Can the Los Angeles Lakers Stay Above .500?
On March 3rd, Kobe Bryant and Lakers beat the Hawks 99-98 to get back to .500 for the first time in two months. Kobe threw down an insane dunk that made him like the springy Kobe of old. The Lakers have been playing much better of late; they went 3-1 this week and stand at 32-31 for the season. While their record is going in the right direction, all four games this week saw the Lakers down for most of the game before taking leads late (except the loss to the Oklahoma City Thunder of course). While they have been playing better, they aren’t putting away mediocre opponents the way a good team should be.
A rally like the one against the New Orleans Hornets and to a lesser extent, the rally against the Toronto Raptors, is quite unlikely against a playoff team. New Orleans is a very young team that is still rebuilding and doesn’t have the leadership to simply squash a rally. Can you imagine any of the top three teams in the west, with their leadership, ending a game being outscored 20-0? No. If the Lakers want to do anything in the playoffs, they have to stop relying on Kobe’s late-game theatrics and start playing good basketball for the whole 48 minutes.
What will the Spurs Look Like Without Tony Parker?
The Spurs all-world point guard, Tony Parker, went down with a sprained ankle on March 1st against the Sacramento Kings, a game they won 130-102. He will miss about four weeks and the questions started coming out immediately after the timetable for the injury was released. Could the Spurs hold on to the top spot in west? The answer, at least after a week, is most certainly yes. They beat the Detroit Pistons and Chicago Bulls easily before losing badly to Portland on Friday. They’re obviously not as good without Parker, but anybody who thinks they can’t survive without Parker is dead wrong.
One of the signatures of Gregg Popovich’s tenure is that his teams have always been so dynamic, never relying on any one player for too long. While nobody has the creativeness of Parker on the pick and roll, Manu Ginobili, Tim Duncan and Kawhi Leonard can and will pick up the scoring lost while the team continues to play great defense. Look for Popovich to start resting different guys a bit more frequently so that they can be as fresh as possible for the playoffs.
Kirk Goldsberry’s Sloan Paper on Interior Defense
This has nothing to do with what happened on the basketball court but this was my favorite paper from last weekend’s Sloan Sports Analytics Conference in Boston. Goldsberry is a professor of Geography and uses spacial and visual analytics to look at the NBA and his paper was absolutely great. Its not too long and he doesn’t speak like an academic but rather presents his data in a way that the average NBA fan with little to no knowledge of statistics can easily understand and enjoy. He examines who the best interior defenders are by looking at the field goal percentages of shooters when certain guys are on the court as opposed to the ‘average’ NBA big man.
He also looks at the percentage of shots coming around the basket against an “average” NBA big man versus the percentage with certain guys out there. He concludes by showing that Dwight Howard is still one of the best big men in the game along with Roy Hibbert and Larry Sanders. I won’t review it in detail here but everyone should take 15 minutes out of his or her day to read it.
Amare Stoudemire’s Knee Injury
This happened as I was finishing up writing this so I had to go back and put this in. Reports came out of the Knicks practice yesterday that said Carmelo Anthony and Stoudemire were not practicing due to their respective knee issues. Carmelo is just taking it easy (Knicks fans hope) and everybody figured Amar’e just needed a day off after playing 29 minutes against the Thunder. Today the Knicks announced that he would need knee surgery and would miss six weeks. The surgery is a form of arthroscopic surgery and will be done on his right knee.
This is not the same knee that caused him to miss the first two months of the season. The injury is yet another setback for Stoudemire, whose offense was very good in his role for the Knicks, giving them another scoring option off the bench although he still played terrible defense. Look for Kenyon Martin and Chris Copeland to get more minutes for the rest of the season.
Games of Note This Week
3/2: Chicago Bulls vs. Brooklyn Nets: The Bulls won 96-85 after holding the Nets to just 12 points in the second quarter. Joakim Noah played 41 minutes going 10-13 from the field for 21 points. He also added 10 rebounds, five assists, four blocks and two steals.
3/3: Miami Heat vs. New York Knicks: Miami pulled out a 99-93 win after being down for most of the game. It was one of those games where you watch and you can just tell that Miami was waiting for their chance to come back, never getting over anxious and forcing up bad shots. LeBron James put up 29 points, 11 rebounds and seven assists plus a thunderous dunk to seal the game at the end.
Oklahoma City Thunder vs. Los Angeles Clippers: The Thunder won an intense game 108-104 with Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook putting up 35 and 29 points respectively. This game also featured the karate chop heard around the (basketball) world when Serge Ibaka laid it on Blake Griffin’s groin, picking up a flagrant-1 that probably should have been an ejection. With a completely straight face, Kobe said he would have smacked Ibaka and dealt with the pain after, surprising nobody.
Indiana Pacers vs. Chicago Bulls: Even on an off shooting night for Paul George, the Pacers still won 97-92. David West scored 31 points to lead the way while Joakim Noah again had a good night, putting up 14 points, 10 rebounds and five assists. One thing of note: Tom Thibodeau has leaned on his starters all year for big minutes, but tonight Marco Belinelli was the only Bulls player on the floor for more than 40 minutes. Look for this trend to continue as the regular season winds down.
