Like the current Laker team, the 2003-2004 Laker team had much hype going into it. Adding hall of famers Gary Payton and Karl Malone will do that to a team, and they ended up making it to the NBA finals only to lose to the one-year wonder Detroit Pistons.

You may be wondering why it matters, since it was almost ten years ago and the current team looks nowhere close to a championship-contending squad, but the current team and the 03-04 has the same makeup of players. It was the last time that a Laker squad had this much “star” power on the roster and I found it very interesting the differences and similarities from the two teams. Lets check it out:

2003-2004 Lakers:

Coach: Phil Jackson

Record through 54 games: 35-19

Center: Shaq, 21.5 PPG and 11.5 rebounds per game

Power Forward: Karl Malone, 13.2 PPG and 8.7 rebounds per game

Small Forward: Devean George, 7.4 PPG and 4.0 rebounds per game

Shooting Guard: Kobe Bryant, 24.0 PPG and 5.1 assists per game

Point Guard: Gary Payton, 14.6 PPG and 5.5 assists per game

Key Bench Players: Stanislav Medvendenko, 8.3 PPG

Derek Fisher, 7.1 PPG

Kareem Rush, 6.4 PPG

Mike D’Antoni’s free-wheeling coaching style has cross-crossed the Lakers, leaving them structureless. By Keith Allison [CC-BY-SA-2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

Coach: Mike D’Antoni

Record through 54 games: 25-29

Center: Dwight Howard, 16.3 PPG and 11.8 rebounds per game

Power Forward: Pau Gasol, 13.4 PPG and 8.0 rebounds per game

Small Forward: Metta World Peace, 12.9 PPG and 5.6 rebounds per game

Shooting Guard: Kobe Bryant, 26.8 PPG and 5.6 assists per game

Point Guard: Steve Nash, 11.8 PPG and 7.4 assists per game

Key Bench Players: Antawn Jamison, 8.4 PPG

Earl Clark (who now is starting), 8.1 PPG

Jodie Meeks, 7.8 PPG

The Lakers currently sit at 25-29 through 54 games, while the 03-04 team went  35-19.

Why is this team so bad? I have the answer in two words: Mike D’Antoni. In 03-04, Phil Jackson knew how to get players to play with each other and do it well. It’s obvious D’Antoni does not.

I truly believe that if Phil Jackson had been hired instead of D’Antoni the Lakers would at least be contending and starting to play the kind of basketball that we all expected them to be at this point in the season. I have said from the beginning that D’Anotni isn’t the right coach for the Lakers and I stand by that.

But it isn’t completely his fault. The lineups of Howard, Gasol, Kobe and Nash have only played in 17 of the 54 games together, a difficult situation for any coach.

The Lakers have been decimated by injuries throughout the season, including Dwight Howard, who is still playing hurt. When Jordan Hill went down, the Lakers found a replacement in Earl Clark who has turned out to be a pleasant surprise. But when Pau Gasol went down in Brooklyn a few weeks ago, the Lakers’ playoff chances went from hopeful to doubtful. Losing Pau was a huge blow to an already-hurt team and it has shown in their play, losing three of five since the injury.

Now rumors have been swirling of trading Dwight Howard because of the poor play and the fact that he may leave at the end of the season.

In my opinion, in order to make sure that Howard stays, the Lakers should part ways with D’Antoni and find a coach that will realize how to utilize the players he has and won’t bench a key cog on two NBA championship teams.

Mike D’Antoni is a good coach with a very high basketball IQ but neither him nor his system fit into what the coach of the Lakers should be. This Laker team is too talented to be playing this poorly and I for one don’t believe it’s all the players’ fault.

The sooner the Lakers front office realizes that, the better and the franchise can get back to its winning ways. At least the 2003-2004 Lakers made it to the finals and although they lost, I’m sure if you ask any Laker fan at the moment if they would take a loss in the finals as opposed to not even making the playoffs – they would take that in a heartbeat.

