If Andrew Bynum keeps it up, hmm, maybe we can win it all

This one is tough to figure out. Maybe you can explain it to me.

If there are any ardent Laker followers, then please leave a comment and explain to me how this group of Lakers can be playing so well.

Phil Jackson must own a lot of mirrors, because it appears he is doing it with mirrors.

Then again, love him or not, Kobe Bryant is special and may just be carrying the Lakers to greater glory. The Lakers are 9 – 3 in December.

The Lakers beat the Suns in the Christmas special NBA game.

The score was Lakers 122 Phoenix 115.

You have heard me expound on the proposed trade of Kobe to Chicago and how Chicago should pull out all the stops to get Kobe. Well, how does it look now with Chicago sinking in the sun and firing Coach Skiles, meanwhile the Lakers are on a roll?

It was rumored that there were two obstacles in the Chicago deal at various points of negotiations. One was Luol Deng of the Bulls and the other was Andrew Bynum of the Lakers. Both teams were ardent about not parting with their young talent.

It appears that Bynum is starting to pay dividends for the Lakers.

Bryant, who complained about a lack of talent around him, has gotten plenty of help recently, especially from the 20-year-old Bynum, who shot 11-of-13 in outplaying Phoenix center Amare Stoudemire.

Bynum left to a roar of approval from the Staples Center crowd of 18,997 and a hand-slap from Bryant with 11.5 seconds to play. source

The victory was a particular pleasure to the Lakers, because the Suns have knocked them out of the first round of the playoffs the last two years in a row. The Lakers need to know they can beat the suns. It is all about confidence.

Kobe NBA records

Kobe is starting to break into the NBA record book.

Bryant, who became the youngest player ever to reach 20,000 career points Sunday in New York, moved past Tom Chambers into 30th place on the career list with his 31st point of this game, which came on a corkscrew jumper that gave the Lakers a 102-95 lead.

NBA Basketball Fan Question Can the Lakers overtake the Suns for the Pacific Division?

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Nobody loves me

The rift between Jerry Buss and Kobe Bryant grows ever wider until it appears like the Grand Canyon.

Kobe must go!

How do you do that when he has a no trade clause, a huge contract, is getting up there in NBA years, and worst of all is displaying a definite attitude problem.

Would other teams want to take on the Kobe act of defiance? Few would find it easy to turn down such an offer. Unfortunately, only the Bulls, Mavs, and Suns are on the table right now.

The owner has destroyed Los Angeles’ leverage on a possible trade, delivering an unmistakable message to the Bulls and Mavericks: Don’t bother throwing Luol Deng and Dirk Nowitzki in possible packages, because it’s become clearer that a peaceful co-existence of Bryant and the fledgling Lakers is less and less likely. source

To decode that message, Kobe’s trade value is dropping because he will become a free agent soon enough and the Lakers are not going to be a place where Kobe wants to stay. So why trade when you can just pay?

Jerry Buss seems to be at the end of his rope.

Maybe Buss was still livid enough with Bryant for calling him an “idiot” over the summer, but turning a peaceful training camp into a circus again because he wanted to tell everyone that he was willing to unload Bryant gave No. 24 a chance to re-cast himself as a victim, and check out of practice – if not his locker – for the week.

The most logical and most often named team to acquire Kobe’s services is the young, make that, oh so young Bulls. Being so young it is hard to evaluate if the core they have is enough to win a NBA Championship.

So far, they don’t know if this core can become a champion. Maybe Dallas knows it can’t win as currently constituted; after all, there’s a body of evidence building that says so. What if the Bulls do trade away Deng, along with a Tyrus Thomas and a Thabo Sefolosha and Bryant does start to have serious trouble with those aging knees? The Celtics had no choice but to trade its young players for Kevin Garnett. They had nothing to lose. But the Bulls? If the Bulls re-sign Deng and Ben Gordon to extensions, they have a contender for the next decade.

Mitch Kupchak somehow comes off all innocent in this debacle.

After GM Mitch Kupchak couldn’t pry Dwyane Wade in the Shaquille O’Neal trade, how could the Lakers now justify working deals with Dallas or Chicago that don’t include the best players on those teams, Nowitzki and Deng?

