LAKERS -at- CAVS - 1/21 - Thoughts and :-(( Ratings

[DancingBarry]

Little Men... Darkness swallows the boat whole as you near the destination. It's a long way from the safety of your sanctuary, and the vibe here is borderline psychotic. Up ahead, a man eagerly waves you ashore.

You tell your traveling companions to stay put as you climb out. They are all too happy to comply. The man wears a camera around his neck and babbles incoherently about how you are here to see the Great One. He is a non-stop chatter box. "I'm a little man. He's...he's a great man!" he says again and again.

There's no telling who he's talking about, but he grabs your hand and leads you down a path. Shortly later, you reach a clearing in the jungle.

"Here! It happened right here!" He scoops up a pile of dirt, holds it to his nose and breathes in deeply. "Oh, you can smell him! Smell this!"

"Yeah, um, I'll pass on that," you reply. You look at the scene. The tracks in the dirt are scrambled. It's hard to make sense of any of it. Where are the Four Horsemen?

"Oh! Oh! I'm supposed to give you this," the man says as he frantically pats down all of his pockets twice. "Here. Here it is, man. Right here. Some cat named... Dancing... DancingLarry. No wait, DancingBarry, that's it, man. Strange cat."

You take the crumpled note from him and read:

The Four Horsemen were here... But none of them resembled themselves. They struggled to impose their will. In the end, when the pressure was on, they collapsed. This is the second time they have shrank from the challenge against this opponent.

I will continue to track them...

Clearly, the Lakers have the Cavs where they want them. Last year, it was the Magic taking them 2-0. Now it's the Cavs.

Despite the familiar territory, this 93-87 loss should have been a win for L.A. The Cavs were missing Mo Williams and the Lakers were missing from the line.

Got to make your freethrows on the road. Pretty simple. Lakers do that and they take this game. All game long the Lakers struggled with their freethrows, going 15-24. With 23 seconds left, Pau was at the line to tie it up.

He missed both.

That changed the dynamic defensively, and the Cavs controlled the game from there. And if they didn't control it by choking their own freethrow, well, the Lakers sent them back to the line for two more when they couldn't get the rebound.

"Pau had a hand in a lot of that," Phil said of the Lakers poor close to the game. His counterpart on the Cavs, J.J. Hickson, had 11 points and 14 boards. The Laker bigmen, once again, didn't play big against the Cavs. They got to quit showing up like Little Men.

"One thing he did was use his energy and athleticism," LeBron said of Hickson. "He countered their height with his speed and length. We're a very talented team, and we are very good in the frontcourt when he plays at a high level."

This was one of the keys. It was a mismatch that the Lakers did a poor job taking advantage of. Cleveland did not.

Although Kobe's back looked normal, his stroke is still M.I.A. It seemed like he started off strong, but he faded as the game went along. He, too, struggled from the line.


