Real Deal

I've been saying it for two or three years now: I want Hinrich in LA. That defense is what lures me in. While everyone criticizes him for how badly he defended Bryant...why not do that to everyone? I don't see anyone stopping him. But Kirk can defend two positions on the floor, sometimes three (depending on the forward). The shooting percentages don't worry me, either. We went over this with Trevor Ariza. With Bryant facilitating the offense, Hinrich gets open looks all day long, especially when there's a post presence in Gasol. Get Hinrich, start him at the point, bring Fisher and Brown off the bench as our secondary backcourt, and we run with that. I'd be one of the happiest Laker fans in the world.

You could probably consider them a rival a few years down the road, but not yet. If anyone out West, I'd say Denver, for the simple fact that we swept them in the first round two years ago, took them out in the WCF just last year, and if we were to meet them once again? I'd say that looks more like the Lakers/Kings rivalry we had going back in the Kobe/Shaq era.

We're on a semi-dedicated server. My guess is we can hold up to 60+ active members at once on it. If I decided to pay $200/mo. for a dedicated server, this topic would still be active 2-3 months down the road, and I'd be wasting my money. Servers/hosting...they have nothing to do with activity increases. And no, I don't want a RealGM environment. Those people would rather post there? Fine. The fact is, there's nothing wrong with our server, as there are no crashes and delays, and the only reason those people don't want to become active here is because they have more people to talk to on RealGM...and that's not always a good thing, as almost half of them are idiots (not taking away from the site, because the other half are good posters). It's too bad those people weren't around when RealGM started out with 10 active members each day. How did they get so active? New members joined and wanted to contribute, and it was those members who became vital pieces in building the most active sports message board on the net today. New members, becoming active, despite very few posting to begin with...ring a bell? If those posters need to think twice about coming here, if they need to "scope it out" before registering and compare us to RealGM...I don't want them here. Their expectations are too high, they probably think they know more than they really do, and I would rather dodge the problems before they develop.

A total of 66 shots between Arenas, Jamison and Butler, and no defense = loss. And it's sad that this is the 3rd or 4th game this season that Washington has lost with an Arenas missed free throw at the end.

That line didn't help Favre at all late in the game and in the OT. Chicago was bringing the rush, and they were getting to Favre. If it wasn't for Brett being so damn good, the Bears would've sacked him 200 times tonight. However, after this game, it should be no question that Rice is very underrated as a receiver. Dude can catch, and with Minnesota's weapons (from Harvin and Rice to Peterson and Taylor), it's Rice who makes that big grab on a pass that would've been through the hands of plenty of receivers in the league. Winfield, Minny's o-line, and Allen lost this game tonight...but if you want to put the blame on one person, really, just point at Childress, who I think is one of the worst coaches in the NFL.

1) Derek Fisher needs to move out of the way on offense. I'm so sick of him doing absolutely nothing but begging for a spot-up three that he only makes at the end of games (and when he makes them, it's because we need it due to his trashy defense for 3 1/2 quarters). 2) Why does Shannon Brown play less than Jordan Farmar? We need defense at the point. Play Brown. 3) Why does Sasha Vujacic even play, and why do we still have Adam Morrison on this team? 4) Andrew Bynum needs to stop being a baby about his touches and realize that both Kobe and Gasol should be getting more shots than him. If he's not going to put forth the effort on defense, he sure the hell doesn't need the ball back down the court. He's not Shaq. 5) Lamar Odom has to find a way to play consistently. If he's not going to do it, we should just trade him for someone that will. We need Ron Artest back, immediately. He, Kobe and Shannon are the only three players who want to play defense on the Lakers, and we aren't beating a Suns team that can score 118 points on us.

Gasol is getting crushed by Amare right now, and Kobe has been doing everything possible to keep them in the game.

