth, he is going to be like Nick Van Exel. He was out there making plays, I haven't seen that from the PG position since Nick. I'll say this right now, he's better than Sasha and Smush.

My thoughts on the other guys:

LO - Looked smooth out there, he didn't look like someone who just had a major tragedy and didn't play all summer.

Kwame - Started off slow but got it going later. He was abusing the Seattle scrubs.

Smush - Stroke looked good, his D looked a little better. He needs to focus all of his energy on D after getting owned by Nash in the playoffs.

Evans - Can't say, he wasn't out there long enough to form an opinion.

Vlad - Shot was off but he was doing other stuff like taking it to the hole, getting rebounds and playing decent D.

Bynum - Looked more under control than at any time last season, the awkwardness is starting to subside. People need to get the idea that he will be another Shaq or Tim Duncan out of their heads, at best he'll be a Theo Ratliff type player.

Shammond - Looked terrible and did nothing, this is only the first preseason game, we'll see. I hope we didn't waste 1.1 million with this signing.

Green - Hustled, got a couple of blocks, he looked good while out there

Luke - He and Farmar had great chemistry, he looked great on O, poor on D

Cook - Great on O, abysmal on D. Vlad is an upgrade over Cook. Cook's awful D makes him a liability.

Turiaf - I love this guy. Played with energy and showed some skill. He can be the enforcer we've needed for some time.

Pinnock - Can't say, didn't get a feel for him

Von Wafer - Cut him please.

McKie - Cut him please.

The Lakers as a team need to work on their free throw shooting, especially Lamar, Kwame and Turiaf. The way they play, they'll go to the line plenty and if they brick free throws like that during the season, we'll lose games because of it. The younger players brought an energy with them, especially with farmar and Turiaf out there at the same time. They'll be big for us off the bench this season.

[Teddy Roosevelt]

Farmar will definatly prove to be the steal of the 2006 NBA Draft.

[Now_Im_Not_Banned]

I had never seen Farmar play until yesterday but dude is the truth, he is going to be like Nick Van Exel. He was out there making plays, I haven't seen that from the PG position since Nick. I'll say this right now, he's better than Sasha and Smush.

Yup...Shit's gunna get exciting again in Lakerville.

Bynum - at best he'll be a Theo Ratliff type player.

 

Shammond - Looked terrible and did nothing, this is only the first preseason game, we'll see. I hope we didn't waste 1.1 million with this signing.

He doesn't look like he's in sync with the offense or the other players yet...We'll have to wait to get something out of him.

Green - Hustled, got a couple of blocks, he looked good while out there

Green will be a really good role player in this league...Very fundamental, does the right things, keeps his ground, plays D. I hope when it's all said and done that he's the 15th man on our roster.

Luke - He and Farmar had great chemistry, he looked great on O, poor on D

Yea, I noticed that too, their smart game really compliments eachother. I saw glimpses of a nice combo developing in them.

Cook - Great on O, abysmal on D. Vlad is an upgrade over Cook. Cook's awful D makes him a liability.

Cook does need to improve his D, but it's pre-season...His O more than made up for it last night though.

Von Wafer - Cut him please.

I agree. I thought he showed a lot of athleticism and potential last year, and Kobe really liked him, but now it's clear that he's simply not mentally ready for the NBA. way too immature on the court...He needs A LOT of time on the Lakers development team.

McKie - Cut him please.

I really hope so...

The Lakers as a team need to work on their free throw shooting, especially Lamar, Kwame and Turiaf. The way they play, they'll go to the line plenty and if they brick free throws like that during the season, we'll lose games because of it. The younger players brought an energy with them, especially with farmar and Turiaf out there at the same time. They'll be big for us off the bench this season.

