– As bad as the Lakers played, it’s incredible the chances they still had inside the final minute of the game. Kobe Bryant had two brutal turnovers, one in the halfcourt where he tried to pass the ball back outside and the other in the Boston end where he couldn’t get an outlet pass over Kevin Garnett and missed a chance for a layup that would have cut the lead to four.

– As good as Bryant is, you can see how hard it’s getting to be for even superstars in the NBA to “get their own shot” consistently throughout a game against a quality opponent. It’s fine when Bryant is draining difficult outside shots, but over time, particularly late in games, it’s extremely difficult for a player against today’s defenses to do that. He’s got defenders all over him. It’s no wonder why he had seven turnovers for the game.

And you wonder why I’m down on the Trail Blazers’ chances of ever making a long playoff run using so many isolations for Brandon Roy? If Bryant can’t do it consistently, how could you expect Roy to do it? And spare me from any thoughts Roy is better than Bryant.

The Lakers are much, MUCH better when they share the ball. When they work the triangle and get good shots inside. But it’s a killer for them when Lamar Odom no-shows and Andrew Bynum isn’t healthy.

Bynum is the key to this series and a difference maker. But it appears that knee is getting worse the longer he plays.

– I give Danny Ainge a ton of credit for adding Nate Robinson to that team late in the season. People laughed when he did it, but it was a huge move. At the level of the Celtics, very often just one big quarter from an unexpected source can mean a championship. Or don’t you remember Herm Gilliam for the Trail Blazers in 1977?

– I am not sure that Boston bench can continue to produce at that level in Los Angeles. I will believe it when I see it.

– Big Baby is pretty good. Over and over we see this — effort and timing matter a lot more in rebounding than height.

– Doc Rivers continues to show he’s an outstanding coach who has a great sense of his team. He has a great feel for substitutions and insists on unselfish play at both ends of the court. On top of that, I think he’s managed to stay humble and retain his sense of humor. I love the way Boston plays at both ends of the floor.

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It’s a funny year. The Lakers are favored by the oddsmakers to win the NBA championship, yet a lot of very smart people are picking Boston to win.

I’m not one of those people. And for me, the series is pretty much a tossup other than one important thing, which I will get to in a moment. First, let me say I hope the Celtics aren’t allowed to turn the thing into a wrestling match. I think they want to get very physical with the Lakers and I’m weary of that kind of stuff. I didn’t like it when the Pistons did it, or the Knicks did it — and I still don’t.

I rue the day that basketball, and not just at the pro level — it’s brutal in college these days, too — got away from the fast-paced beautiful game it used to be. Now, there’s already too much grabbing, pushing, bumping and downright brutal play. It keeps the great players from fully showing what they can do and it keeps the scores down, which I don’t like, either.

Man, sorry to go old-timer on you, but those days when teams averaged nearly 120 points a game where amazing. But I doubt we’ll ever see them again. That’s when you actually had to defend someone by getting your body in front of them and not grabbing or bumping them. Which meant you really couldn’t defend them.

Anyway, the biggest factor of the Finals has been the decision several years ago to go to a 2-3-2 format. The road team is really up against it. It’s why when I hear people predict Boston to win in six or seven games, I shake my head.

I can’t see it. I can’t see the Lakers losing a Game 6 or 7 at home. For Boston to win the series, I think it has to come in four or five games, before the Finals shift back to the west coast. The 2-3-2 format has been a killer for the team without homecourt advantage.

And I just don’t see the Celtics being so much better than the Lakers that they can overcome it.

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I’ve made this known before, but I have to reiterate — don’t count me among those all geeked up for another Lakers-Celtics NBA Finals.

The tradition of this doesn’t move me much. I’ve seen them play enough over the years. Been there, done that — even in the days when a 2-2-1-1-1 travel schedule in a seven-game series between Boston and Los Angeles meant enough cross-country flights to jet lag me for days.

I find these the two most unlikeable franchises in the league — mostly for their arrogance, I guess. There is nothing very lovable about either team, if you ask me. And I’m hard-pressed, too, to pick a winner in the series or to even say which team I’d like to see win.

Usually, I’m more accustomed to subtly pulling against one of these teams. Now, I’ve got to watch one of them win. I suppose, if you put a gun to my head — and I wish you wouldn’t do that, by the way — I’d have to say I’d prefer the NBA championship stays in the West. But really, it wouldn’t break my heart to watch Phil Jackson lose a series.

However, it looks to me as if the Lakers may have too much for Boston this time around. I like the Los Angeles front line over Boston’s. And I like Kobe Bryant over anybody in basketball. The only thing that worries me is the physical nature of Boston’s defense. In the West half of this bracket, the Lakers haven’t seen a mugging like they’re going to get from the Celts.