We’ll see what kind of heart this star-driven version 2.0 of the purple and gold have in the second half of the season.  Stay tuned.

There is only one man who can answer these pondering’s, that being “Big Shot Bob,” otherwise known as Robert Horry, who made a living with the Rockets, Lakers, and Spurs, en route to seven rings by nailing the clutch shot.

Why does this matter? He was never a star, but he has rings galore bronzed on his swish- svelte fingers. 

In today’s NBA we judge  all-time greats by how many rings they’ve won and whether or not they led their teams to title town. But is this a fair assessment, considering a life-long bench guy like Horry can be carried to seven?

Never was Horry the franchise guy. In fact, as great as he seemed in closing minutes, Robert Horry never became the player we expected him to be after his timely three point shooting for Houston’s 2nd title run.

Horry’s brief stint in Phoenix after a trade in 1996, proved he was not endowed with a star motor. A hot tempered, dramatic and aloof head case, Bob languished averaging 6.9 points at a career low shooting clip: 41.8%. A trade by mid-season to the L.A. Lakers–a team filled with Kobe Bryant, Shaquille O’Neal, Nick Van Exel, Eddie Jones, Elden Campbell, and Cedric Ceballos changed the trajectory of his failing career.

So why then is Bob a champion? Why not franchise guys like Barkley, Malone, Stockton, Dominique, Ewing, or Reggie Miller?

Each of those listed above were worthy of winning gold, were they not? All of them were respective franchise pieces with the heart, skills, and late game heroics to hold the O’Brien.

The answer to their problems was Michael Jordan’s Bulls: a team of role guys surrounding the king of the sport with that IT factor needed to win it all. Something today’s critics use to gauge greatness and rank the all time elites.

So what is the issue then with the tautness of this old-time equation? Why not turn a blind eye and allow this to be the answer to everything?

Simply because it just does not add up. It does not offer enough answers. If Big Shot Bob has seven, or the likes of Jack Haley–former twelfth man for Jordan’s final three peat has three, the equation’s a bit off. We need something else, a new perspective when thinking of the greats and why and how they never hung the O’Brien.

And I believe individual luck IS the partly the answer, luck, a maddening machine random like the California Lottery. Historians prefer the term historical happenings–a notion that choices are made for no other reason except that they were made, and the dominoes re-arrange the cosmos of a world more closely inter-connected than we might wish it to be (think guy who smells like farts at the movies, or the swine flu victim winding a cough onto the back nape of the neck.)

Luck.

To think Michael Jordan fell to number three in the 1984 draft could be easily overlooked for a variety of reasons: Sam Bowie, the number two pick before MJ, was a  college superstar and a big man compared at the time to the greats. The Blazers already had a gifted wingman in Clyde Drexler andat the time the league was built around bigs: Kareem, Sampson and Olajuwan, Robert Parish, Patrick Ewing, and Moses Malone.

But that doesn’t make things less ludicrous.  Look at how the draft shaped the NBA forever. MJ goes to an ordinary Bulls team built in perhaps the greatest city in America, where he wins ROY, ultimately five MVP’s, slam dunk contests, becomes the games biggest mogul, and wins six titles. Alongside Oprah, MJ is easily the greatest name in Chicago history and can be attributed for an economical explosion that saved the lower West side of the city once run with crime: drug abuse, gang wars, and prostitution.

Bowie, in the annals of the NBA, is known as ‘the bust.’ He never won a thing in the pros: no all star games, no shoe deals, thus injuring the once bright ideal the Blazers had in trading their franchise Center Bill Walton to Boston.

This, my friends, is the Sam Bowie, a supernatural element that cannot be ignored.

Luck.

Yet like so many children born into inner city poverty without the tools necessary to change their lives, we cannot judge the stars through the a similar bias, because not all players are born lucky into a posh franchise. The gift of playing in Los Angeles or Boston does not come to everyone. Not every player is born into a showtime era, a team so deep they make the ocean look like a kids pool.