Kobe -- -- With his shot misfiring lately, Kobe asked Gary Vitti to go back to work on the finger protection. He's made 21-31 (68 percent) from the line in his last several games, including tonight. Nothing demonstrates the struggles more than that stat (although you could look at the 39 percent shooting from the floor in January, too). Clearly, the finger is making life difficult. He started off looking smooth with it in this game, but later faded later (going 4-15 in the second half). His handle also looked a bit limited as normally he'd try to attack Shaq off the screen and get contact and fouls (see Christmas and whistles that didn't come). He didn't look like he was as confident in doing that. With the jumper questionable, the Laker offense missed his full impact. Phil put Kobe on LeBron briefly defensively, but not to close the game. If the Lakers meet the Cavs in the Finals, I think you will likely see Kobe on LeBron down the stretch. They'll try to shake him with screens, but the Lakers will force LeBron to take advantage of the size difference in the paint via the post or pay the price. The attack we saw from LeBron most of this game was the attack we shut down last year. It was different than the first match up at Christmas. Phil doesn't want LeBron thinking about a post game more than he has already experimented with this season. Kobe surpassed the 25,000-point mark tonight. The youngest player to do it. The Stats: He scored 31 points on 12-31 shooting (2-6 from three, 5-8 from the line) to go with 2 boards, 4 assists, 3 turnovers and 2 fouls in 40 minutes. He was a -8. The Action: He sank a wing jumper off the screen to start the game. He hit a three on a kickout next time down. He missed a turnaround in the post. He got crossed up on a pass and threw it out of bounds. He missed a turnaround leaner trying to draw a whistle that never came. He missed a fade in the lane, short. He got his next post turnaround to bounce in. He drained a wing pull-up three in transition. He sank another pull-up wing jumper in early offense (probably not a good shot despite our tempo pushing). He ball-faked, spun away from the double and swished the tought baseline fade. He sank a face-up wing jumper from the right side. He missed a sideline three. He missed a wing jumper off the two-man game. He pumped his man into the air and hit the wing jumper. He drew FTs on iso next time down, he made the first one to hit the 25,000 mark, he missed the next. He blew past LeBron and drew FTs, he made just one again. He missed a pull-up baseline jumper. He attacked, got close to the rim, missed, followed it up and missed his second attempt, but LO cleaned it up. He lost the handle trying to attack with a couple seconds left. He had 20 points on 8-16 shooting and 2 assists. Second Half: He missed an 18-footer. He blew past his man and drew FTs in the lane, he made just one again. He stumbled and missed a long runner. He lost Parker with a spin and banked over a help defender. He missed a long pull-up jumper. He missed a wing three, short. He was called for a travel in the lane when he took an LO pass, uggh. He sank a 10-footer flashing weak to strong. He took contact with no call and swished the elbow fallaway. He missed a wing jumper at the third quarter buzzer. After a long rest, he missed a baseline fallaway. He missed a long three trying to beat the shotclock. He missed a long jumper. Down 4 with under 2 minutes left, he attacked off the high screen, hung and drew FTs, he made both. He tied it up next possession down working off the Pau screen against Shaq for a 20-footer. He attacked off the screen and missed. He missed a running three.

Gasol -- -- Pau was in on several key sequences down the stretch. Most of them went against the Lakers. If he hits his FTs, boxes out, gets a score instead of blocked twice by not going up strong, maybe he's the hero. Instead, he'll take some blame for the Lakers not taking the W. Those missed FTs were key and probably made the difference between this being a loss in regulation instead of an overtime battle. The Lakers didn't use him particularly well in his mistmatch with Hickson. Pau didn't get to work him in the post as much as he should have. When Pau got the ball against Z or Shaq, he tried to shoot over them. On rare occasion he went to the dribble, which is what he needs to do. On the other end, the Lakers made poor and late rotations when Pau left Hickson to help. As a result, Hickson put up better numbers. That should never have happened. That's a mismatch we have to exploit and win. When Shaq went up against Pau, he overpowered him on single coverage. That's two poor games against Cleveland. The Stats: He scored 13 points on 5-14 shooting (3-6 from the line) to go with 8 boards, 1 assist, 1 steal and 5 fouls in 33 minutes. He was a -3. The Action: He hit a quick jumphook on his first touch. He hit a baseline turnaround on his next post attempt. He missed a 10-footer. He posted up and drew FTs, he made one. He missed a face-up wing jumper over Z (attack that). He dunked off the quick bounce pass from DFish. He choked a lefty layup on a drive at the end of the quarter. He attacked across the lane and drew FTs on Shaq, he made both. He picked up his third foul on a LeBron drive and had to sit with 1:39 left. Second Half: He hit a runner down the lane. He backed Hickson down and scored easily with his left on the jumphook. He missed a wing jumper. He missed a point-blank layup and putback. He missed a long jumphook. Only man back against the two Cav bigs, he challenge the shot well, then tipped the board out with 1:12 left (clutch stop). He was blocked on the other end twice not going up strong. He grabbed a Kobe miss but was fouled on the putback, should have had that, then he missed both FTs, arggh. He and Ron couldn't handle Varejao on a FT miss and gave up more FTs. Ballgame.

