February 16th: Lakers Take a Step Down. Lakers Hesitant To Make A Move.

 
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Phil
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PostPosted: Thu Feb 16, 2006 6:31 am    Post subject: February 16th: Lakers Take a Step Down. Lakers Hesitant To Make A Move.

Lakers Take a Step Down
# They blow a 15-point lead and lose to the Hawks, 114-110, falling to .500 at the All-Star break.

By Mike Bresnahan, Times Staff Writer

The break in the season came 48 minutes too late for the Lakers, who wrestled with the Atlanta Hawks as if they were the Eastern Conference All-Stars when, in truth, none of them will be playing in Sunday's game.

The Lakers, usually kind enough to step down to the level of their competition, lost to one of the league's worst teams, 114-110, eschewing their typical late-game meltdowns for a much slower burn, a second-half disbanding in front of a very late-arriving crowd that also didn't appear to expect much from the Hawks on Wednesday at Staples Center.

Two days after a 26-point lead almost escaped them against Utah, the Lakers frittered away a 15-point first-quarter advantage as the Hawks improved to 16-34 overall, 5-20 on the road and 5-17 against West teams.

Laker Coach Phil Jackson envisioned quite a few ways of going into the All-Star break. This wasn't one of them.

"Wow, how can you lose a ballgame like that?" Jackson said. "I just don't understand sometimes the capabilities of this team to disappoint."


Last edited by Phil on Mon Feb 27, 2006 7:15 pm; edited 2 times in total
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Phil
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PostPosted: Thu Feb 16, 2006 6:32 am    Post subject:

Lakers bottom out in defeat
Lakers blow early lead in loss to Hawks
By Ross Siler, Staff Writer


LA Laker Kobe Bryant goes to the hoop around Atlanta Hawks' Josh Smith during 1st half action.
Photo Gallery: 2/15: Lakers Vs. Hawks (Hans Gutknecht/Staff Photo)
The missed free throws and blown dunks were two things he hadn't seen before. But Lakers coach Phil Jackson had sat through too many similar losses during the first 52 games of his team's season not to say something.

So Jackson walked into his postgame news conference after the Lakers' 114-110 loss to the Atlanta Hawks on Wednesday night with a question of his own to ponder over the All-Star break.

"Wow, how can you lose a ballgame like that?" Jackson said. "I just don't understand sometimes the capabilities of this team to disappoint."

There have been worse losses in this Lakers' season, but never one at a more inopportune time.

With Kobe Bryant uncharacteristically missing 6 of 10 free throws in the fourth quarter, the Lakers fell to a Hawks team that had lost 23 consecutive road games to Western Conference teams dating to November 2004.
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Phil
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PostPosted: Thu Feb 16, 2006 6:34 am    Post subject:

Yes, They Can Get Along
By Mike Bresnahan, Times Staff Writer

The stories of the Laker season at the All-Star break: Kobe Bryant's scoring spree, more than a half-dozen late-game gaffes and tenuous eighth-place footing in the Western Conference.

The Lakers' non-story at the break: the relationship between Bryant and Coach Phil Jackson.


A blistering topic when Jackson agreed to rejoin the Lakers has cooled and hardened, the least of the Laker worries with 30 regular-season games left.

They have coexisted peacefully by all accounts, with Jackson's occasional nitpicking of Bryant's shot selection serving as a lone line of criticism. As such, early-season questions about their relationship have lessened significantly in scope and severity.

"It went through the pipeline for a week or so and it kind of dissipated," Jackson said. "That came and went, which is natural. But now he's having the best season of anybody in the NBA, really."

Bryant, averaging a league-best 34.9 points, incurred some second-guessing when he responded to Jackson's hiring last June with a brief written statement. When training camp began in October, he vowed to drop any ill feelings lingering from the aftermath of Jackson's book, saying, "Who am I to sit up here and judge somebody?"

Bryant reiterated Wednesday that the past was just that.

