Might I add, the most telling quote that I heard last night after the game was Magic Johnson. We all know Magic spoke out in the Denver series saying the Mike Brown would get fired if we lost that series, and it was kind of like, “ok Magic. Chill.” Then yesterday he said this, and it was like he was speaking what all of us are thinking:

Everybody thinks I hit on coach Mike Brown. I like him, I really do. But he’s not a great in-game adjustment coach like a Phil Jackson or Pat Riely. … The Lakers never made any adjustments.

The biggest offense in Game 4 was Mike setting Pau up 20 feet away from the basket, setting picks for Steve Blake instead of down on the block. I repeat, setting picks for Steve Blake (more on this later). Everyone knows that the Lakers aren’t a p&r team. They don’t run it very well, nor do they even defend it very well.

Not to mention that the guards couldn’t even get the ball in to Andrew Bynum, who was being fronted. Not quite sure how NBA guards can’t get the ball in to a man on the post being fronted, and I really am not sure why Mike Brown doesn’t have the players swing the ball and set Bynum up on the opposite side.

As for the Steve Blake issue, why was he on the court in the fourth?? I understand you have rotations, and in late-game situations those are usually set, but Ramon Sessions was clearly the better guard for the Lakers. Early in Game 4 he routinely broke down the defense of the Thunder and got to the basket, either setting up a easy dunk/lay-up or getting one himself. Furthermore, if the Lakers ARE going to run a pick-and-roll with Pau, it’s Sessions who you should run it with, not Blake.

I won’t entirely rag on Mike Brown, because his hybrid defense worked very well against the Thunder in the first 3 quarters. But the Thunder still ended up with over 100 points, the Lakers had a very poor offensive 4th quarter, and a moral victory simply isn’t enough.

It’ll be interesting to see what adjustments Brown comes up with in a very important Game 5. I actually feel (in my heart, not in my head) that if the Lakers can somehow win Game 5, they can win the series. Silly me. Right?

nbaoffseason:

NBA Playoffs Throwback: Denver Nuggets vs. Los Angeles Lakers, 1987 Western Conference quarterfinals, Game 1

Magic Johnson drills a miracle 80-footer before halftime of a game that the Lakers were winning 82-53. Don’t rub your eyes. You read that correctly. Also, Chick Hearn. No surprise that Los Angeles sweeps the series, advancing to defeat Golden State, Seattle, and rival Boston Celtics for a 10th NBA title in franchise history.

The 2012 match-up begins with Game 1 on Sunday at 3:30pm EST on ESPN!

nbaoffseason:

Magic Johnson, not a fan of the current Lakers line up.

Magic is never satisfied for the most part.

Official trailer for ESPN Films’ “The Announcement,” airing March 11 at 9 p.m. ET on ESPN

A lot of us were probably too young to remember Magic coming out with the news that he had HIV, but it was huge. Beyond huge. After bringing attention to the disease that around that time was mostly associated with the lower class and homosexuals, Magic became the spokesperson for the fight against it. It was no long longer a disease for drug addicts, but something real, that anyone could get. Even the best NBA player in the world at that time. The awareness that he’s brought to HIV/AIDS is immense.

gotemcoach:

#LakerGang / @gotem_coach

Did anyone else just get chills?

gotemcoach:

20 years ago, to the day:  November 7, 1991.

@gotem_coach

Magic Johnson

gotemcoach:

GODDAMN:  The Quarterback

@gotem_coach

NBA 2K12 Cover.

MJ & Larry Bird are going to be on the other covers.

I was quite surprised to see Magic Johnson throw Andrew Bynum under the bus so quickly after his (very, very stupid) foul on J.J. Barea, especially after he’s done things like in the video above.

I will say this — while Andrew Bynum will deserve the suspension he’ll receive from the league, I understand why he did what he did. I don’t condone it, but I understand it. I was speaking with a coworker and I told him, “I think Bynum was more frustrated at his own guards than the Mavericks.” Play after play Barea was driving into the lane past his man, and at some point a big man starts to get frustrated. Now, that frustration doesn’t mean knock someone out of the air, but you have to think that Bynum had officially had it with Steve Blake’s inability to keep his man in front of him.

Back to Magic though. A lot of people are outraged at Bynum’s foul, and I think for reasons that lie outside of Bynum’s foul. You have people who just needed another reason to talk bad about the Lakers. Those are the ones calling the Lakers classless, when they’ve been anything but, save for stupid plays in the last series of the season. 

They’re the ones saying that the NBA is headed down a terrible path, forgetting that before you got a technical for throwing your hands up in the ayer, ayer, this was how playoff basketball was played. And Magic Johnson committed the EXACT SAME foul, actually, maybe worse. This was why I was disappointed to see him act so eager to lambast Andrew Bynum because he’s done the same thing before. Quiet is the talk of Jason Terry pushing Steve Blake into the crowd a month ago, it seems as if people forgot about that. Plays are made, dirty plays, but it truly depends on who it happens to, and where.

There’s no room in basketball for trying to intentionally hurt the opposing player, but I think it’s time we stopped acting like Bynum shot Barea.