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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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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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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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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I’ve put this off all week. I’d love to see Orlando win the NBA championship. I even wrote a post earlier in the week that I never published predicting the Magic to win the NBA title.

Not that I’m a big Magic fan, but I’m a big Dave Twardzik fan and he’s been there in the Orlando front office helping Otis Smith put this team together. I’d love to see him grab another championship ring because he’s one of the NBA’s great guys.

And really, I know he’d also be overjoyed to see me pick against him. If I picked Orlando, in fact, he’d be texting me and accusing me of putting the hex on the Magic.

Thing is, I think the Lakers are probably just a tad too good for Orlando. They’re long — much longer than the Cavaliers or Celtics — which should help them defend the Magic. As much as it pains me to say it, they’re extremely well coached and they’re accustomed to the big stage.

And then there’s the Kobe thing. You can hate him all you want, but folks, he’s really the guy who will probably decide the series. Down the stretch of games, there’s nobody better — and that certainly includes LeBron James.

I don’t expect it to be easy, but I do expect Los Angeles to win. My goodness, don’t you?

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The “Wheels at Work” crew on 95.5 The Game had one of my all-time favorite guys — Indiana assistant coach Dick Harter — on their show yesterday.

You may remember Dick as the head coach at Oregon for many years and an assistant coach to P.J. Carlesimo with the Blazers. Anyway, Dick, a defensive guru throughout his coaching career, was talking about the Pacers’ Danny Granger and how Granger has dedicated himself now to becoming a better defensive player.

“Your best player has to also be your best defensive player,” Harter said (and I’m doing my best to quote him accurately since I was driving when I heard it and couldn’t take notes). “Look around — LeBron James, Kobe Bryant, Dwight Howard, those guys are first-team all-defense. You have to have that to win now.”

I had never thought about it in those terms because I don’t believe that’s always been the case. Certainly Larry Bird wasn’t his team’s best defender. Neither was Isiah Thomas or Magic Johnson. But times have changed in the NBA. Nobody is winning games just by running up and down the floor and outscoring you. They’re winning by stopping you.

In today’s NBA, Dick Harter may well be correct.

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And what a series THAT would be. Here’s a bite of his post-game interview session Friday night.

Kobe, by the way, seems to be a little upset about the fact that the Lakers were called for 12 more fouls than the Blazers and that Portland shot 17 more free throws.

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It’s one thing to be a modern-day, Jerry West, Mr. Clutch type of player. You know, the guy you can depend on to hit those big shots to win games. But it’s quite another to do what (help me, am I missing someone?) LeBron James, Dwyane Wade, Kobe Bryant and, yes, Brandon Roy can do at the end of games.

Get to the basket for a layup.

Now that’s a unique talent. When everyone in the arena knows you are going to have the ball, everyone knows that if you go to the basket there won’t be time to pass to someone else, everyone is collapsing on you — and you still can get, with athletic ability, guile and great skills, a point-blank shot – well, you’re not just great.

You’re very great.

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Well, a whole lot of things went wrong, obviously.

To begin with, not much of it had to do with Greg Oden. I would say when the game was in its meaningful stages, Brandon Roy was as ineffective as I’ve ever seen him. Kobe Bryant had him tied in knots and Roy really didn’t start to score until Bryant was off the floor. LaMarcus Aldridge wasn’t overwhelming, either. Too many jump shots and not enough post-ups. These are the two guys meant to carry this team.

But a lot of the problems at the offensive end had to do with the Blazer system. The Lakers’ defense just completely took Portland out of its halfcourt stuff. A lot of the time, Portland is an isolation team on offense and in this case the Lakers got so much help defense to the point of attack that the Blazers seemed to be playing one-on-three all night.

Good NBA offenses are predicated on moving both the ball and bodies. Movement is essential because 24 seconds isn’t very long when it comes to getting a good shot. If you don’t move the ball and your players, defenses lock in and you get stuffed. That happened a lot of times Tuesday night but it’s a problem a lot of teams can have and it’s usually quickly solved.

The underlying problem is that the Blazers are still way too dependent on outside shooting. They get virtually no fast-break points and not enough points in the paint. Without easy baskets, there’s way too much pressure on the halfcourt offense. Portland simply must quicken its pace and grab some of those easy points that are out there in transition.

On defense, it wasn’t all that bad, particularly when Portland got back in time to choke off the Lakers’ running game. Los Angeles forces an uptempo game and also takes the ball to the basket. At the end of the night, the Lakers usually get better shots than their opponents — it’s why they win a lot of games and why Phil Jackson is probably THE great coach of his generation.

This game was a combination of two things — how good the Lakers are and how overwhelmed by the situation the Trail Blazers were. But these games happen in an 82-game season. The Lakers will do this to a lot of teams. What you do as a pro player is just put that one in the mental trash can. Forget about it. And that’s one thing that’s probably harder for fans than players.

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