NBA Obsessed takes you into the hit and run game of NBA Basketball.

There will be many that will disagree with the Ron Artest move to L.A., but you will not find me to be one of them. The Lakers just won the title and that is no time to sit still. Those of you out there that have won a title in anything will understand that statement. Those of you that have not will be mystified.

It works like this. You fight hard, get lucky, work hard, play D, hit some big shots, get hot, come together, get a break or two and the next thing you know, your team owns the NBA Championship trophy. Now comes the hard part. You have convinced yourself that you are great and you may be, but there was also the get lucky, hit big shots, come together, etc. stuff that helped you get there.

Changes will be needed and Ron Artest will be a big change for the Lakers.

Ron Artest will soon help Kobe to seek another NBA title

Still some will disagree.

The Lakers have all the shots they need, Kemo Sabe, and they don’t need Ron Artest taking them out of their offense, shooting shots he that should not, making it possible that more efficient players are unable to do their thing. Yes, Ron Artest shot 40 percent from behind the arc last season. But he also shot 40 percent inside of it, and that’s … awful. That’s just not good. While taking fewer than four free throws a game.

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NBA Obsessed takes you into the hit and run game of NBA Basketball.

Phil Jackson is the best coach in the game today.

You want proof. 10 NBA Titles.

Big deal, you say? How about 10 out of the last 19? Now that is incredible.

Stuart Scott interviews Phil Jackson

With this last title, Phil Jackson has become the NBA coach with the most NBA titles passing Red Auerbach of the Boston Celtics and Phil did it in the age of the free agent.

Those are staggering statistics, especially in this era of free agency, expansion and the salary cap.

Still, there will always be some - like the late Auerbach - who say that Jackson has only won with ready-made championship teams.

Jackson’s current superstar, Kobe Bryant, laughed at that notion Saturday.

“I can’t name one coach that won a championship with a bunch of scrubs, so that argument makes no sense,” Bryant said.

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Phil Jackson has left the game before and Read more

NBA Obsessed takes you into the hit and run game of NBA Basketball.

The NBA Title series ain’t what it used to be, by 10% to be exact. Ratings were down 10 percent according to an AP article in ESPN.

At first blush that seems kind of bad for a series featuring Phil Jackson going for his 10th coaching title and Kobe Bryant trying to prove he can be a one man band, but it has to be kept in the context of being compared to last year’s dream matchup of the Celtics and Lakers.

Dwight Howard and Pau Gasol did not have people turning on their TV's

Boston brought in Kevin Garnett and had a title starved large market in Boston. The Boston area has won in all other sports and they were ready for an NBA title. The Orlando market is a smaller area and Dwight Howard is less of a draw than the 3 amigos. That may change as Dwight improves, but it is fact for now.
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NBA Obsessed takes you into the hit and run game of NBA Basketball.

You snickered at him, didn’t you? You know, that time Kobe announced that he would like to win the NBA title without Shaq. You remember. Hey, did the same thing myself.

How many NBA players have announced they wanted to be the man and win the title without the help of another superstar? 4,203 to be exact. Kobe was one of them and you laughed.

This NBA title belongs to Kobe Bryant

Now Kobe has done it and done it in style. The Lakers are champions and it is because of Kobe Bryant and not Shaq or anyone else. Kobe has become the best two guard in the game and taken his team to the NBA Championship.

Bryant led the Los Angeles Lakers to their 15th NBA crown, defeating the Orlando Magic in five games courtesy of a 99-86 victory Sunday night. While this is Bryant’s fourth ring, it’s his first without O’Neal and as such the one that redefines his career and, indeed, ends the Shaq discussions.

It secures his legacy as one of the greatest players in NBA history and adds some measure of proof to the teammate testimonials that he isn’t the same me-first, often petulant player of his youth.

It wasn’t Kobe’s 32 points a game this series or Finals MVP honors that changed everything. It’s that he finally became the leader of a championship team, the center of a group that was built around him and the star who learned he couldn’t prosper until he stopped trying to do it alone.

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Long live the Kobe!

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Final Score: Lakers 99 Magic 86
The rest of this was written in the middle of the fourth quarter.

Kobe Bryant has been a complete player for a long time, but only now as he puts together a Laker Championship without the help of a big guy named Shaq, that Kobe’s complete game is being noticed. One of the best things he does is close out games. Kobe gives meaning to the saying ice water in the veins.

He passed the ball to Derek Fisher on both of his big threes the other night. That is right, he passed the ball. Most of the time we only think of Kobe shooting and scoring, but he does it all.

We are witnessing, before our own eyes now, the maturation of Kobe and possibly as soon as tonight the championship essence of Kobe.

He is the greatest closer of today’s game, finishing off foes with that legendary, step-on-your-neck killer instinct. But clearly Bryant has learned between those dynastic days of three straight titles and today that winning games all by himself is pretty futile. And maybe that’s why he started trusting his teammates more and at times serving as the game’s most glamorous decoy ever.
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Kobe does it all

It is midway through the fourth quarter and the Lakers have a huge lead in the game, the Magic will need a sizable miracle to get back into this game. Kobe is not going to allow that to happen and he may do it by passing!

NBA Obsessed takes you into the hit and run game of NBA Basketball.

The Los Angeles Lakers are a team known for talent and coaching and Kobe Bryant. What they are not known for is toughness. In last year’s series against the Boston Celtics, the lack of toughness haunted them and drove them out of the playoffs.

This year they face the Orlando Magic a team known for toughness with one of the toughest players in the league, the very physical Dwight Howard. Everyone felt the Lakers were the better team, but Orlando was hot and playing physical. Would the Lakers fold up and not play up to their potential.

