God I hate ESPN: Cowherd - Kobe PEDs too much!

Tactical wrote:Is this seriously an issue?

DarthRekal wrote:people here on CL dont like this type of crusade.. i myself would like to see BSPN fall by the wayside... or split into some west coast version that will be our champion.. it's a big deal to me cause it's how the majority of the country sees our team.. but. i let it slide cause my CL bretherin pop me my xanax

LOS ANGELES -- "Who did daddy play tonight?" LeBron James asked LeBron Jr. as they stood in a Staples Center hallway.

"The Lakers," the younger LeBron said.

That wasn't the answer LeBron was looking for.

"Who plays for the other team?" he pressed.

"Kobe," his son responded.

LeBron Jr. had it right the first time. This wasn't about the marquee matchup (As if to emphasize the hype heading in, two hours before the Lakers played the Cavaliers the whiteboard used to display scouting report in the visitors' locker room had only two numbers: 23 and 24). Cleveland wasn't KO'd by Kobe Bryant. It was about the Lakers' size and depth and a stronger-than-usual commitment to defense overwhelming an injury-depleted Cavaliers squad for a 105-88 victory that was more about the practical matter of homecourt advantage than an accurate forecast of an NBA Finals matchup.

At the moment the Lakers (32-8) are ahead of the Cavaliers (31-8) and would start the series at Staples Center if the teams met in the NBA Finals. The Cavaliers can only hope and assume things would be different if they weren't missing the currently injured Zydrunas Ilgauskas and Delonte West.

"You've got to be full strength," James said -- to the media, not his son. "One thing right now, we're not full strength. One thing Z does is get one of those bigs out of the paint. Delonte being out, that hurts us too."

Although the Lakers were without backup point guard Jordan Farmar and sometimes-starting forward Luke Walton, they still had the superior depth that made the difference while Kobe and LeBron played to a statistical draw (20 points, 12 assists, six rebounds for Kobe, 23 points, nine rebounds, four assists, four steals for LeBron).

This month, I've realized two things are overrated: New Year's resolutions and determining who's better between Kobe Bryant and LeBron James.

We put so much emphasis on the start of a new year without thinking about just how random the date is. All it marks is a point on the Earth's orbit, and if we're not going to use in our everyday lives the days the Earth is closest to or farthest from the sun, one day is really no different from any other day. To us, nothing really changes on Jan. 1. Where is the start or finish on an ellipse? Someone (apparently, Julius Caesar) happened to pick Jan. 1, so that's the date after which the waiting times for the treadmill at your health club increase thanks to all the extra people who resolved to lose weight. It's arbitrary.

puffyusaf#2 wrote:I think I hate JA Adande more than I hate Skip Baseless. The only time he gets on one of the main pages of ESPN is when he disses (somehow) the Lakers and Kobe. He talks about Bron and there injuries to their team but not ours though he does talk about Kobe's injury. Heres a bit of his Daily Dime info:

LOS ANGELES -- "Who did daddy play tonight?" LeBron James asked LeBron Jr. as they stood in a Staples Center hallway.

"The Lakers," the younger LeBron said.

That wasn't the answer LeBron was looking for.

"Who plays for the other team?" he pressed.

"Kobe," his son responded.

LeBron Jr. had it right the first time. This wasn't about the marquee matchup (As if to emphasize the hype heading in, two hours before the Lakers played the Cavaliers the whiteboard used to display scouting report in the visitors' locker room had only two numbers: 23 and 24). Cleveland wasn't KO'd by Kobe Bryant. It was about the Lakers' size and depth and a stronger-than-usual commitment to defense overwhelming an injury-depleted Cavaliers squad for a 105-88 victory that was more about the practical matter of homecourt advantage than an accurate forecast of an NBA Finals matchup.

At the moment the Lakers (32-8) are ahead of the Cavaliers (31-8) and would start the series at Staples Center if the teams met in the NBA Finals. The Cavaliers can only hope and assume things would be different if they weren't missing the currently injured Zydrunas Ilgauskas and Delonte West.

"You've got to be full strength," James said -- to the media, not his son. "One thing right now, we're not full strength. One thing Z does is get one of those bigs out of the paint. Delonte being out, that hurts us too."