For some, seeking a new home is like divorcing an abusive wife. In order for Mitch Richmond to adorn gold, the talented and true shooting guard had to eventually break ties in the perils of Sacramento. Karl Malone found it necessary to join with Kobe and Shaq in 04′ after a long tenure in Utah. And even the humble Clyde Drexlerleft a hell of a situation in Portland to win it Houston. All three of which were great with or without (Sing it Bono) a championship.

The reality of the situation is heart breaking for most. We as childish dreamers wish our favorite player could be greater than the others, but this is not real. Embracing a pragmatic approach to the sport tied less to your heart strings will allow you to see greatness wrapped in many different packages. 

Reality 1: Great players DO NOT win championships, great TEAMS win championships. The 2004 Detroit Pistons are a perfect example of this. A team of role guys without a future hall of famer, the Pistons had the momentary IT. Call it faith, hard work, purity, and any other beautiful thing you want, but to explain why they won a title over an L.A. Laker team stocked with four future hall of famers would be absurd.

Reality 2: Like the stars in the sky, NBA STARS need other STARS. Think for a moment about the teams who’ve won championships the last thirty years. All of them have one thing in common: team depth and stars surrounding stars. Magic had Kareem and Worthy; Bird–Mchale and Parish; Dr.J–Moses Malone; Isaiah–Dumars and Rodman; MJ–Pippen; Hakeem–Clyde; Shaq–Kobe and Wade; Duncan–Robinson, Parker, and Ginobili; Pierce–KG and Allen.

Reality 3:  Winning titles does mean a lot, but it does not mean everything for a myriad of reasons. If the 1919 Chicago Blacksox or dirty referees like Tim Donaghy can throw World Series and playoff games, then how serious can we take this thing? Not very. Take everything with a grain of salt and learn other decided facets when it comes to judging all-time greats: MVP’s, All Star appearances, Career Totals, Game Winners, Ability to close, Athleticism, Re-defining the sport, dominance-ometer, and sociological affects.

LeBron James is not a sell out because the guy wants to win, he’s a realist. A star unselfish enough to admit that NO star including himself, can win a title completely on his own.

LeBron is stuck in the the Bill Clinton Vacuum. Though he does great things, he is brushed aside because of one unlikeable decision.

But greatness is not a grade school quiz on being friendly, it is brutal giftedness. And likeability is not the twin brother to being great.

LeBron made a  decision to better his career andhis life. Leading a Cleveland Cavs team the last seven years, that never boasted anybody better than a has-been version of Antawn Jamison warrants James departure.  No it does not warrant the overdone TV cinematic’s regarding “the decision,” nor the Pat Riley blowout introduction party in South Beach. Yet neither should it foster the illogical hysteria across America attempting to deny the man’s sheer dominance and greatness.

This isn’t patty cake kids. We are talking about a production entertainment, where all titles are but a decorative decor. They might help the woman look fine, but if that woman is not fine without the jewelry or the tight fitting jeans, I say run, run as fast as you can.

Drop by the nearest bar and have a scotch on me. Look through the world with freshness and at what is truly great (it is not the girl next to you.). It is the scraggly bartender able to whip up drinks faster than the average Joe.

Watching Sir’ Dirk diggler his way between double teams then drop the off-foot fade away, with feathered bangs haunting his brow is like hot chocolate with a bust of hand-whipped cream lapping at the tongue…sizzle sizzle and more busty sizzle.

My nizzle.

Fans swore off of Dirk after his Mavs famous meltdown in 06′ and 07′; said he was overrated, couldn’t hit the big shot, seven feet but soft as butter, a lanky vanilla–sweet but melts with contact.

Well not so fast.

In the meantime Nowitski has collected an MVP, eclipsed twenty thousand career points,and freeze framed his Shaggy Doobie Do face in the list of all-time greats. Dirk’s freakazoid bar, with his insante giftedness to dribble like a point, hit the fade away like a guard, rebound as a forward and finish inside is Lady Gaga unparalleled.

Did I just say Lady Gaga unparalleled?  I did because Dirk is the the greatest powerforward to ever play this game.

