Tue. 1/06 @ Wolves - Results Inside - Postgame comments

maybe that is just wishful thinking

I thought Kobe could carry this team? It looks like we are gonna blow this one. Lets see, the game Shaq went out early, we lost, we lost to LAC, and now to Minny, all without Shaq and Malone.

I think we need to give Shaq and Malone more credit, esp. Karl he has been working hard. I just hope they come back soon if not we a done.

crucifido wrote:It's not all about offense jsm - George is in because Sampson and Walton are far worse on defense.

I know that's why he is playing, but Russell could do just as well. I was just stating, that if we needed him to step up big, it would have been tonight, and because of his weak defenders he should have been able to do more than he did...and I am disappointed he didn't take advantage of this opportunity

Lakers 83
T-Wolves 95
6:16 left and Kobe's in

if we could just stop them on d, we might stand a slim chance if Kobe and Rush could score some points

I totally agree jsm. I'm disappointed the whole team hasn't stepped up though, it doesn't speak well of their desire to win right now and that disturbs me more than any losing streak ever will. It looks to me like they're giving up as soon as they fall behind by 4 or more.

Gee - ya think we have to give Shaq and Karl more credit? That goes without saying and I hope everyone who speaks poorly of Shaq is watching what this team would be without him in the mix. But it's not a matter of one guy carrying the team - this isn't golf it's basketball - there's more than one guy who makes and/or breaks a season. The Lakers all need each other to win.

And once again, if you want a preview of what it'd be like if Kobe had "his own team" this is it. And from the looks of it, it ain't too pretty.

The problem is we can't stop anyone right now. There's nobody to clog the middle, nobody to box out aggressively, no last line of defense when the defnese collapses as it has been. Playing a team with a dominant big guy (aka Garnett and even Madsen tonight) it makes it almost impossible unless you play tight and communicative defense. These guys aren't talking to each other on d at all for the last 5 or 6 games now.

what about giving Cook his own team...haha...no, but he is doing very good tonight, he needs to be given a lot more time from now on by Phil. He should be Malone's back up, and let Grant and Slava share time as Shaq's back up

he has 16 points, 4 rebounds, and 5 fouls, in 28 minutes

Lakers 85
T-Wolves 98
3:46 left

I reallty think Phil might want to try starting him against Denver - it could be a better defensive foot forward rather than our resident "No D Euro" Medevedenko. The way it's goin' some kind of starter change may be in order even if they are a rookie.

He truly is the one bright spot in this game though if you want to find a positive in this rank performance the Lakers delivered tongiht.

Lakers 88
T-Wolves 102

2:03 left

the sad thing is...we spent extra time working on our defense, well maybe we need a few more years of practice...because this is ridiculous.
KG-24 points & 19 rebounds
Spree-30 points
Cassell-24 points

Lakers 90
T-Wolves 106

Final

i think our objective was to try and let those guys have career games.

jsm0331 wrote:Lakers 90
T-Wolves 106

Final

agreed, that was very poor.

[censored] Garnett and his missed dunks.

Kobe-20 points & 10 rebounds
Cook and Rush-each with 16 points
Payton-13 points

whats golden wrote:

jsm0331 wrote:Lakers 90
T-Wolves 106

Final

agreed, that was very poor.

breakout games for Rush and Cook though and Sampson had 3 offensive boards

I was disappointed with every single Laker tonight, with the exception of Cook, Rush, and Sampson...everyone else played like crap. Phil has to do something about this, because we could use a couple wins before Shaq and Malone come back

One suggestion I have is go with a different starting 5. George needs to hire Russell's shooting coach and go sit on the bench until he gets out of his slump or just stop shooting, if we need D we will use Russell. The other is bring Slava off the bench, he would probably do better coming off the bench as an offensive spark instead of a starting pf for now, especially since we have more options now. My suggested line up:

Grant
Cook
Kobe
Rush
Payton

If we need defense we will bring Russell off the bench and George, if absolutely necessary. But that line up will at least get us some points, and maybe since we can't play D right now, we can try and play a Mavs' type of game style and just try and win games by scoring a lot of points and just suffer the defensive consequences

cook seems to be good, i hope he can be consistent with his game, maybe not average 16, but get around 10 points and like 6 rebounds


no one showed up today cept for GP, Kobe, Cook, and rush

the rest were just horrible

cassell lit us up in the first, scorin like 20 or something in the first half itself


man we need shaq and malone back, and we need kobe to be more aggresive

at least against the clips our offense was somewhat there, today there was no O nor any D

jsm0331 wrote:One suggestion I have is go with a different starting 5. George needs to hire Russell's shooting coach and go sit on the bench until he gets out of his slump or just stop shooting, if we need D we will use Russell. The other is bring Slava off the bench, he would probably do better coming off the bench as an offensive spark instead of a starting pf for now, especially since we have more options now. My suggested line up:

Grant
Cook
Kobe
Rush
Payton

If we need defense we will bring Russell off the bench and George, if absolutely necessary. But that line up will at least get us some points, and maybe since we can't play D right now, we can try and play a Mavs' type of game style and just try and win games by scoring a lot of points and just suffer the defensive consequences

excellent idea =:}}

A very tough loss yet again... It shows you how much we miss our two stars...

Rush played extremly well as did Cook. Another face you cannot leave out is Walton. He played well too. All we can do is look towards tommorow's game.

Expect better games from Fisher and George.

Sad loss. Fisher, Payton, Slava and George all were ABSOLUTELY TERRIBLE. They all were missing open shots and did not contribute much to the game.

Kobe stepped back in the offense a bit, and put up under 20 shots. The fact that Kobe is our leading rebounder with 10 rebounds, just shows us how badly we need our two big guys. He passed the ball more, but our guys were missing OPEN looks. That's what was terrible.

Brian Cook was amazing. 7/13 for 16 points? On Kevin Garnett. He was playing very confident for a rookie and I finally can say our draft picks were GREAT for the picks we had. He wasn't just playing against an average guy, but he was squaring up with Garnett. He's going to be a big time player and we really stole him in a low first round pick. Thanks Mitch.

Where has Devean been these past games? Where has Fisher been? These are guys we need to step up and hit shots. They missed their open looks and played terrible.

Luke Walton also was impressive for just playing 14 minutes. 4 assists and he was running the offense better than Fisher. Phil needs to break his rule of benching rookies and play Luke and Cook.

Then again, I didn't expect us to win. It was fun seeing the bench, especially Brian Cook and Kareem Rush, show off their offensive talents.

Once again a terrible defensive game-- all we can do is wait it out until Shaq and Karl return.

In the meantime, Phil needs to make some adjustments to his rotation.

jsm0331 wrote:Grant
Cook
Kobe
Rush
Payton

Yes, that's a GREAT line-up. We really should try that.