Comments on a stupid SI.com article

Posted on 12/6 on Lakersground.net here
How does a guy with so little basketball knowledge get articles published in SI? Take a little Conventional Wisdom, sprinkle with a few clever metaphors and, voila!, basketball wisdom.

Although the season isn't even 20 games old, the Lakers apparent lack of talent -- outside of Kobe Bryant and Lamar Odom -- is making it clearer by the day that the postseason is a long shot. Still, they're only two games under .500 and a game back of the eighth spot in the Western Conference.

I love it when writers contradict themselves one sentence later. If the Lakers obviously don't have enough talent to make the playoffs, how are they just one game back of the eighth spot?

As Smush Parker goes, so go the Lakers. In the Lakers' seven wins, Parker has scored five points more per game (15.9 in wins; 10.7 in losses) and hit more than 55 percent of his shots, compared to .425 in losses. As the season progresses and Parker becomes more comfortable in the triangle offense, the Lakers will only improve.

A semi-intelligent observation. The problem of late is that Smush has been playing carelessly, so the Smush's comfort level probably isn't as important as Smush's focus.

Play aggressively So far, only one of the Lakers has been aggressive on the offensive end of the floor, and if you can't name that player, you're living in a vacuum. : Balanced scoring is what the Lakers need, but it won't happen until Bryant makes those around him better, which is what Jordan did in the triangle during the Bulls' title years. If Kobe can show some confidence in his teammates, their aggressiveness will increase, and the scoring burden will be taken off No. 8.

The Lakers besides Kobe don't need to play aggressively - they need to play consistently. Odom over the last 7 games has scored 6, 23, 8, 27, 12, 24 and 7. Chris Mihm had a 5 game stretch where he scored 3, 20, 2, 2 and 20. Smush has also been up-and-down. Kwame, Devean and Luke have been out significant amounts of time because of injuries. If Kobe knew that the Lakers top 8 were all going to show up for each game, it would be a lot easier for him to trust them.

Playing on back-to-back nights is a fact of life in the NBA. The Lakers just haven't figured out how to play that second game. In three back-to-backs this year, L.A. is 3-0 on the first night and, you guessed it, 0-3 on the second night.

Talk about jumping to conclusions from a small sample set. 2 of those 3 losses were after OT games the night before and when the team had to travel. How often is that circumstance going to happen?

Get Latrell Sprewell Yeah, I know, it's highly, highly, highly unlikely (OK, virtually impossible) that Spree will take the Lakers' only available offer -- the veteran's minimum of $1.1 million, which he's already rejected, but the Lakers could use a proven scorer right about now. It's hard to say how the addition of Sprewell would affect the Lakers, but it's fun to speculate. In his worst season -- last year with Minnesota -- Sprewell averaged 12.8 points, his lowest average since his rookie campaign. Think the Lakers could use a 13-point scorer in their lineup? With Kobe and Sprewell at the 2 and 3, the Lakers' backcourt would definitely create some matchup issues and possibly earn the Lakers at least a few more wins, which could be the difference between the lottery and the eighth spot in the West.

This is moronic. Would you bench Odom in favor of Sprewell? If you slide Odom to the 4 spot so that you can start Sprewell, the Lakers lose their interior defense and a lot of rebounding. Kobe is getting bashed for shooting only 41.6%, but Sprewell hasn't shot that well since the '00-'01 season.