Bynum -- -- Bynum has been nothing in two games against the Cavs. There were possession in this game where he seemed ready to battle Shaq in the post and others where he was caught off guard. Getting strapped with fouls has made him very cautious defensively lately. Even on single coverage like we gave almost all of the night (except for one dumb double by Ron), Bynum still should have kept Shaq in check more despite his flu bug. He's a better post defender than that. On team D, he wasn't rotating well at all. The Laker bigs are getting outplayed by the Cavs bigs. They need to get after it better. Offensively, Bynum wasn't made into an option. He did do a good job on the offensive glass, taking some away from Shaq by out-sizing him. Hard to do. The Stats: He scored 7 points on 3-5 shooting to go with 8 boards, 1 assist, 2 blocks and 4 fouls in 27 minutes. He was a +3. The Action: He dunked when left alone under the hoop and Artest spotted him. He had his shot goaltended on the screen-roll with Kobe. He dunked when Fish spun and no-looked to him in the lane. He couldn't finish an And-1 dunk off a nice move in the post, he made one FT. He missed a flat face-up jumper over Shaq. He picked up his third foul with 5 minutes left and had to sit. Second Half: He tipped an offensive board to himself from behind Shaq, we got a score off it. He bricked a FT jumper badly. He sat with his fourth foul after 3 minutes. After Shaq got a couple of scores, Bynum finally swatted Shaq's turnaround.

Artest -- -- Ron was called for an arm hold of Varejao on a LeBron miss. That was the nail in the coffin. Sideshow Bob might have gotten to the offensive board had Ron not held him, hard to say. Perhaps that's a board where Phil needs to bring in his best rebounders...or Pau should just take care of business there. Defensively, he went up against LeBron. He sagged off him and left him shooting jumpers quite a bit. He got shed on a lot of screens to allow LeBron to work against others. The one three that LeBron made was one of Artest's least smart defensive plays and it came at a critical time. Phil didn't want doubles on Shaq, wanted to play him straight up. Ron sagged down to help despite Shaq not having good position. It resulted in a kickout and easy look from three. Doubt he makes that mistake twice because Phil was all over him. Phil on the Ron/LeBron matchup during the game: "The size of LeBron wears guys down and Ron can take that on," Phil said. Offensively, there didn't seem to be a lot of purpose to Ron's game other than spacing the floor. The Stats: He scored 8 points on 3-10 shooting (2-8 from three, 0-1 from the line) to go with 7 boards, 4 assists, 1 steal and 3 fouls in 35 minutes. He was a -1. The Action: He spotted Bynum wide open for a dunk. He missed a wing three when the ball stopped in his hands. He missed a three from the top of the arc. He choked a layup off a nice cut that left him open. He splashed in a wing three out of a timeout. Second Half: He missed a three. He knocked a ball from Shaq to regain possession, he got it back and scored an And-1 around Shaq, he missed the FT. He missed a turnaround heave from three with the shotclock low. Bad idea on a reach 35 feet from the hoop and it led to a LeBron drive an And-1. He sagged off LeBron to help on Shaq (against Bynum), he gave up a three and Phil yelled at him. He missed a wing three. He grabbed a long Kobe miss and hit a three to cut the lead to 4. He was called for hold Varejao with 21 seconds left of a missed LeBron FT.

Fisher -- -- DFish got a break with Mo Williams sidelined. Who knows how this game would have ended up had he been on the floor? Kobe went up against Delonte West quite a bit. None of the Cav guards did much damage unless Kobe's legs were gone from working hard defensively. I don't think that was the case. The Stats: He scored 6 points on 2-4 shooting (1-3 from three, 1-2 from the line) to go with 3 boards, 4 assists, 1 steal, 3 turnovers and 3 fouls in 34:28. He was a -3. The Action: He took a bounce pass on a cut, spun on Shaq and dumped it to Bynum for the dunk. He up-faked West and dribbled in for an uncontested layup. He missed a long three trying to beat the shotclock. Nice bounce pass to Pau in early offense for the dunk. His lob pass was picked off. Next possession, his interior feed was picked off for a dunk the other way. Second Half: He was clipped from behind on a pull-up jumper for FTs, he made one. He was called for a moving screen. He swished a sideline three in early offense. He missed a three with the clock low. He drew a moving screen call.