The rim was awkwardly loose last night, but it's pre-season...Odom is a decent free-throw shooter and he'll improve (he made that a point of emphasis for this season). Turiaf and Kwame also have a nice stroke, they just need to perfect it. Our team is pretty set from the get-go this season!...PeACe

[Now_Im_Not_Banned]

LAKER UPDATE:

Guard Sasha Vujacic did not play Thursday and will be out three or four days because of a strained muscle in his left foot…. Andrew Bynum sustained a slightly sprained left ankle and left in the third quarter…. The Lakers waived forward Marcus Douthit and center Mamadou N'Diaye. They now have 18 players, three more than the league

[Now_Im_Not_Banned]

Rambis Comes Full Circle

By Mike Bresnahan, Times Staff Writer
October 13, 2006

The game-worn eyeglasses were hung up a long time ago. The Clark Kent references have also been retired.

Kurt Rambis looks at those days and smiles, employing a pop-culture analogy to describe his past life as a Lakers power forward.

"Wham! was still big," he said, a reference to the former George Michael--led pop-music duo that peaked in the mid-1980s.

Rambis, now 48, has long since shifted into the coaching part of his career, entering his ninth season as a Lakers assistant. He is guiding the team while Coach Phil Jackson recovers from hip-replacement surgery.

He has been in charge before, taking over in the interim for Del Harris 12 games into the strike-shortened 1998-99 season. He tied a league record at the time by winning his first nine games, but then the season began to unravel.

Eddie Jones and Elden Campbell were traded to Charlotte for Glen Rice, B.J Armstrong and J.R. Reid, a move that failed to bring the desired results. Then Dennis Rodman was signed. The Lakers were swept by San Antonio in the Western Conference semifinals.

Rambis could not shed his interim tag. Jackson was hired before the 1999-2000 season.

"The way I look at it, it was a great opportunity for me," Rambis said. "I was thrown into the fire and just about every bad thing that could happen to a coach during a season happened to me that year. It was just unfortunate I didn't get an experience to have my own team, run my own team and come back with the Lakers, but if I'm sitting in the Laker business office at that time and Kurt Rambis is your interim coach and Phil Jackson is available, it becomes a very easy decision about which coach you're going to take."

Jackson did not pick Rambis for his staff, so Rambis became a consultant for the Lakers.

"He obviously had a tremendous amount of success here with this organization, but it did kind of push me to the back side," Rambis said. "It was disappointing, but I understood it. It was probably a good break for me too, to get me away from the team. He brought me back later and has meant an awful lot to me as a coach and a mentor."

Rambis was asked to join Jackson's staff before the 2001-02 season, the result of a budding friendship. The players have reacted favorably to him.

"He has a high basketball IQ," forward Lamar Odom said. "The guy played on championship teams with Magic Johnson and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. He looks younger now, with the shaved mustache, contact lenses … those glasses were kind of thick."

Eventually, Rambis wants another chance as a head coach.

"I definitely want to be a head coach in this league, as long as the team has realistic expectations," Rambis said. "If you go to a less-talented team and the owner and general manager are expecting you to win a championship, that's just completely unrealistic. As long as there's support from management and realistic expectations and a realistic timetable for a team to improve, it would be enjoyable to coach just about anywhere in this league."

[Now_Im_Not_Banned]

Lakers' unknown quantity; Radman.

By KEVIN DING
The Orange County Register

ANAHEIM – Whether shopping for a sweater, car or free- agent basketball player, you're seeking for value for your dollar.

It is just hard to know exactly what you're getting. And that is where the Lakers are with their summer investment in Vladimir Radmanovic.

With Radmanovic having come to the Lakers right from the crosstown Clippers, there should be some buyer confidence. That's the thing with him, though; you can just as easily say this guy is coming from Serbia.

There are many opinions on Radmanovic, and they start with his jump from Europe to the NBA in 2001. That's when many scouts projected Radmanovic as a better candidate for stardom than Dirk Nowitzki, no matter that Nowitzki's blond bombing already had him on the road there.

Is Radmanovic, 25, on the cusp of meeting all those expectations? In addition to the 6-foot-10 size, there were predraft promises of surprising ball-handling and athleticism, innate passing instincts, great hands on defense, plus the Nowitzki-like three-point reliability.

Five years later, only the last flower has blossomed. Radmanovic had Rudy Tomjanovich spinning in place with eight three-pointers in a Staples Center showcase two years ago that beat the Lakers - the same season Radmanovic was invited to the three-point shooting contest at All-Star weekend. With the Clippers in the playoffs last season, Radmanovic hit 46.3 percent of his three-pointers.