Even now, Kupchak doesn’t have the best returning player from the Shaq trade in his employ, Caron Butler, because he somehow moved him to Washington for Kwame Brown.

Let’s face it Kobe, you are history.

NBA Basketball Fan Question What team would be the perfect fit for Kobe?

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Hmm, Kobe ponders where to play?

Summer of 2009.

Mark it on your calendar. Well, don’t mark the whole dang summer. It was just an expression.

Anyway, Summer of 2009 is when Kobe can walk out of LA as a Free (Agent) man.

Where oh Where will Kobe go? Sounds like a start to a good poem.

5 top reporters were polled on the possibility of the Lakers trading him first. Where would he go? (Must be they forgot about me, huh?)

The reporters are J.A. Adande, ESPN.com, Chris Broussard, ESPN The Mag, Ric Bucher, ESPN The Mag, Chris Sheridan, ESPN.com, and Marc Stein, ESPN.com.

Wait a minute; those are 5 ESPN reporters, which is why yours truly was not asked.

To get on with the story, Adande said Kobe would go to the Bulls.

The Bulls have a wealth of talented, smart young players. But the Lakers have to hold out for Luol Deng and/or Ben Gordon. They can’t make the same mistake they made the last time they dealt a superstar, when they sent Shaquille O’Neal to Miami and didn’t get a single all-star in return. source

The Bulls, of course, are dreaming it would be the second coming of MJ with the only problem in that scenario being that there is only one Michael Jordan.

Broussard has Kobe going to maybe Chicago, maybe Dallas, but not Phoenix. Geez, make up your mind.

I think Dallas will be in the hunt (if I were the Mavs, I’d trade Dirk for Kobe straight up). Forget the Knicks, and I don’t see how Phoenix can get it done without breaking up its duo of Nash and Stoudemire.

Hmm, Dirk on the Lakers? Why would they do that? Kobe shoots enough without having a 7 foot outside gunner. No knock on Dirk as he is a perfect fit for the shoot before you blink Dallas team.

Bucher thinks Dallas or Chicago and ponders the Celtics.

If the Lakers would accept a Paul Pierce package, he’d happily go play with KG and Ray Allen. Would the Lakers accept a Suns package that didn’t include Nash or Amare? He’d go there, too.

My guess is that Chicago remains the only logical choice for both Kobe and the Lakers, because it puts him in the East, far from L.A. — as well as San Antonio, Dallas and Phoenix, if you can smell what I’m steppin’ in. He does have a no-trade clause, so he won’t go just anywhere and he won’t go to a team stripped of contention by the deal.

Hey, this Chicago/Dallas thing is getting old. Kobe has a no trade clause and these are the only two teams on his short list with Phoenix on the long list.

Sheridan also has Kobe going to the Bulls and amuses us with the number of players needed in return to match salaries. Another interesting notion he gives us is the Knicks.

But no one has deeper pockets than Dolan, who would be more than willing to pay Kobe’s full trade kicker and give him an extension that would make even Allan Houston jealous.

Still, there’s always the question of whether the Lakers would accept anything offered by New York, which would try to overwhelm the Lakers with some voluminous combination of Jamal Crawford plus young talent on rookie contracts (David Lee, Renaldo Balkman, Nate Robinson, Randolph Morris), plus Malik Rose or Quentin Richardson for salary cap purposes.

What is that smell? Is it David Stern thinking of reviving the Chicago market or better yet jump starting the New York market?

Sheridan also toys with the idea of a New Jersey trade of Vince Carter. Unfortunately, Vince is no Kobe.

Stein brings up the point that Kobe Bryant has the only no trade clause in the NBA. The only one in the NBA (that beared repeating). How stupid is Jerry Buss?

The only teams on Kobe’s list are Chicago, Phoenix (not going to happen), and Dallas.

So what does your NBA Hit and Run Obsessed author think? How funny it would be to trade him to Miami! Actually, it is easy to say Chicago, but if Kobe allowed it, the Nets, Celtics, Cavs, and Pacers all have possibilities.

We will have to keep tabs on how this unfolds.

But the handwriting is on the wall. Kobe will not be a Laker for much longer.

NBA Basketball Fan Question What city do you have Kobe going to?

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