Lamar -- -- The Lakers needed his defensively mobility on the floor, but it didn't seem to manifest itself into a positive. In fact, Lamar was a team-low -12 for the game. Too often, he got caught on LeBron on a switch and didn't challenge shots well. Not a lot of notes on Lamar in this game, which is never a good sign. The Lakers seemed to be missing that extra pass on a lot of sequences. When that is working, LO is usually involved in some manner and making things happen. The Triangle is also clicking at a deeper level. The Stats: He scored 10 points on 3-5 shooting (1-1 from three, 3-3 from the line) to go with 10 boards (4 offensive), 2 assists, 2 steals and 3 fouls in 35 minutes. He was a -12. The Action: He sank a pull-up on the baseline on iso. He was swatted by Shaq on a drive, but hustled to get it back. He drew FTs on the defensive glass, he made one. He tipped in a Kobe miss. Second Half: Late rotation and he gave up a three. He pushed out a steal and drew FTs, he made both. He drained a big three to answer a three at the other end. No box out and he gave up a tip in.

Brown -- -- The Lakers could have used some spark off the bench tonight. They got very little throughout the lineup. Shannon missed a few shots he had been hitting lately. Defensively, he had some nice challenges and showed good hands on a play. The Stats: He scored 5 points on 1-6 shooting (1-2 from three, 2-2 from the line) to go with 1 board, 1 assist and 1 steal. He was a -3. The Action: Nice challenge on his man to force a bricked jumper. He missed a short runner, we got it back and he missed the 16-footer. He missed another 16-footer on the break. Second Half: He got tapped on a wing three. He took the outlet from Luke, elevated and was drilled for FTs, he made both. He swished a wing three off the high pinch post. He was blocked on a jumper.

Farmar -- -- The Wrath of Phil. Farmar caught a little of that movie tonight in the first half when he didn't feed Lamar in the post. Phil quickly got up and called a timeout, then yelled at him before benching him for the half. Better second half. Despite the Lakers wanting to push the tempo in this game, Farmar never seemed to spark any of that. The Stats: He scored 5 points on 2-4 shooting (1-3 from three) to go with 1 board and 1 block. The Action: He missed an open sideline three. He got yelled at by Phil for not giving the ball to Lamar in the post. Second Half: He missed a three. He swatted a shot from behind. He swished a step-back sideline three to tie the game up midway through the fourth.

Luke -- -- Some spot duty for Luke. When he came in for Artest, we had Kobe usually on LeBron or LeBron was resting. Offensively, he got the ball against some mismatches, but wasn't able to do a lot with it. The Stats: He scored 2 points on 1-4 shooting The Action: He missed a short jumper in the post over a smaller man. Phil brought him back in for Ron with 2 minutes left in the half, putting Kobe on LeBron. Second Half: He posted up Gibson and hit the baseline turnaround. He hit Shannon with an outlet for FTs. He missed a short runner, got it back and was stripped.

Mbenga -- -- Phil brought him in with 1:39 left when both Bynum and Pau had 3 fouls a piece. You hate having to tap into your third-string center in a close game, but the Lakers had to. With as poorly as we were defending Shaq on several possession, might have been better to see a little more of him. The Stats: He didn't score or shoot, had 1 board and 1 turnover to go with 1 foul in 1:39. He had a +/- of 0. The Action: He was called for a lane violation on a Lamar missed FT. He couldn't secure a defensive board, knocking it away from other Lakers, then he gave up FTs. Second Half: He did not play.