The stroke is flawless. Just ask Kwame Brown, who swears Radmanovic made 200 shots in a row the other day.

If there is a textbook for shooting a basketball, Radmanovic has studied well: right elbow locked at a 90-degree angle; the release high, but not too high at the forehead level; perfect base for good elevation from the legs, yet nothing that is overexertion so as to fluctuate from shot to shot.

But for a five-year, $31million investment, the Lakers obviously see more in Radmanovic than a bigger Mike Penberthy. And that's where the dichotomy picks up again.

Is he the guy who sulked in Seattle whenever he wasn't starting? The guy so dollar- conscious that those around the SuperSonics say his mental focus slipped badly because of money? Radmanovic turned down a six-year, $42million contract offer in a gamble for a one-year, $3.1million tender in hopes of cashing in even bigger in unrestricted free agency.

Then there are the stories of Radmanovic's difficulty fitting in for his national team. Getting kicked off the team in 2002 for eating a banana in the corner during a coach's halftime speech? More trouble in 2005, when he supposedly mailed it in because he didn't like his role on the team?

But didn't Radmanovic take less money to join the Lakers compared with what he could have had with the Clippers? And didn't he show his drive to improve by playing for Seattle's summer-league team even after having two productive NBA seasons already on his resume? And isn't choosing to play with NBA scoring king Kobe Bryant an indication Radmanovic isn't abnormally self-absorbed?

By signing Radmanovic, the Lakers basically committed to a plan of Bryant, Lamar Odom, Brown and Radmanovic being their future - popping the bubbly dream of signing a superstar free agent down the road to go with Bryant and Odom.

Bryant did his work as a personnel consultant when the Lakers first were considering Radmanovic. Bryant's conclusion falls on the side of those scouts in 2001: "He has something inside of him that hasn't been tapped yet."

"Everybody that I've talked to that plays against him and plays against him in the summertime, they tell me that he has more to his game than he was able to showcase in Seattle," Bryant said. "So he's much more than a pure, flat- out shooter. He can put the ball on the floor, he can post, he can do more things. And as a player, you want to be able to showcase the myriad of skills, just 'cause it's fun."

Knowing firsthand how much fun, Bryant used that as his pitch in the conversation with Radmanovic that helped sway him to the Lakers.

So far in training camp, so good. Radmanovic has surprised acting coach Kurt Rambis with defensive tenacity and Lakers general manager Mitch Kupchak with ball-handling proficiency.

Kupchak would love to have gotten a brilliant buy in Radmanovic after going for brand-name recognition and established mileage in Vlade Divac and Aaron McKie in the recent free-agent markets and basically getting ripped off.

Consider Kupchak a wary investor who thought it worth $31million to get the sure thing that is Radmanovic's shot - and then wish for more.

"We're not looking for a player who is going to turn into one of the top three or four players in the NBA, although we'd be very happy if that happened," Kupchak said. "We have a team that needed certain components. With guys like Lamar and Kobe, you need guys they can deliver to who will make shots. We know he's a guy who can make shots."

[LAKERS_FAN89]

Lakers vs. Phoenix 
6:30 pm (TV: KCAL)
Thomas and Mack Center at UNLV

[LAKERS_FAN89]

[Doggystylin]

beauitiful^^

[LAKERS_FAN89]

THX U^^^

[LAKERS_FAN89]

KOBE IS GOING 2 PLAY 2NIGHT FUCK YEAH....................


Shocking News... Kobe Bryant will play tonight!
Body: Bell tired of talking about Lakers series
By Jerry Brown
Tribune


Raja Bell is asked about it every day. In fact, it's a good day when he's only asked once. Raja Bell and Kobe Bryant. The playoffs. The war of words. The clothesline. The suspension. "It's unbelievable. I literally get asked constantly," Bell said. "I'll meet people, we'll start talking basketball and it takes about 10 seconds for it to come up.

"It's beyond old. It's really old. I'm starting to let people know it's not a topic I want to revisit."