I’m not sure the Phoenix Suns did much to prepare Los Angeles for the Celtics.

That’s Boston’s big chance — to physically beat up the Lakers and make it an old-fashioned, NBA wrestling match. And even without the physicality, the Celtic defense is much better than anything the Lakers have seen to date in the postseason.

I can’t recall ever saying this before, but I wouldn’t mind seeing it end quickly. Man, it seems to me that this has been one long NBA season. I wouldn’t mind seeing it finish up. Let’s get to the draft so we can start the whole thing all over again, right?

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• Isn’t it funny how all the people who said Orlando couldn’t win four straight against the Celtics — or even, when the Magic trailed 2-0 in the series, said they couldn’t win four out of five — are now saying that the Magic will win Game 6 in Boston and there’s no way Boston could win a Game 7 in Orlando? Don’t count on anything in that series.
• And people are talking about Phoenix “not boxing out” on Ron Artest late on the last play of Thursday night’s Laker win over the Suns. Thing is, when a guy throws an airball, boxing out isn’t always the answer. Boxing a guy out means being between him and the basket. On an airball, the guy with inside position doesn’t always get the ball. In this case, Artest had the advantage of coming from the weakside, so he had a line of vision to the ball and the rim, which helped him. The man “boxing him out,” Jason Richardson, didn’t watch the ball — which normally is OK. But it’s funny how often an airball is beneficial in that situation. A whole lot of big plays have come off offensive players plucking an airball and throwing it in the basket — just ask Houston against North Carolina State, the most heart-breaking loss I’ve ever seen in a big game.
• All of a sudden, people are making Orlando the favorite to win that series. I think you still have to think Boston will win Game 6. But in a city where the NHL Bruins famously blew a 3-0 series lead — even a 3-0 lead in Game 7 at home — there will be incredible depression in Boston if the Celts don’t win that series.
• Do the Blazers look good after seeing how well Phoenix has played in these playoffs? After all, Portland is so far the only team to defeat the Suns on their homecourt during the postseason. Yeah, I think it makes Portland look good. But I’ve also thought about what a great opportunity this season would have been for the Blazers if they’d stayed healthy. There was a definite path there to a long playoff run.
• If Orlando emerges from the East to a berth in the Finals, well, my love for Stan Van Gundy will continue to increase. Love the guy. One of the most straight-talking guys in sports. And he still COACHES. He never stops coaching. He doesn’t defer to these guys or shy away from confrontation — in fact, he gets right in their face. I’m not saying he’s going to last for a long time doing that, but I love it as long as he gets away with it. It’s refreshing.

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Except me.

Yes, I know — best teams in the league. Long, long traditional rivalry. The matchup everyone wants to see. Blah, blah, blah.

But for me, the biggest problem the NBA has is that the same damn teams are winning the championship all the time. No other major sport has had just a handful of teams monopolizing its championships the way professional basketball does. And I think over the long run, it hurts the league.

I’m sick of Boston or Los Angeles winning titles over and over.

Yes, TV ratings will be sensational for an NBA Finals featuring the Celtics vs. the Lakers. And I’ll watch, too. For sure. But please, at some point, that league needs to show other franchises that they have an opportunity to win a title. There has to be at least a promise of parity. Man, I cannot believe the fans in so many NBA cities have been able to maintain hope after all the years of futility. Won’t, at some point, they just stop caring?

Or — believe it or not — maybe people out there in some markets are going to start believing the league is fixed.

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When Red Auerbach spent the No. 6 overall pick in the 1978 NBA draft on Larry Joe Bird of Indiana State, there were a few eyebrows raised. You see, Bird wouldn’t be actually entering the NBA for another year because under the rules in place in those days, Bird — who had taken a redshirt season when he transfered from Indiana — was eligible to be drafted after his junior season.

But for one full year, the Boston Celtics would not have any benefit from that draft pick.

At the time, there wasn’t a lot of fuss. Nobody was too sure how good Bird was going to be — he hadn’t had a lot of big-time exposure. And oh well, Red usually knew what he was doing.

Did he ever. A year later, of course, Bird was a much hotter property.

But fast forward 30 years and the world isn’t quite as laid back. David Kahn, the new general manager in Minnesota, possibly having to wait two seasons for Ricky Rubio has set off a real fuss. He’s being called an idiot from coast to coast. Look, I’m not comparing Rubio to Bird in any way (or Kahn to Auerbach for that matter), other than to point out the way the world has changed to a results-right-now culture.

Kahn took Rubio in the first round last June, knowing full well how difficult Rubio’s buyout is. Now, with word coming out of Spain that Rubio’s been traded and is probably two seasons away from a cheap buyout, Kahn is still insisting that no deal with any team has been reached.