Phil -- -- Like the Orlando Magic going 2-0 against the Lakers last season, Phil has the Lakers where he wants them against the Cavs... The Lakers got off to a 9-0 start. The Cavs went on a 10-2 run to reel them back in... Pau was helping on LeBron, but his man kept getting the ball and scores when others didn't rotate well (Bynum mostly)... Phil sat Bynum for Lamar with 3 minutes left in the first. The Lakers went on a 12-4 run to lead 27-18... Phil started a Bynum, Lamar, Kobe, Shannon, Farmar lineup with Kobe defending LeBron... Later, he swapped Kobe for Ron as he usually does... He called a timeout to bark at Farmar for not feeding Lamar in the post. He benched him and left Shannon at PG... The Lakers were outscored 26-19 in the second quarter... The Lakers led 46-44 at the half... Phil brought in Lamar after 3 minutes in the third when Bynum picked up his fourth... The Lakers trailed 67-65 heading into the fourth. Another 19-point quarter for the Lakers... Phil started a Bynum, LO, Luke, Shannon, Farmar unit. No Pau or Kobe. That's and odd unit for that long... He ran that for 6 minutes until the Cavs brought in LeBron. Then Phil swapped Luke for Ron down by 1... He went with a Bynum, Pau, Ron, Kobe, Fisher starting unit with 5 minutes left... He brought back in Lamar with under 4 minutes left... Pau could have tied the game up with two FTs, but missed them both with 23 seconds left. Unfortunately, that put the Lakers in a foul situation instead of a defending situation. We got one miss, but gave up a foul to Varejao and two more FT makes. Poor way to close... Phil tried to push the tempo in the game. He continually preached being aggressive. The Lakers won the battle of the break, but by a weak 5-2 margin. Not much speed game going on... Cleveland won the battle in the paint 42-26... Lakers won the battle on the offensive glass 15-6... The Lakers shot 39 percent, the Cavs 48 percent...

Game Flow -- LINK -- Zero points from Pau and 4 from Kobe in the fourth. Can't close with a weak one-two punch like that.

[Vishnu]

1st. yeah! best part of my night along with UCLA finally winning.

Thanks DB

[mirak]

DB, is that intro a tip of the hat to Conrad (Heart of Darkness) or Apocalypse Now?

[RVCdesigns]

Thanks DB

[67ShelbyGT]

[DancingBarry]

[mirak]

[DancingBarry]

Ming - (wherever you went...) - Freethrows were the reason for the L. Missing there killed them...and at the worst possible time, too.

No one played well. Bottom line, we didn't get impact ball from our impact ballers. Got to have that.

[City_Dawg]

Thanks DB.

The Kobe/Pau pick in roll made a uh brief return near the end. But I think the lack of practice didn't make it as smooth as usual
_________________
*sighs*

!...

[Sister Golden Hair]

Is it just me that's not worried about this game or what it means in the long-run? Why do I feel that way?

1. Running LBJ ISO over a 7-game series WILL NOT work against any team, let alone the Lakers. It's too limiting. It tends to make other guys stand around and watch. It's Fool's Gold that sooner or later catches up to you. (I'll say the same thing about the lakers depending so much on Kobe -- the rest of the team needs to step up consistently to rduce that dependence. I think they wil do it -- they did last year.)

2. A corollary to point 1: I don't think we'll see Pau play as soft for the remainder of the season. maybe it's just me but he just looked like he didn't have his game legs all the way back. Tired players don't go to the rack. They try and shoot over opponents. I agree he lacked aggression, as did Bynum, but I also think the fouls had a lot to do with it. I still insist that the way to take away the aggressivness of opposing bigs is to punich them on offense. That means that Kobe, Fish and the rest of the guards need to pound it inside RELENTLESSLY. This team abandons the inside waaaay too often and way too quickly. They need to be patient.

3. PJ will reinforce the importance of post-play. Playing inside out maximizes the strength of all Laker guards not-named-Kobe., which means cripser, more efficuient offense, which means everybody gets their head in the game. Also, the bench guys should play better with 3, and possibly 4, games at home in a Finals match-up, if it came to that. In fact, that's why HCA is an advantage -- start will be stars, but the the bench players tend to play MUCH better at home.

4. It's 1 game out of 82. Tomorrow's game vs. the Knicks is just as important. Cleveland will miss Mo Williams more than people think.

All the sky-is-falling-we're-doomed-vs-Cleveland are not simply premature. They're kind of bizarre.

The lakers need to lace 'em up tomorrow, get the best record they can get without running the selves ragged the remainder of the season, tighten up the defense, and, believe it or not for a team with the best record in the league, jell. The team is still not playing coehsively on either end. Whioe none of the injuries have been season-ending, collectively they've impacted this team's on-court chemistry. Guys don't seem to know tgheir roles. Too many missed rotations. Often, that's not a sign of laziness; it's a sign that guys aren't fully used to playing with one another.