Yes you heard me. My condolences to Timmy Duncan, but today I am writing with a blasphemous resignation to the truth of things. I have post stamped this through the mailman, and asked his caddy Sir Charles, to verify its arrival. Dirk is not only the greatest powerforward, but when it comes to closers is listed as: MJ….Bird…..West…..Kobe….Dirk.

Monday’s performance was one of the greatest this league has ever seen. Dropping 48 on OKC in game one of the Western Conference Finals, he did it in Gaga fashion: 12-15 shooting, 24-24 from the free throw line, hitting clutch jumpers late to close out the Thunder in the fourth quarter. Setting the tone from the get go, Dirk started 4-4 with the Mavs first ten points, and twenty in the first half. It was obvious  that this Sir’ Dirk is no longer living under the devils of his past.

OKC looked stupefied in his wakes and had no answer for him all evening, throwing seven different defenders his way including: former Defensive Player of the Year Thabo Sefalosha, and block king Serge Ibaka. His unguardable abilities and size caused former NBA coach turned ESPN TV personality Jeff Van Gundy, to continualy pose the X and O question, “How do you stop that?” His sidekick, former point guard Mark Jackson returned, “You got to close the air space.”

Air space?

This is not about some make believe air space, this is about fate. As much as I love the twenty-three year old Durant–a two time scoring champ, and gifted 6’10 wingman with the ability to hit the three, take you off dribble, and get up and finish, I am aware that his moment has not arrived yet.

It was obvious Monday who the better team is. This is not your usual lay-down and die Dallas Mavs team who’ve become more of a hard-nosed defensive squad with their yet classic art of tres droplet supremes. Key moments on Monday included: Barrea sparking Dallas with twelve straight points in the third, and Jason Kidd bringing stability at point when Darantula made it a game scoring Jasseven of his teams ten points in a 10-0 run in the fourth to pull to within five with 3:34 to play. Like a black widow spider dangling from a single thread, only to lose her luscious prey a few inches from her triangular grasp, that is as close as things would get. This year there is no hesitation from the Mavs–a collective of cast-aways, bridging their way to title ascension.

And with a German juggernaut like Dirk taking them there, it bids the question, “will this finally be their year?”

Go ahead, compare him with Charles Barkley. He was a unique talent that could also do things no one else in the league could for his particular sub-era. Charles, also like LeBron, after not being able to win a championship as a centerpiece, sought out another all-time great to try and fancy his finger with the ultimate shine. D-Wade, giving Hakeem a call at this point in time, might behoove you greatly.

Be my guest, compare him with Karl Malone. He also revolutionized a particular skill-set for his time and place. Try as they might, the greatest assisted connection of Malone and John Stockton could not reach the pinnacle. Karl, also like LeBron, “took his talents to a Beach,” this time Venice Beach, after his failure in the hopes of confetti and champagne in Utah.

The angle of these comparisons is simple: you can group James with a group of all-time greats if you so choose. Just make sure that group of all-time greats you are grouping him with is the one filled with the all-time greats that either never achieved championship immortality at all, or never won a ring as the heads-and-shoulders “best” player on their team.  Make sure to separate that group from guys that had the ultimate, the ring and the clutch gene that looks the penultimate in the face and laughs. To group James beyond this elite group is myopic, is in some way bias, and simply beyond a stretch of reality. He can sit at the Barkley and Malone table no problem; just don’t place him at the head table with Jordan and Bryant.

But hey, anyone can reveal “what is,” right? I’d like to burrow into “why.” What is below the surface? Why are his elite talents ostensibly devoid when it matters most?

I believe it is a culmination of many factors. It starts with a lack of humility. LeBron already thought he was much better than he actually was at a very young age. He was the guinea pig, the Neal Armstrong of today’s phenom basketball player that is coddled like a movie star from a junior high age. We are just now seeing the full tsunami of this generation come through the league, and LeBron was the Pioneer. Just search Sports Illustrated’s archives, and in February of 2002 you will find a barely 17-year old “Chosen One” in his St. Vincent – St. Mary Irish #23, trying to emulate some kind of Magic Johnson Showtime dime.