"It's just a matter of time because people are seeing there's really nothing to it," Bryant said. "People have kind of moved on from there."
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Phil
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PostPosted: Thu Feb 16, 2006 6:36 am    Post subject:

He Tries, but Jackson Just Can't Take a Compliment
Phil Jackson has let it be known that he thinks I'm too negative, and like you, I have no idea where he'd get an idea like that.

I know some people in town who would make a big deal out of the Lakers choking, gagging and collapsing against hapless Atlanta on Wednesday night, but my inclination here is to not even mention it.


That's why I'm not sure where Phil is coming from these days. I would think a guy who begins every day chanting and getting in touch with his inner whatever would roll with things better, but I got to thinking that maybe it's my fault, standing next to Vic the Brick at every news conference and coming off sounding negative by way of comparison.

So before Wednesday night's choking, gagging and collapsing pratfall against Atlanta, there was no sign of Brick, giving me the chance to cozy up to Phil.

"You've won more than 800 games in your career," I said. "You're brilliant, on top of the game like no one else," and Phil interrupted me.

"See," he said to the other reporters at the pregame gathering, "he has to throw out insults like that. Now, T.J., don't be starting that (bad stuff)."

"Just trying to be positive," I said.

"That's not positive," Phil said. "That's insulting."
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Phil
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PostPosted: Thu Feb 16, 2006 6:40 am    Post subject:

Lakers Hesitant To Make A Move

Feb 16 - Lakers GM Mitch Kupchak said he doesn't expect to make a trade before next Thursday's deadline, reports the Riverside Press-Enterprise. "I am making calls and receiving calls every day," Kupchak said Wednesday by phone. "If something makes sense, we'll look at it." Because they hope to get Aaron McKie back soon, Kupchak told the newspaper that the Lakers are hesitant to make a move for a guard.
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PostPosted: Thu Feb 16, 2006 6:43 am    Post subject:

Notebook: Kupchak doesn't foresee a trade

Broderick Turner

01:37 AM PST on Thursday, February 16, 2006

LOS ANGELES - The Lakers are young and very thin in the backcourt, and they probably could use some help there, especially with veteran Aaron McKie still on the inactive list with a slight tear in his left quadriceps tendon.

But General Manager Mitch Kupchak said he doesn't expect to make a trade before next Thursday's deadline.

Kupchak knows that speculation about the Lakers will be flying about, like the rumors of a Lamar Odom trade that are circulating.

Smush Parker and Sasha Vujacic are inexperienced guards who've had up-and-down seasons.

Parker, a starter, is just 24 and in his third season. Vujacic, the third guard, is 21 and in his second season.

The Lakers could probably use another veteran guard.

"I am making calls and receiving calls every day," Kupchak said Wednesday by phone. "If something makes sense, we'll look at it."

The Lakers had expected McKie, who has missed 38 games, to be one of the primary backup guards. Another backup, Laron Profit, was let go after he ruptured an Achilles' tendon in December.

Because they hope to get McKie back soon, Kupchak said the Lakers are hesitant to make a move for a guard.

"We had hoped to get a contribution from Aaron, which we haven't because he had a hard time learning the offense and because he got injured," Kupchak said.
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PostPosted: Thu Feb 16, 2006 6:47 am    Post subject:

Fundamental breakdown
The Lakers falter on free-throw shooting, rebounding and defense in losing to Atlanta.

By KEVIN DING
The Orange County Register

LOS ANGELES – Making for a convenient excuse, Lakers officials have taken to saying they're fielding the second-youngest lineup in the NBA, justifying the team's inconsistency this season.

On Wednesday night, the Lakers lost at Staples Center to the youngest team in the NBA, the Atlanta Hawks, 114-110.

There will be five idle days now for the Lakers to grasp for a new rationalization.

In their final game before the All-Star break the Lakers lost to an Atlanta team that came in with a 4-20 road record. Against such an inexperienced opponent and after Coach Phil Jackson had lectured them specifically on the importance of beating league lightweights, the Lakers' failures could not have been more basic: free-throw shooting, rebounding and defense.