SGH

[night89]

The only positive I saw from this game was that Bynum was moving a lot slower than he did against Orlando, which one could attribute to the flu. However, the Cavs didn't have Mo(whose presence means we would not be able to double team Shaq at all), and the officiating was pretty even. If we meet this team in the Finals, then it will be a most interesting matchup.

[8750]

thanks, DB
while i still think that we are the best team around, it's evident that we can't solve our problems:
-our d against p&r is historically atrocious...
-our starting pg is embarassing... fisher could come from the bench in a robert horry role, but -with all our admiration- he's our weakest point
-gasol and bynum don't work together, and they'll never work together
-bynum has slow feet, he doesn't rotate, he's always late, he doesn't intimidate
-sometimes i wonder where the legendary motivational skills of our coach are gone... too often we are not mentally ready to play tough games

at this point, maybe it's better if we trade bynum for a good pg and a strong big man (hinrich-noah?)

[AprilRyan]

I agree with SGH. This is just one game. While it would have been great to win it, maybe it was necessary for the Lakers to realize some of the things they're doing wrong - which are being masked by their good win-loss record.

It's a good opportunity for Phil to emphasize the things they need to improve on...a good opportunity for Pau and everyone else not named Kobe to assert themselves to make sure they get their share of the shots.

I can still remember Pau's reaction (and how he played) the first time the Lakers played Boston after the beatdown during the Celtics championship. I have no doubt he will come back and redeem himself.

Now if somebody could just get Kobe to cut down (a little) on his shots. Hahaha!

[limchrc]

Hope we get W on our next game. Thanks for the recap.

[prisma8slg]

freethrows

thanks DB
_________________
"I define success by championships, by winning..." Kobe Bryant

"I've seen it all. Sasha dunked on somebody," Kobe Bryant said. "I'm ready to retire now."

[Rick12322]

You and i both know had Bynum rotated to cover Pau that Shaq would get a dunk.

[angrypuppy]

[pask]

[Rick12322]

[JTS1]

i saw the first half on tv. the second half i couldn't watch, but i was able to read along the play-by-play on nba.com.

at least what i felt was the problem from the first half (free throws) had a lot to do w/the loss. (db confirmed :/ ) it's inexplicable how this particular team can have such piss poor games at the ft line.

the next thing was i looked at the stat sheet and noted that the bench did NADA...that will not get it done on the road.

then i looked at the shots...kobe took 31. i guess he thought at some point he'd find his stoke back like in the first quarter...guess he didn't.

our bigs did little, very disappointing. i thought that big z, in particular was hanging all over drew w/o a call. drew gets touch fouls...a center getting touch fouls...is that really possible in a nba game? anyway, since drew and pau had foul trouble, that might have explained some of the tententive play of pau that some have noted. but him missing those 2 fts toward the end of the game p'd me off.

i don't take much stock in one loss. i just hate the fact that my team had a loss that when they had plenty of chances at a w. i was grouchy last night. glad i didn't read lg either.

but now i'm glad to have read db...and sgh, (nice! very astute poster).

thanks for the write up.
_________________
'How many kids can say growing up that they'll turn pro and play for their favorite team in the world and spend your entire career there? IT'S BEEN A DREAM!'-Kobe Bryant 11.29.15

[angrypuppy]

[JTS1]

[Nobody]

Impressive first quarter and quite forgettable other three. Too bad, they could've had the game if not for some stupid mistakes. Playing a good opponent close to the end on the road is pretty much all you can ask for... but they didn't close it out properly.

Thanks for the write up, DB.

Now on to the Knicks, go Lakers!

[Rick12322]

We lost at the FT line, we lost in the first quarter when we stopped abusing Hickson with Pau. We lost when the refs reached out and touched someone named Bynum, the dirty bastards. And we lost because Kobe didn't take time off after his injury to let it heal. Just think, it would be all better now.

Bynum did a pretty dam good job against Shaq, and yes, Phil, you are senile for not having Bynum attack Shaq in the post. I don't care if he fails 5 times, you have to TRY to get him in FT and Drew will gain invaluable experience that WILL PAY OFF IN THE PLAYOFFS.

[golakersgo121]