Bell and Bryant meet up for the first time since the Suns won an epic, seven-game playoff series with the Lakers - with Bell's takedown the signature snapshot - tonight in Las Vegas. Both players will be in the lineup, but the game will be more about sharpening skills than renewing a rivalry. And Bell, for one, hopes it's a dead issue.

"I'm moving past it," he said. "I don't want something like that to define my career. If I look back at that as a bright spot, even though we won, I'll be disappointed. I want to help my team win a championship, not be the reason they don't. I was fortunate my guys went out and won without me."

But while the Suns were able to overcome a one-game suspension, beating Dallas with Bell out and then hobbled by a calf injury proved too much. Steve Nash has said he feels Phoenix could have won the series with a healthy Bell and Bell sheepishly concurs.

"No matter who (was injured), we were so low on healthy bodies that losing one more guy really made a difference," he said. "We won the first game, and we led at halftime in all the others. We needed everybody.

"That team with myself and Kurt healthy . . . I would take my chances. That's what has me so pumped about this year. We have more bullets."

THE LONG WAY HOME
The Suns' traveling party endured a brutally long trip home from Germany. With a fuel stop in Iceland, a customs stop in Detroit that took nearly three hours due to a communications mix-up and a strong headwind, it took almost 19 hours for the plane to reach Phoenix.

"I thought we'd never get home," forward Shawn Marion said.

Apparently, the wrong agency was contacted regarding customs in Detroit, and every piece of luggage and equipment had to be removed from the plane and searched. For a time, it appeared some of the wine and other spirit items would be seized, but everything was ironed out in time.

"When you're flying that far, the last thing you want to do is sit in an airport," forward Jumaine Jones said. "But it finally got ironed out."

BONUS SHOTS
The Suns, who played the Lakers and Clippers 14 times in the playoffs and 17 times in one 23-game stretch late last season, are getting a heavy dose of the two teams again. After playing the Lakers Sunday, they host the Clippers Tuesday at US Airways Center and play the Lakers again next Sunday in San Diego. . . .

The Suns open the regular season Oct. 31 in Los Angeles against the Lakers, then return four days later to play the Clippers in their home-away-from-home, Staples Center. . . .

Guard Marcus Banks missed Saturday's practice. A Las Vegas native, Banks flew home early to attend his grandmother's funeral. He is expected to play tonight, his first game back at Thomas & Mack Center since starring at UNLV (2001-03). . . .

Eric Piatkowski (sprained ankle) did not practice Saturday and will miss his third straight exhibition game tonight. Jumaine Jones (ankle) did practice, is improved and will likely play against the Lakers. . . .

D'Antoni on how guard Leandro Barbosa, who signed a five-year, $32 million contract extension over the summer, grew half an inch at age 23: "Maybe he was standing on his wallet when they measured him."

Suns vs. Lakers
When: 6:30 p.m. today
Where: Thomas & Mack Center, Las Vegas
TV/Radio: None/KTAR (620 AM)

[Doggystylin]

Am I the only one who isn't excited about Kobe playing? We all know what Kobe is capable of, he has nothing to prove. Why would he risk further injuring his knee and play so early? He should definitley sit out ATLEAST until the season opener if not more. He's way too important and his long term presence for the Lakers franchise is imperative.

[Now_Im_Not_Banned]

Kobe isn't playing and the Lakers are faring just fine against the Phoenix Suns regular rotation! Players like Turiaf, Farmar, Shammond, Bynum, Green, Cook, etc. are getting most of the minuts on the Lakers as of now. The score is 47-52 Suns leading at the half...

[Doggystylin]

I still don't understand why this nigga Mckie is still around and playing so much. Smush seems to have really improved his 3 point shooting.

[Now_Im_Not_Banned]

I still don't understand why this nigga Mckie is still around and playing so much. Smush seems to have really improved his 3 point shooting.

LOL...They're just testin' him, probably to see if he can still contribute and to see who'd be more worthy of that last roster spot... him, Green, or Pinnock. Von Wafer looks to be way out of the picture at this point...PeACe