LA Lakers vs. Atlanta Hawks: The Lakers blew a 16-point lead but Kobe sealed the win with an emphatic dunk over Josh Smith with just over 2 minutes left in the 4th quarter. Kobe had 34 points while Dwight Howard had 15 rebounds and Steve Nash dished out 10 assists. This win puts them at .500. The Lakers did have 21 turnovers, a number that needs to be lower if they want to compete with the best of the best in the Western Conference.
3/4: Miami Heat vs. Minnesota Timberwolves: Miami took care of business with a 97-81 win over the injury-plagued Timberwolves. The story of the night was Jose Barea getting ejected after a little scrap with Ray Allen following a questionable flagrant call. Barea could be seen calling Allen some questionable words that no doubt got him fined by the league. The T’Wolves also made the Harlem Shake video to end all Harlem Shake videos a day after the Heat recorded their own 30 second version.
3/5: Oklahoma City Thunder vs. LA Lakers: Westbrook went off for 37 points as the Thunder dispatched the Lakers 122-105. The Lakers would like to think they can play with the best of the best, but it is clear they still have plenty improvements to make.
3/6: Miami Heat vs. Orlando Magic: LeBron James finished on a layup with three seconds left to preserve their win streak. Nikola Vucevic had a huge game in the post like many centers have this year, putting up 25 points on 11-16 shooting and grabbing 21 rebounds (9 offensive). Vucevic, a USC product, seems to like playing against the Heat. He put up 20 points and 29 rebounds (11 offensive) against them on New Years Eve in a 112-110 loss.
LA Lakers vs. New Orleans Hornets: The Lakers came back from 25 points down, and ended the game on a 20-0 run. Kobe put up 42 points and dished out 12 dimes while Howard had 20 points and 15 rebounds. The play to seal the game saw the Lakers seemingly fake the Hornets into thinking they were shooting on the closer basket, leaving Kobe for wide open dunk at the other end. Watch for yourself here.
San Antonio Spurs vs. Chicago Bulls: The Bulls still cannot score against great defenses. They put up only 83 points while giving up 101 points. Five Spurs players scored in double figures while committing only nine personal fouls the whole game. The Bulls’ solid front court encourages physical low scoring match ups but if they can’t score it really doesn’t matter. When Marco Belinelli has been your best shooter for a couple games, you know something needs to change.
3/7: Oklahoma City Thunder vs. New York Knicks: J.R. Smith was great for three quarters and then went 2-9 in the 4th and the Knicks still only lost 95-94. You look at Durant’s face in these tight games and it almost never changes. He’s just so confident even in himself to hit that big shot or get to the rim when necessary even when he’s having a bad night. The Knicks looked pretty good without Carmelo, but now that Stoudemire is out the rest of the season, the particular look that they gave the Thunder won’t be seen until the playoffs.
3/8: Portland Blazers vs. San Antonio Spurs: This was the biggest lost of Tim Duncan’s career, the Spurs got trounced 136-106. Damian Lillard had 35 points and nine assists and zero turnovers in 40 minutes while LaMarcus Aldridge had 26 points on 12-18 shooting. Tony Parker might be missed more on the defensive end than the offensive end as the Spurs have little to no answer for fast guards like Lillard. Look for Westbrook to have a big day if he can shoot well on Monday against the Spurs.
LA Lakers vs. Toronto Raptors: Kobe hit 3 three-point field goals near the end of regulation to send the game to overtime. Rudy Gay bricked midrange jump shot after midrange jump shot, going a ghastly 7-26 from the field. Bryant again had over 10 assists, dishing out 12 on this night to go along with 41 points on 50% shooting.
Playoff Implications:
The Lakers are continuing to play good basketball while the Warriors, Jazz and possibly the Rockets have been inconsistent at best. One of those three is going to lose out on a playoff spot to the Lakers and my guess is the Jazz. They’re simply not deep enough nor good enough on the defensive end to make it through the year.
The loss to the Amar’e-less and Melo-less Knicks on Saturday night was a rough game to drop. Their schedule the rest of the season doesn’t bode well for the Jazz either, as they have to play the Thunder and Grizzlies twice and the Spurs once more. They also have a few games against their fellow playoff hopefuls and winning those games are probably the most important for them.
Indiana is showing why they are the biggest threat to Miami in the Eastern Conference. They win close games and blow out teams when they’re supposed to and that’s a sign of a good team. Danny Granger is still getting into game shape and should be fully integrated on both ends of the court by the time the playoffs start barring any injury setback.
Player of the Week:
Kobe Bryant has been on a tear this week. He’s averaging almost 37 points per game on 51% shooting to go along with 5.5 rebounds and 7.5 assists per game. In each of the Lakers’ three wins this week, he has carried the team late, hitting every possible kind of shot with ease. He’s also given himself a new nickname: Vino, because he gets better with age