Post the original link to the article, please. http://www.nfl.com/news/story?id=09000d5d810bda9e&template=without-video-with-comments&confirm=true

He had both feet on the floor, moving forward and to the right slightly after the pass. I've watched it 20 times just now. And as I said, Kobe wasn't at full speed, or else Mo wouldn't have gotten up, considering the way he fell at the speed Bryant was running to begin with. In addition to that, after watching it over and over again, Kobe wasn't even looking at him. You can take a peek at it here. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yNM28C0XNF0 Kobe wasn't even looking at him the entire time, in fact, and that could've been Fisher he laid out. Careless by Bryant. Intentional or not, Mo needs to put on some strength, some weight, or something, because he didn't lay him out like Fisher did Scola, and as much as Kobe wasn't looking at Mo, Williams wasn't looking at him, either.

Haha, I'm not pre-designing anything to favor Bryant. I'm simply considering all things, while you are talking just rings. Bryant is the better overall player, he had less to work with from 2004-2008, he's crushing Lakers scoring records (both games, season and career, in due time), and while Magic and the Lakers visited the Finals nine times, Kobe and LA have been there six so far, in a Western Conference that I believe is stronger than it was 20+ years ago. It's the rings that favor Magic. THAT would be pre-designed to favor one player. That would be like me saying Kevin Garnett is greater than Karl Malone. If you believe that to be true, I guess we're done discussing the topic.

Wait, Kobe was running full speed, and Mo was on one leg?

It's not about the greatest player, it's about what that player has to work with. I can't discredit what someone like Michael Jordan did in his first 5-6 seasons just because he dropped into a Chicago Bulls team with the likes of Oakley and Woolridge. I don't remember when Magic DIDN'T have solid teammates in the 80's. What happened after Kareem stopped being a threat on the floor? He averaged around 15 per game in their last championship, if I remember right (remembering this from Shaq/Kareem debates, so I may be off), and after that, Detroit ran off two consecutive titles, and Chicago took over while Magic was still in the league. I don't take away anything from Magic because of that, and I was hoping nobody would take away from Kobe when Shaq decided to gain 15 pounds, fix his injuries on company time, and demand more money (which led to his departure). So basically, this is what I understand already: if Kobe wins his fifth, he's in the debate. What happens if the Lakers make another run in 2010-11? Do six rings put him on top of Magic, despite everything you've provided us (as far as Magic's impact on the league goes)? For me, there's too much of a gray area. Chauncey Billups led a Pistons team to a championship in 2004, but does that make him the greater Detroit Piston between him and Dave Bing?

He's not the right coach for the Bulls, but then again, he led them to 41 wins and a huge chance of beating Boston in the first round last year. This new team is 11-17 right now and looking like they need more help to get to that .500 record. I guess management isn't considering the fact that they just lost Ben Gordon, and Thomas has been out for quite a while, also. They didn't have a problem with him, at all, last season. I don't see why they have one this year, given the circumstances noted above.

Haha, good point. Kobe isn't getting the MVP unless the Lakers win 65+ games and obtain the top record in the NBA. He's not the future of the league anymore, and the NBA (and mainly the media) needs to build on those guys that will lead the NBA in 10-15 years.

I'll update it daily, not a problem. RSS feeds are already running along the sides, and a feed down the middle won't include what I want, so I'll take care of it.

If I had any denial being a biased Lakers fan, I would tell you it was accidental. I just don't see how someone just 15 pounds more can knock down another professional athlete without running at him, simple as that. My cousin has hit me with screens when I was younger, outweighed me by a good 40 pounds or so, and that's almost exactly how I fell on the ground, no more than that (and sometimes not falling at all). If he flopped, I was right. If he didn't, I'm right in calling him a wimp. Either one doesn't matter to me. As I mentioned earlier, Garnett sets illegal screens harder than that, much harder, and I've seen guards under 200 bounce right off of him without falling to the ground in pain.

