Am trying hard not to post on weekends. Using them to rest up and since most people check this blog on the boss’s time Monday through Friday, I have been able to get away with it.

But that was some game. Probably the best one I’ve seen the Blazers play against a quality opponent in some time. Great focus at both ends of the court and an excellent defensive job.

Martell Webster was terrific on Kobe Bryant and is playing with great energy. He got plenty of defensive help, too, and Portland’s scheme on Kobe was terrific.

Andre Miller was solid, as he’s been for the most part lately and you have to give everyone who played a lot of credit. Brandon Roy, of course, was special. He seems to save his best for the best teams.

You just wish they came out with that kind of focus and energy all the time. Make no mistake, it was a special night.

(An interesting sidebar to the game: Jerryd Bayless did something in  the first half I don’t think I’ve ever seen. He hit four straight shots when he was basically behind the three-point line but had his toe on the line — getting credit for only two points. Each shot looked so close to a three-pointer. Man, look down next time, kid. You cost yourself four points.)

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Tags: Andre Miller, Brandon Roy, Dwight Jaynes, Jerryd Bayless, Kobe Bryant, Martell Webster

A lot of people are pointing at Los Angeles coach Phil Jackson and saying yes, Phil can handle Ron Artest. After all, Phil made it work in Chicago with Dennis Rodman. Artest joining the Lakers can do nothing but make the Lakers better.

I would not be so quick to jump to that conclusion.

Rodman, while probably crazier even than Artest, was not the problem on the court that Artest will be. Rodman did not want to shoot. In fact, when you passed him the ball he reacted as if you’d just pulled the pin on a hand grenade and lobbed it to him. What Dennis wanted to do is rebound and he did that just about as well as anyone ever has.

Artest not only wants to shoot, he’s the most toxic kind of shooter — the type who thinks he’s good at it and isn’t. I think it’s going to make for some long nights for Kobe Bryant, trying to somehow get it through Artest’s noggin that those long jump shots he favors aren’t going to be what’s best for the Lakers.

And that team does play in Los Angeles, you know. Ron Artest anywhere near Hollywood just seems like such a potential trainwreck. I’m not sure if Artest looks for trouble or if trouble just has a way of finding him but it’s going to be fun to watch this play out.

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Tags: Dennis Rodman, Dwight Jaynes, Kobe Bryant, Los Angeles Lakers, Phil Jackson, Ron Artest

Nike has certainly set the standard for advertising shoes. Nobody is even close. But here’s the thing about those ads we keep seeing featuring puppets of LeBron James and Kobe Bryant:

I don’t care if you think they’re funny, cute, entertaining, just OK, awful or totally annoying. Doesn’t matter. It all comes down to one thing — I just don’t see any way in the world those ads are selling one, single, solitary shoe.

No way. And they aren’t doing anything for the popularity of the two players, either.

So really, what’s the point?

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Tags: Dwight Jaynes, Kobe Bryant, Lebron James, NBA, Nike, puppets, shoes

I’ve come to believe that as far as the media is concerned, this series is all about Kobe Bryant. And whatever happens tonight it’s likely to be explained in one of these ways:

– Kobe just wouldn’t let them lose.

– Kobe is tired.

– Kobe just isn’t as good as everyone thinks he is.

And it’s still only Game 4.

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Tags: 2009 NBA Finals, Dwight Jaynes, Kobe Bryant

He’s worn out. At least that’s what this column in the Los Angeles Times talks about, using a veritable festival of one-sentence paragraphs. Maybe he is. He has every right to be. But he’s also just as entitled as anyone else to have an off-night once in a great while.

Besides, it’s not as if he’s out there playing alongside a Laker team for the ages.

After reading about Tuesday night’s game in all sorts of places, I still have to marvel at how experienced media people still, after all these years, have such a tendency to jump on the bandwagon of whatever team won the most recent game in these series.

And by the way, if Courtney Lee had made that shot at the end of Game 2, would the media have been heavy on Bryant’s ass by now or what?

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Tags: Dwight Jaynes, Kobe Bryant, Los Angeles Lakers, Los Angeles Times, NBA Finals, Orlando Magic

Some day someone is going to say or write just that about the 2009 NBA Finals. You know, ol’ Kobe Bryant just willed them to the title.

Yeah, except ol’ Kobe is the luckiest stiff on the planet this morning.

Courtney Lee blew a chance to make one of the biggest shots in NBA Finals history Sunday night — and a layup at that — and it saved a turnover-prone Kobe from being the fool in that game.

With wide-open teammates all over the floor in the waning seconds of the fourth quarter, Kobe tried to win the game himself — only to have his jumper totally capped by Hedo Turkoglu. With sixth-tenths of a second to go, the Magic had the ball at midcourt.