But really, Kahn has a long-term vision on this thing that most fans and media these days just can’t abide and his worst-case scenario isn’t as bad as it looks right now. He knows his Timberwolves aren’t going to be competing for a playoff berth next season. Or probably even the season after that. Frankly, they’re awful.

The way you build a solid franchise in the NBA isn’t through quick fixes and rapid transformations. You build with solid people, good young talent, astute trades, you do it piece by piece and it takes time. There are no shortcuts, other than getting lucky with the ping-pong balls at the draft.

What Kahn has done is decide that if Ricky Rubio is a pretty good player right now, with two more years of European experience he’s going to be an even better player and even more valuable to an NBA team.  Kahn has already taken a pretty good point guard in this draft and he can afford to be patient with Rubio.

At some point when Rubio buys himself out of Spain, Kahn will be able to better see the long-term needs of the T-Wolves and decide whether to bring Rubio aboard to his team or trade him for a missing piece. And oh yeah, they won’t have him on the salary cap for those years, either.

Either way, Rubio is a very big asset to the Minnesota Timberwolves, no matter where he’s playing.

It’s all a matter of patience. And that’s something in today’s world — not just in sports but everything — that’s really in short supply.

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As I read all the reports today about Rasheed Wallace heading to the Boston Celtics, I happened to notice the old T-shirt I’d thrown over my head today. It’s my favorite of all time and put out in a limited edition (a very limited edition, I believe) and it arrived shortly after one of Wallace’s special media performances during the playoffs.

You know the story. But if you don’t, suffice it to say he’s a guy who didn’t offer much in post-game interviews. (Clip thanks to”Arthritis” in the comments).

So as Celtic fans await the arrival of a guy who can produce plenty as long as you don’t have to rely on him for it,  enjoy this photo of my favorite shirt.

And by the way, I hope he and KG get along perfectly.

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Two disheartening games last night, as far as I was concerned. I know in Orlando they’re saying they got the shaft in Boston last night when officials said an airball hit the rim, allowing the Celtics to retain possession. People are saying for sure it was an airball but I saw three replays where you just couldn’t tell.

But the Magic can’t blame referees for that loss. They imploded in the final four minutes of the game, getting poor shots or no shots and then not stopping the Celts at the other end. “We just quit playing,” Orlando coach Stan Van Gundy said. “We looked like we were trying to run the clock out.”

That injury to Jameer Nelson, the outstanding Orlando point guard, has really hurt in the playoffs. His replacement, ol’ Skip to my Lou — Rafer Alston — is an “And One” streetball refugee who just isn’t up to this kind of heavy lifting, at least so far.

And then there is the Laker-Rocket series. Houston has done a great job of putting together meticulous preparation and monster effort but is way too overmatched. I love how hard the Rockets play but seriously — they’re just not good enough at this point. At the same time, the Lakers have been very inconsistent.

So far, Los Angeles does not look like a team capable of winning an NBA title. The Lakers are just out of sync right now and out of rhythm.

And for all you people who think Ron Artest is the answer for the Blazers, come on. This is a guy who looks great on the odd night when his shot is falling. Or when, for some reason, he decides just not to take any shots. But for the most part he’s a guy who thinks he’s a scorer who will rattle off 20 shots, hit four of them and then shake his head and wonder why everyone is mad at him.

I wouldn’t touch him.

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Yes, Tyson Chandler is on his way back to New Orleans because he couldn’t pass the physical at OKC. A tough thing to go back to a team that tried to trade you.

A lot of Portland fans may not remember that same thing happened here, in 1987. My Fourth of July barbecue (oh well, it was raining that day, anyway) was interrupted when the Blazers traded Jim Paxson to the Cleveland Cavaliers for Keith Lee. But Lee had knee problems and the Blazer doctors wouldn’t pass him.

So Paxson stayed here, had a foot surgery that caused him to miss the start of the season and then played a few games before being traded to the Boston Celtics for Jerry Sichting, whose career would end here because of chronic foot problems.

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Over at ESPN, Chad Ford is saying that the Boston Celtics and Sacramento Kings are involved in talks that would send Cassell to the Kings for a draft pick and some cash. And nobody thinks the Kings want Cassell.

Could the Kings be acquiring him for the Trail Blazers? Cassell hasn’t played in a game all season and fancies himself a veteran leader who someday will be an NBA head coach. He’s created a unique niche for himself in that role. Could the Blazers, who reportedly also have an interest in the Kings’ John Salmons, be looking to bring Cassell in to mentor their point guards? Or just to provide some locker room savvy prior to the playoffs?

It’s an intriguing thought.

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