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by Mark Stein
ESPN.com
Getting a Read on the Lakers
We've all seen this story before: 'Lakers swing for the fences and make blockbuster trade', but this has a different feeling to it. Two weeks ago, the Lakers make a deal to get Jason Kidd to run the offense to replace the maligned championship winning point guard Jason Williams. then last night, the Lakers pull off a 5 person deal that sends they're near guarantee'd top 10 pick for Defensive stalwarts Jermaine O'Neal and Shane Battier. With these recent trades, a lot of fans are confused with the direction of the Lakers, and i'm here to hopefully clear some of it up. In my recent interview with GM: Mitch Kupcheck I asked a few questions to kind of get in line with his thinking.
Why the Jason Kidd deal?
"We felt at the beginning of the season we were in line to be contenders again. We saw a lot of the teams in the West, and felt we could compete with any of them. As the season prgressed and as injuries mounted we realized we need a little more firepower to get us through the final push without our other big star. On a larger scale, we brought Jason in to shore up our perimeter defense which had been terrible up until that point. Jason's a leader in the locker room and we felt like it was a good move."
What was the thinking with adding O'Neal, Battier and House?
"Believe it or not, at the beginning of the season we had a vision of this team being more in the mold of the 76ers than the Dallas Mavericks. No disrespect to the Mavs who've put a very good product on the court, and if I were to be honest, a better product than us. Our vision was to have a defense for the ages and let our two stars, T Mac and Duncan do the heavy lifting on offense, something we didn't believe the 6ers had. With those two (Duncan and McGrady) you never have to worry about taking too many shots because they're so unselfish. "
"As the season moved on we realized not only did we miss the bullseye on our target, but we missed the whole target with our vision. There's a lot of people who wouldn't admit they were wrong and would see how it played out, but we have a directive by ownership to always be in the contender's conversation, so we pulled the trigger. We also promised tim Duncan during sign and trade talks that we'd always keep the team relevant and never fade into obsurity. We intended to keep our promise and we now think we have the foundation to realize our vision on the court."
Did the state of the Western Conference play into these moves?
"Absolutely. there are some teams that are rebuilding right now and there are a few teams on the cusp of being good enough to make it to the finals, but no sure thing. We felt if we stacked the deck, no matter the seed we'd have a chance to make it back to the finals. We also made the move so we could match-up a little better with the best in the West. when you look at the top 4 seeds right now, what do you see? Stacked at the 3 position. Seattle: Al Harrington Memphis: Joe Johnson Houston: Carmello Anthony Dallas: Jamison. you have to be able to defend the 3 well to make it in the playoffs. "
Where does Josh childress fit in?
"We were really excited to add Josh. Josh is a multitalented guy who can really do everything well. We can plug him in at the 2 or 3 and in some situations the 4. He's an excellent passer and rebounder for his position. We think with Childress, House, and Sheldon who's really coming into his own, we have one of the best benches in the league."
Was the First half of the season a failure?
"By our standards, yes. Even with the injury to Tracy it's a failure. We went something like 8 games under .500 during the month's he was out. Unacceptable. "
If you have any question for the Lakers GM, please ask away.
"I don't know if people know — I dislocated my pinkie finger. And [Tyreke] told me, 'You wanna go home or you wanna be here?' I want to be here. And he said, 'All right, then go tape it up and let's play. Let's go. We not stoppin' at no stores. Straight gas. That's what we do, just keep going.'"
http://thebasketbawlblog.com/
Jason Jones from the KingsCorner, the Lakers are officially 10 games behind the SuperSonics and the #1 seed and have 5 more sims until the season is over. Which seed do you see your team taking, and to follow up that which team would you least likely want to face in the first round?
Did you think about making a coaching change or did you feel the roster without TMac was not good enough to succeed. Also, do you feel you will you have the right coaching to get the most out of this team?
Emeka Okafor - Joe Smith - Carmelo Anthony - Manu Ginobili - Jason Williams
Al Jefferson - James Posey - Aaron McKie - Shaun Livingston
Mitch Kupcheck: Thanks Jason, and let me tell you, those Kings of yours are making waves. Regarding the question, we have a lot of respect for what a lot of the upper tier teams in the Western Conference have done and are doing. With that being said, with their current Pace this is how the West looks at the end of the season:Originally Posted by NOLa.