Although the Lakers were without backup point guard Jordan Farmar and sometimes-starting forward Luke Walton, they still had the superior depth that made the difference while Kobe and LeBron played to a statistical draw (20 points, 12 assists, six rebounds for Kobe, 23 points, nine rebounds, four assists, four steals for LeBron).

Then there is this one about not comparing players which made me laugh out loud

http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/columns/s ... ron-090119" rel="nofollow

This month, I've realized two things are overrated: New Year's resolutions and determining who's better between Kobe Bryant and LeBron James.

We put so much emphasis on the start of a new year without thinking about just how random the date is. All it marks is a point on the Earth's orbit, and if we're not going to use in our everyday lives the days the Earth is closest to or farthest from the sun, one day is really no different from any other day. To us, nothing really changes on Jan. 1. Where is the start or finish on an ellipse? Someone (apparently, Julius Caesar) happened to pick Jan. 1, so that's the date after which the waiting times for the treadmill at your health club increase thanks to all the extra people who resolved to lose weight. It's arbitrary.

CaCHooKa Man wrote:if it makes any difference, the headline on ESPN mobile says "Kobe Leads Lakers To 105-88 Thrashing Of LeBron And The Cavs."

Pau16Kobe24Drew17 wrote:That is why I call it BSPN. Wilbon is one of the biggest Laker and Kobe haters as well.

Weezy wrote:Ok, again, I'm not big on whining about ESPN after games, just big on mocking them, but wow they're really trying to make excuses for the Cavs. The poll in today's Daily Dime reads "If Delonte West and Zydrunas Ilgauskas are healthy, are the Cavs better than the Lakers?". So basically ESPN is using the injury excuse FOR the Cavs, never really giving us full credit, pretty sad. Oh and the results of that poll are so far 26% yes, 74% no, ha ha.

prince24kobe wrote:

Weezy wrote:Ok, again, I'm not big on whining about ESPN after games, just big on mocking them, but wow they're really trying to make excuses for the Cavs. The poll in today's Daily Dime reads "If Delonte West and Zydrunas Ilgauskas are healthy, are the Cavs better than the Lakers?". So basically ESPN is using the injury excuse FOR the Cavs, never really giving us full credit, pretty sad. Oh and the results of that poll are so far 26% yes, 74% no, ha ha.

No they're not, that's actually a very good question. Of course a team with two starters out is going to suffer. ESPN sucks sometimes sure, but some of you guys are making something out of nothing.

Weezy wrote:

prince24kobe wrote:

Weezy wrote:Ok, again, I'm not big on whining about ESPN after games, just big on mocking them, but wow they're really trying to make excuses for the Cavs. The poll in today's Daily Dime reads "If Delonte West and Zydrunas Ilgauskas are healthy, are the Cavs better than the Lakers?". So basically ESPN is using the injury excuse FOR the Cavs, never really giving us full credit, pretty sad. Oh and the results of that poll are so far 26% yes, 74% no, ha ha.

No they're not, that's actually a very good question. Of course a team with two starters out is going to suffer. ESPN sucks sometimes sure, but some of you guys are making something out of nothing.

First, calling people dumb is against the rules here, even doing it in question form. Second, would there be a poll up like "If Jordan Farmar and Luke Walton were healthy, are the Lakers better than the Cavs?" had we lost? No, there wouldn't be, we'd have just lost, move on, no excuses. There was no poll for "If the Lakers had Farmar, Walton, Vujacic and a healthy Odom, would they have beaten the Spurs" back when SA beat us, they don't bother to make excuses for us.

Then today on ESPN First and 10 one of the guys was making a ton of excuses for LeBron, kept bringing up the question who has the better supporting cast. I say really, if you look at them, other than Pau, what's so great about our team? We're a bunch of no name overachievers just like Cleveland, and I you'd NEVER see Kobe get that excuse made for him back in 05/06 when he was carrying us but still losing, it was simply 'Kobe can't get it done'.

prince24kobe wrote:

Pau16Kobe24Drew17 wrote:That is why I call it BSPN. Wilbon is one of the biggest Laker and Kobe haters as well.

Are you dumb?

Weezy wrote:Also, even though I'm sick of the ESPN whining cause they're opinion means nothing, the headline ACTUALLY reads 'Supporting cast pushes Lakers past Cavs', there's zero mention of Kobe.