Would Kobe play it cute? Would Pau Gasol play it safe?

Kobe and the Lakers are showing toughness

No, the Lakers came to play and have brought surprising toughness.

In these moments, two things became abundantly clear: The Lakers weren’t going to let Orlando’s physical play get to them, and the Lakers had added a thick outer callous since the Boston Celtics beat them up in last year’s Finals.
All season they have talked about being tougher. But toughness, like character, isn’t learned, but rather forged.

Through experience, from failure, with regret and desire fueling the hot fire it requires to be fed.

It wasn’t until Thursday night though, that the Lakers were pushed hard enough to show how much they had hardened.

“It was a game we had to work so hard for and fight through so much and in the end it really paid off,” Gasol said.

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No, the Lakers will never be compared to some of the Piston championship teams, last year’s Lakers, or even the Shaq Kobe Laker teams, but this team has found the toughness they needed to survive and gain victory.
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NBA Obsessed takes you into the hit and run game of NBA Basketball.

Why do you doubt this guy year after year, thinking he can’t coach his way out of a paper box unless he has a superstar box cutter on his team. That is the excuse you have used for years. Oh, Phil, he has that superstar player, that is why he wins.

The only problem with that argument is the other coach, the one coaching the team Phil is beating, also has a superstar player on his team and he is losing. Meanwhile, Phil just keeps on winning and it looks like the Lakers led by a superstar named Kobe Bryant, will win the NBA title for Phil.

Kobe Bryant believes in Phil Jackson

So can Phil coach? You bet he can.

When Orlando’s Dwight Howard missed his two free throws near the end of regulation, Jackson, his Lakers down by three points, chose to inbound the ball and have the Lakers go the length of the court. He figured that an inbounds pass at midcourt would likely have drawn an immediate foul.

Going all the way down the court, the Lakers were able to get the ball in to Bryant, then to Ariza and then to Fisher.

“I do think some of it the credit does belong outside of myself, to my teammates, to Phil,” Fisher said. “Just the way that he’s willing to stick with certain people that he believes can help get the job done. It’s not always about statistically what is this guy going to bring to the table.

“A lot of coaches won’t have that kind of faith, confidence, that kind of perseverance to figure he’ll be rewarded in the end. Phil doesn’t have to say anything to me. We’ve been together a long time, been through a lot of games. We understand.”

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NBA Obsessed takes you into the hit and run game of NBA Basketball.

Pau Gasol is getting banged around by Dwight Howard, but what did he expect? Dwight has only one style of play and it involves a lot of muscle applied in a not so gentle manner.

Pau rubbed the back of his head to the referee for a visual explanation.

Then again, Pau is not the most physical center in the league and Dwight is going to have to be physical to compete with Gasol. If Dwight Howard lightened up for even a moment, the crafty Pau would destroy him on the offensive end.

Dwight Howard fights off the Lakers

Howard even seemed to acknowledge Gasol’s complaints, though he had not been told of them before his postgame news conference.

“I think with (Andrew) Bynum, he doesn’t mind banging,” Howard said. “With Gasol, sometimes you’ve got to be aware of what you do in the paint. Gasol is very smart. He’s been playing for a long, long time and I think with him, I’ve just got to be smart. I don’t want to pick up any cheap fouls and have to sit on the bench.”

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Hey, Dwight knows what he is doing.

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NBA Obsessed takes you into the hit and run game of NBA Basketball.

The Lakers are primed and ready and feel that no team can stop them from taking the NBA 2009 title series from the Orlando Magic.

Who cares about the Celtics and the injured Garnett?

Who cares about the Cavaliers and the non-talking LeBron?

Who cares that Dwight Howard seems to be coming into his own and was more than Cleveland could handle?

Kobe is focused

Not the Lakers, their focus is only on winning the title and not on who shows up to play against them or how they got there. Even though Jackson could retire and Kobe could go free agent, the Lakers will have no distractions. They will only have their eyes on the prize!

Like the Celtics last spring, the Lakers’ hunger was evident on the eve of the Finals. Their resolve combined with their playoff experience of the past two seasons makes them the favorite of many pundits to win the franchise’s 15th NBA championship.

“Obviously, we’re mad,” Gasol said. “We’re upset about losing in the Finals, especially the way we lost. Also, the last game, we just felt we could have given it a better shot than we did. But it didn’t happen, and now we’re here again.”

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NBA Obsessed takes you into the hit and run game of NBA Basketball.

My first views of Shannon Brown came at Michigan State University. You could tell this guy was awesome right off the bat. He became an instant starter on a team loaded with talent, but there was just no way to keep him on the bench. Unfortunately he left after his sophomore year for the NBA and was drafted by Cleveland.

All of my friends, and me included, thought that playing for LeBron would be perfect for Shannon Brown. He was quick, strong, and could shoot, although a bit undersized. But the leap to the NBA was greater than we thought.

Shannon Brown can get up in the air!

Now one of our favorite Spartans is also a Laker and in the finals playing alongside Kobe Bryant. What could be cooler? All Spartan fans will be rooting for him! We are excited, but Shannon is even more excited.

The way the Los Angeles Lakers reserve point guard has bounced around the NBA for three seasons, he is fortunate — and he knows it. A little magic has come into his life.

The former Michigan State and Mr. Illinois basketball star is stoked as he awaits his first NBA Finals, against the Orlando Magic. “I’m very excited. It’s one of those opportunities where people play in the league for 15 years and don’t get a chance to play in the NBA Finals,” Brown said.

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