Blog Archives

As I wrote in my column last week, let’s take a look at the positional matchups of the L.A. Lakers and OKC Thunder to see why the purple-and-gold now look like the team to beat: Positional Breakdown:   Lakers vs. Thunder PG: Steve Nash Perhaps the most difficult matchup to give an advantage to, as the two-time MVP lacks what the 23-year old Westbrook doesn’t, and vice versa. While Nash’s superior three-point shooting and exceptional floor leadership/passing skills have helped maintain the 38-year-old’s status...

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After back-to-back seasons of merely being one of the best eight teams in basketball, the Los Angeles Lakers had enough. As glamorous a franchise as the Lakers are, any season ending short of a championship is failure. Tack on one more consecutive season of the same result, and you’ve got some ‘splainin to do. Adding two-time Most Valuable Player Steve Nash and three-time Defensive Player of the Year Dwight Howard to the Lakers’ roster will probably help change that. Looking back at Lakers General...

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On the last day of June, the Oakland A’s had a 37-42 record, “good” for third place in the American League West’s four-team race to the postseason. Though just the season’s halfway point, the A’s looked lost without a cause. They’d just dropped three straight to the team looking farthest down on them in the division, the first-place Texas Rangers. With a severe lack of offensive firepower, the A’s offense appeared simply incapable of picking up its otherwise exceptional pitching. Down 13 games to...

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We could beat them. The message was already unmistakably clear as Kobe Bryant quickly began fawning over the MJ-in-his-prime-led 1992 Dream Team, backtracking from any potential media-driven dispute he might have sparked. Regardless, the message was clear: according to at least one of the leaders on the 2012 Olympic USA basketball team, this year’s squad could have beaten the previously-undisputed greatest Olympic basketball team ever assembled. Bryant’s actual quote was simple, unassuming, lacking of deep implication. What he said—“I don’t know. It’d be a...

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Paul Pierce was tired. At the ripe age of 29, Pierce had wasted yet another season of his prime on a Boston Celtics team that had endured one of the worst basketball seasons in their storied history, finishing a paltry 24-58 and dead last in the Atlantic Division. The five-time all-star small forward had missed significant time that season with a bum foot, as the lack of help surrounding Pierce contributed mightily to the team’s miserable year. Negative attitudes between Celtics players, Pierce included,...

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Whenever he’d guard against routes, hang out with teammates, or shower alongside them, nobody raised an eyebrow. Whenever he’d enjoy team dinners, spot teammates while they benched, or make jokes while riding the team bus, nobody questioned his belonging. Whenever he’d talk with the press, show up early to preseason practices, or proudly don his Titan navy blue and white, nobody took offense. Leave it to an over-scrutinized admittance of an “abnormal” sexual orientation to undo all the “normal” that Wade Davis did. When...

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I love L.A.! The familiar Randy Newman chorus serenades down from the rafters between an entire city’s worth of fluttering accomplishment banners, joining the millions of little confetti sprinkles liberated from the ceiling above. The familiar sounds that accompany the familiar confetti depict an all-too-familiar reality for most L.A. sports fanatics, one as maniacal as it is expected: championship or bust. Every year. No excuses. From lightin’ up your halos to livin’ it up in Lakerland, a big success spotlight illuminates everything-So. Cal to...

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