Regarding his lecture in preparation, Jackson said after the game: "There's a lot of difference between talking and doing it."

Atlanta's field-goal percentage (54.7) was nearly better than the Lakers' free-throw percentage (55.6). The Lakers did plenty more simple tasks wrong, too, including Smush Parker's missed dunk with 51 seconds left that would've tied the score after a Kobe Bryant steal.

"I tried to go up strong with two hands," Parker said, "and I just overdid it."
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PostPosted: Thu Feb 16, 2006 6:49 am    Post subject:

Lakers begin their break early

Hawks 114, Lakers 110: They have the All-Star weekend to mull over another lackluster loss.

01:43 AM PST on Thursday, February 16, 2006

By BRODERICK TURNER / The Press-Enterprise

LOS ANGELES - As the first part of the season comes to a close for the Lakers -- some would say mercifully -- they find themselves looking both at the past and towards the future.
AP photo
The Hawks do their best to make sure Kobe Bryant (39 points) doesn't beat them in the final minutes of a close game.

What they see in the immediate past, the last of their first 52 games, is perhaps their most embarrassing, inexplicable loss of the season, 114-110 to the Atlanta Hawks on Wednesday before 18,259 at Staples Center.

The Lakers, apparently thinking about the All-Star break and not the task at hand, watched a Hawks team with the third-worst record in the NBA overcome a 15-point first-quarter deficit.

"Wow! How can you lose a ballgame like this?" Coach Phil Jackson asked. "I just don't understand sometimes the capabilities of this team to disappoint."
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PostPosted: Thu Feb 16, 2006 6:50 am    Post subject:

PRO BASKETBALL: HAWKS 114, LAKERS 110: Rally breaks long West skid
Rare victory in L.A. sets up weekend off
Sekou Smith - Staff
Thursday, February 16, 2006

Los Angeles --- Apparently all that chatter from the Hawks about needing a break was just talk.

They didn't play like a team itching for a vacation Wednesday night at Staples Center, when they rallied from a 15-point first-quarter deficit for a stunning 114-110 win over the Los Angeles Lakers.

Joe Johnson didn't need a break, not after finishing with a career-high 15 assists to go along with his 20 points.

Josh Smith, who tied his career highs in points (21) and rebounds (15), didn't look like he needed break. Smith and Johnson hooked up on the biggest sequence of a game full of them in the final minute.

With the Lakers trailing 109-107 and 50 seconds to play, Kobe Bryant stole a Royal Ivey pass and flipped it to Smush Parker for what looked like a game-tying dunk. But Smith ran the length of the floor and blocked the shot. Bryant got the rebound but fell down, and Josh Childress scooped up the ball as the Hawks went back the other way.
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PostPosted: Thu Feb 16, 2006 6:53 am    Post subject:

Kobe's going sole-searchin' with Nike ad
By DWAIN PRICE
Star-Telegram Staff Writer

After nearly a three-year hiatus, Kobe Bryant is back in the endorsement game.

Nike produced an in-your-face commercial featuring Bryant that started airing on national TV last week. It's the first commercial by Bryant since he was charged in 2003 with sexually assaulting a Colorado teen-ager.

Nike's move is being scrutinized by advertisers. Rich Thomaselli, who covers sports marketing in New York for the Advertising Age magazine, dubbed the commercial as a low-risk endeavor.

"I don't think Nike is taking a big gamble, although I will say that Nike is one of the blue-chip marketers that we have in this country," Thomaselli said. "But they don't fall under that same umbrella that Coke and McDonald's do, i.e., a family-friendly marketer.

"So I think if Kobe is going to make a comeback, this is the ideal spot for him, a sneaker apparel company. And he gets his new sneaker out there in the market, and gets his image behind it for the first time in almost two years with the commercial."

Bryant is narrating while shooting free throws and going through drills.

"Love me or hate me, it's one or the other," Bryant said in the commercial. "Always has been. Hate my game, my swagger.
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