However, it goes beyond that. It stretches further than just a preconceived throne in all its majesty. His constant lapse in judgment seems to be an ever-progressing monster with James. He just can’t help himself. And even with the factor of the scrutiny of a microscope following him, he has exposed himself time and time again by saying or doing the worst possible thing at the worst possible time. How can this be explained?  Some people just have the virus of absolute obliviousness?

It has nothing to do with basketball and everything to do with character. Be it on-camera during post-game interviews, he and Jim Gray wrapping uncomfortably for supposed production value before “The Decision,” or his constant spamming of ignorance on his Twitter feed.  There is, at its core, something missing with LeBron.

Most recently on Twitter, for LeBron it’s now “war,” he is a “soldier” and it’s time for “battle?” Does James even vaguely remember how Kellen Winslow, Jr. was vilified for the very same inconsiderate and insensitive statements no more than five years ago? You are supposedly a grown-ass man, LeBron. When will you start acting like one and not like a juvenile?  Champions don’t behave like this, do they?

I believe the road to making it right or at least respectable in the department of public relations starts with James cutting the fat of some of his supposed “advisors.” With LeBron, this is mostly a collection of his childhood friends.  I know if I had the friends of my youth helping advise me in my career, I’d end up selling hot dogs at Costco.

Advisors are supposed to give advice in the best interest of their “client,” right? What James could really use are less people to telling him what he wants to hear, and more people telling him what he needs to hear.   He needs less childhood friends and more of the industry’s best PR-geniuses. You have the money? The underlying fact of the matter simply is: surrounding yourself with gravy-training “yes” men has never ended up taking anyone anywhere close to their full potential.

All the analysis of this social ineptitude be as it may, let’s return to the bottom line of “on-the-court.” Recent examples relating to the overall theme being presented are becoming more and more prevalent. Just checking in with your favorite media outlet over the past two weeks will reveal as much. We don’t even have to begin to list the history of buzzer-beating failures from past seasons.

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On Thursday versus their heated inter-state and Atlantic Division rival, the Orlando Magic, the ever-present issue reared its ugly head again. This time it capped off an implosion of epic proportions. With the Heat up 24 in the 3rd quarter, Orlando went on a 40-9 run, highlighted by Jason Richardson going 5-5 from behind the arc in the second half.

Despite the avalanche, the Heat had a chance to tie in the final possession. Chris Bosh badly missed on a 3-point attempt, and upon the Heat scrambling for the offensive rebound, Lebron had a wide-open 3-point attempt with only seconds remaining. The expected occurred once again.  These aren’t just insignificant regular season games that don’t matter anymore. This victory for Orlando pulled them to within 3.5 games of Miami in the Southeast division.

In the Heat’s last home game prior to this debacle, also they blew a lead in an eventual loss to the New York Knicks, this time of the 15-point variety. A clutch performance by Carmelo Anthony coupled with some stout New York defense lead to the Knicks taking the lead in the closing moments. With a chance to be the hero in the closing seconds once again, a James drive to the hole was thwarted by the shot-altering defense of Anthony and a greatly-timed blocked shot coming from the weak side by Amare Stoudamire. The “King” was again unable to rule.

On February 24th, The Chicago Bulls had their turn. What was different? The Heat didn’t blow a late-game lead this time, but rather were neck-and-neck with the vastly improving Bulls for the entire contest. What was the same? Lebron missing yet another clutch shot, this also an uncontested 3-pointer, down 3 with 15 seconds remaining. You are supposed to wear a crown? Maybe a court-jester cap is more suitable for right now.

These recent instances are obviously just part of a small sample size. That doesn’t make them any less relevant of a piece in the way the overall puzzle is being sculpted. Go ahead, put the pieces together yourself. It’s the same as what you see on the box cover – the “King” bricking another game-winning shot when it counts.