So when do player abilities factor in? Because Michael Cooper has as many rings as Magic as well, so does that make him a greater Laker than Kobe Bryant? As many "Kobe Kult" fans you see, you'll find just as many "Magic Minions" in Lakerland, all who think he's arguably greater than Michael Jordan, so I don't see why something like that has to be mentioned in this topic. Magic has one more ring than Bryant, with a far superior team over a course of a full decade of basketball. That's it. Earvin was a Laker for 13 seasons, Bryant at 14. Kobe has had the greater performances, and he's the better overall player (this you agree with). So other than championship rings, which Magic has only one-upped on Bryant...what else has Johnson done for the LAKERS that Kobe hasn't? The Magic/Bird/Jordan trio is what changed basketball in the 80's, not just Magic himself...and the truth is, it was Jordan who brought the interest back to the playgrounds, with kids wanting to be like him, and it was he who raked in deals with the likes of Nike, McDonald's, and many others that significantly helped the NBA turn into a media giant, but even then, that wasn't just for the Lakers, Celtics or Bulls, that was for the league. The impact isn't shown today because the NBA is already global. Is there any doubt that Kobe could've done the same thing, assuming he came into the league with someone like LeBron at a time when the NBA needed that extra boost? The greatest Laker should be the greatest player to play in a Lakers jersey. Being the better overall player has a lot to do with that, or else Cooper trumps Bryant, and that's just ridiculous, to say the least. By the way, I think it's close enough to be a tie, in my opinion...but there's only one choice available for each member, so yeah...

For one, they weren't signing up when I was posting all the articles anyways, so that's not the case. Let's not start pointing fingers at things that make little to no difference when it comes to our problems with keeping members around here. If I remove that homepage altogether, 75% of you wouldn't notice. As far as actually updating it goes, I've been gone since the beginning of December, pretty much. I haven't been to my house for weeks, which explains why roster pages aren't up, which explains why the remaining banners aren't up, and because I've been busy doing other things, it explains why the homepage isn't updated. In the past, I have assigned five people to do it for me. This is on three different pages since probably two years ago. All five shut it down on their own, just stopped doing the work. I have to post at least 20 times a day, approve registrations, update team records, update the homepage, finish roster pages, finish team pages, enter player data into the database, put up the rest of the banners, re-code the skin after our update coming up in a week, perform maintenance on the forums, and do many other things that I'd rather not do. But yeah, it'll be updated soon, not a problem.

Williams is 6-1, 190 pounds. Kobe is 6-6, 205. There's a 15-pound difference, and that's it. If this were LeBron, I could see Mo falling hard and going about five feet down the court. It was intentional and it was a flop. Both were idiots at that time. Kobe's arms didn't push away from his body, he didn't run his shoulder into Mo, and he wasn't even running to begin with, so if Williams really did fall like that, he's a bigger pansy than I thought.

Then if even part of that wasn't an acting job, he needs to put some weight on him or get thicker, because he bounced off Bryant pretty easily, despite Kobe not running full speed or driving his shoulder into him.

Oakland has the strongest kicker and punter in the NFL, and that's not even up for debate. Both have the legs to kick the football 60+ yards, field goal or punt.

After five days' worth of questions.

Ah, see, the people that do it seem to be braindead on the matter. When they go in and mess with our new members, they don't realize they are only adding to the problem, joking or not, and I think that's what most of you just don't get. There is no sarcasm button on the internet. When you guys dive into a topic and crack your "funny" jokes, they cause more problems than anything else. Most of the Lakers fans here followed me in. I didn't go recruit them. But it's also not my problem that there are 15-16 teams in the league that have little to no fans, either, and those fans won't post anywhere that lacks others of their fanbase because, quite frankly, those teams don't draw interest. I don't see why this is so difficult to understand by now, for anyone on this site. Maybe that's why I run the place? Whether all of you like it or not, we lost non-Lakers fans, some Lakers fans, and even potential members here, because everything turns into a joke. Suddenly, the site becomes a personal haven for you guys to bash each other (friendly bashing?), to dog a particular team to no end (such as the Jazz), and to join some "rebellion" made by a banned member that failed miserably, just to be "cool" like him and maybe, just maybe, run other members off. I don't have time to sit here and stick pacifiers in members' mouths, really. That [expletive] got old two years ago. I have work to do on the site, and the posters here have things to post. If some of you don't want that role, nobody is holding a gun to your head. Go run off to another site if you don't want to be a part of what we have going on. Some of you keep attempting to, so why stop now? Thread closed, because there is nothing to discuss beyond this point.

Wilt played four full seasons with us, and his best years came earlier.

Probably when I just start banning people for it.