Seattle: 53
Memphis: 49
Houston: 49
Phoenix: 48
Dallas: 47
Minnesota: 46
Clippers: 41
We're currently at 21 games with 36 remaining. So to win the Pacific we'd need to be at that 53 game mark we'd have to win 89% of our next few games. Realistically we're not going to worry about seeding because it's a moot point at this time. We're going to focus on making sure we put the best product on the court come playoff time. Let me be clear though, we don't really fear anyone nor will we aim for any matchups. We're confident we can beat the Sonics or the Grizzlies or the Rockets or the suns in a first round match-up. the 6 or 7 seed seems like the worst seed for us logistically because that would make us potentially go against 1,2 and 3 to get to the finals. To us, there's no team we'd rather not play, we think it's the other way around, which top seed will lose on the seeding roulette table and have to play us.
Bill Simmons, Sports Guy here. You like my Celtics who struggled last year b/c of injuries refuse to call it a lost season and Doc didn't quit on his team (something my time traveling buddy Joe House tells me he does in the future). But we fell short and still missed the playoffs, it's all but certain the Lake show will make the playoffs do you think the top teams will try to position themselves to avoid you in the first round?
#FREEQUAIL
Mitch Kupcheck: When you have a championship coach and a guy who's been to the finals twice and the western conference finals 4 times, you tend to give the coach the benefit of the doubt. Humor me for a minute though. We tend to use the comparison of a coach to a jockey. If you have the best jockey in the world and give him a below average horse, he can do everything he wants with it, but he's not going to win a race. When you give him a Thoroughbred though, he's going to give you a great chance to win. In our scenerio we felt this was a management issue and not a coaching issue. We didn't give him the Thoroughbred and told him to win the triple crown, and that's just not fair to him if he's getting blamed.
Mitch Kupcheck: Thanks for the question Bill. You know, you can draw a lot of comparisons between the two teams. They are both teams that not many top teams considered it a reward to face in the first round. I'm doubt teams will purposely try and avoid us, but i imagine it will make the decision in the last few weeks of the season to rest their starters or not a little easier. It's really premature to discuss it in depth though; we have a lot of work to do to show we deserve to be considered a threat to these upper tier West teams that have done a fantastic job of getting where they are today. another thing that needs to be considered is that the Clippers were the best team in the West until losing Etan Thomas, who they'll be getting back very soon. People talk about how weak the West is, but 1-8 I'm not sure there's been much more talent.
Why are you going with the smaller O'Neal at center and the bigger Duncan at PF?
Mitch Kupcheck: It's a fluid situation but the initial line of thinking is Tim Duncan is a top 2 PF of all time.
J. Felders from SI.com here. Are you ready for cap hell, or is this just a one-season deal? If so, does this mean that you are officially in "2006 Champs or Bust" mode?
HR Sim League
Any truth to the rumor he didn't want to battle against bigger centers at his older age?
Hey Mike Hawk from supseattle. Are you worried about the teams future in a Western Conference with a lot of young teams that can only get stronger. An older core, expiring players, and a tight cap look like a mess regardless of how good the current roster is. Congrats on building the best roster for a possible 2nd championship in 3 year by the way.
Mitch Kupchec: We feel confident with out current cap situation currently and in the future. We're always in championship or bust mode, which we believe is what seperates us from a lot of other teams in the league.
Mitch Kupcheck: We respect what other teams have done to create their current situation for themselves at the cost of early success. We don't believe in that model for our team. We wish everyone the best until playoff time. We're not worried about the future because we have a very creative ownership and a management team, so we're confident when the time comes, we will still be competing. Thanks.
Hey Mike Hawk from supseattle. Are you worried about the teams future in a Western Conference with a lot of young teams that can only get stronger. An older core, expiring players, and a tight cap look like a mess regardless of how good the current roster is. Congrats on building the best roster for a possible 2nd championship in 3 year by the way.
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