Written By: Derrick Bond
@bond_agent187
Where to begin? As a Los Angeles Lakers fan I’ve been spoiled rotten. Championship runs or always in contention have become the norm for me. My grandpa was a fan of Wilt and Jerry West, and my dad was a fan of Magic. In my household Jordan was ok, but Magic was the goat! We can talk about that another day. The current state of my team has me worried though.
It all started with David Stern rescinding the Chris Paul trade to LA a few years ago. Kobe may be looking for ring 7 with him as a backcourt mate. It definitely would have eased the wear and tear on both player’s bodies. Next, Jim Buss taking over operations of player personnel drastically hurt the organization. His initial moves set us up for immediate failure.
Firing Mike Brown five games into the season followed by hiring Mike D’Antoni a regular season winner, but ring less and unable to affectively coach defense, something the current Lakers lacked. In spite of those things we seemingly had the players to compete; D Howard the best center in the league, P Gasol a skilled big man, Kobe the best 2 guard this century and Steve Nash an all time great point guard. Even with limited time together I expected them to gel, they just had so much talent.
Despite flashes of substance they faltered big time due to injury and a terrible system to fit them. Kobe got hurt two weeks before the playoffs were set to tip, and they made an early exit. Howard splits for the Rockets in the summer and we make no moves.
Now our backcourt is a combined 75 years old and we’ve been out of the playoffs since Beyonce became “drunk in love.” Phil Jackson a man who gave us 5 titles now resides in NY after being dissed by LA too many times. We have a hurt, old superstar and pretty much nothing else.
No coach, no talent/youth and no direction. We are left with questions and hopes that another star will sign with us in the off-season even though we may have overpaid Kobe. Stating those facts makes me want to go get drunk in love myself, hell St. Patrick’s day isn’t that far removed.