Stan Van Gundy can really coach. I’m just guessing here but I think he used a fake out-of-bounds play, something he didn’t intend to run, just to set up a possible game winner. The Magic called timeout after the first one, when Turkoglu didn’t at all seem to be ever intending to inbound the ball.

Then, after a 20-second timeout, Turk lofted a high-arching pass intended for Lee, who had used Rashard Lewis’ high pick to totally free himself. I believe Lee may have gone up in the air just a shade too soon, catching the pass on his way down instead of on the way up, when he could have possibly even dunked it.

It was a still a dead-cold layup on the left side, though, and Lee barely missed curling it in with his right hand. It was a shame Orlando squandered such a brilliant play – and the guy who missed the shot had previously missed a layup just seconds earlier.

But what was an even bigger shame is that Bryant emerged with his strut intact, even though the man he was guarding on the play was Lee. But a storyline is a storyline in the NBA. And all those same people who have been predicting Orlando’s quick demise for the last three days will stick to their version of history.

Yeah, it will be remembered as Kobe’s vindication, most likely. HIS title.

But I’ll always remember Lee’s missed opportunity.

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Tags: Courtney Lee, Dwight Jaynes, Hedo Turkoglu, Kobe Bryant, Los Angeles Lakers, Orlando Magic, Stan Van Gundy

That deal Thursday night was just a little too easy. It isn’t going to stay that way. In fact, odds are it will turn around significantly. But a whole lot of “experts” and Laker fans are getting carried away with the Game 1 win.

Let me say just a couple of things: First, Kobe Bryant took a lot of shots and went off on his own a lot. That’s not usually a good thing and I wouldn’t expect it to continue. If it does, the Lakers are going to be trailing in the game. Second, the Magic missed a lot of shots they’ll make on normal nights.

It’s customary in all seven games series for the media to jump firmly on the bandwagon of whichever team has won the last game. In this case, it was a real big crowd because of how convincing the win was on Thursday.

But Orlando will not be deterred by that game. The Magic have bounced back from whippings in these playoffs before and will again. And the Lakers are going to make it much easier for them if they expect Sunday’s game to be as easy as Thursday’s.

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Tags: Dwight Jaynes, Kobe Bryant, Los Angeles Lakers, NBA Finals, Orlando Magic

Yes, it's the Grrrrr Face

Kobe Bryant showed the world his Grrrrr face during Thursday night’s game. It’s designed, I guess, to make sure everyone knows how much he wants to win. What a tough competitor he is.

It looked pretty dumb to me. He was mugging for the cameras. Sorry, But I don’t really buy anything the guy does. Helluva player. But he’s a phony.

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Tags: Dwight Jaynes, Grrrrr Face, Kobe Bryant, Los Angeles Lakers, NBA Finals

Even Phil Jackson does it.

You’re up by 25 points in the fourth quarter, the clock is moving quickly as the beaten team is just trying to get out of the building with a shred of dignity, yet there you are with your best players still on the floor!

Kobe Bryant, running around still trying to add to his point total in a blowout in Game 1 of the Finals. Some day, somewhere, a great player is going to get hurt in this situation and everyone it going to turn around in unison and point a finger at the coach and say,

“What the hell is that guy doing still in the game?”

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Tags: Dwight Jaynes, Kobe Bryant, NBA coaches, NBA Finals, Phil Jackson

All over the place I’m reading stories that Kobe Bryant must, for some reason, validate his place in history by winning a championship without Shaquille O’Neal around to help him. And that’s what this NBA Finals is all about.

And that is so ridiculous.

My goodness, Michael Jordan never had to win one without Scottie Pippen. Bill Russell didn’t have to win one without all those great players he had alongside him in Boston. Magic Johnson didn’t have to grab one without Kareem and Worthy.

I really don’t understand why Kobe suddenly has to win “his own” title to someone cement his legacy. Come on, folks — I don’t think MJ ever won an NBA title with a supporting cast as weak as the one Kobe has right now. I mean, this Laker team isn’t exactly Kareem, Worthy, Byron Scott and Magic, is it?

Basketball is a team game. Ask Wilt Chamberlain (well, he’s dead, but you know what I mean). Oscar Robertson, ask him. You need talented players, plural, to win titles. The NBA does all it can to make it seem as if it’s just one man on these teams. There’s way too much of that “Kobe vs. LeBron” and “Garnett vs. Howard” marketing junk going on as it is. And people actually fall for it. They think if the Lakers lose this series, it falls totally on Kobe’s shoulders.

Don’t get roped into it. It’s the Lakers vs. the Magic. Period. The great players play a big part in it, but they aren’t the whole show. Didn’t we learn anything from LeBron’s conference finals last week?

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Tags: Dwight Jaynes, Kobe Bryant, Magic Johnson, Michael Jordan, NBA championship, Oscar Robertson, Scottie Pippen, Wilt Chamberlain