Los Angeles Lakers

Bill Plaschke of the Los Angeles Times: "Making his season's first appearance after sitting out the first 11 games because of a hamstring injury, Pau Gasol took the Staples Center floor against the Chicago Bulls to an ovation that was less than standing. Folks cheered, but only slightly l...

John Reid of The Times Picayune: "In the locker room after Tuesday night’s game against the Los Angeles Clippers, New Orleans General Manager/Coach Jeff Bower had his players gather around him. He told them they gave a good effort, but he was caught off guard when injured point guard Chris...

Hmm, could there be some latent frustration in Phil Jackson about Pau Gasol’s slow-to-heal right hamstring? When someone compared Gasol’s acting duties to Andrew Bynum hoisting a Playmate at a Playboy Mansion party while out with an injury last season, Jackson stayed on his roll.

Howard Beck of The New York Times: "On a recent night at Madison Square Garden, the camera focused on Mike D’Antoni as he plopped himself on the bench. D’Antoni looked down, clasped his hands, took a deep breath, puffed out his cheeks and let out a sigh so powerful that his bottom lip fluttere...

Looking at the NBA's best records thus far. The Celtics have been celebrated for their tough early schedule, but Suns have the NBA's best record at 9-2, and they haven't exactly had a cakewalk of a schedule, either. Seven of their 11 games have been on the road. They've had three sets of back-to...

The hungry Rockets scored a major victory, on the road in Los Angeles against the defending champion Lakers. How did they do it? Well, Kobe Bryant had a miserable night, making just five of his 20 shots, to go with four turnovers, just one rebound, an no made 3-pointers to go with three assist...

Jonathan Feigen of the Houston Chronicle: "This was why Trevor Ariza came to Houston, for nights like these. It was not that he wanted to beat the Lakers, though he seemed to enjoy that as much as a very classy pregame ceremony in which Kobe Bryant and Derek Fisher gave him his championship ri...

After Kobe Bryant missed 15 of 20 shots and came out with two minutes remaining in the Los Angeles Lakers' 101-91 loss to the Houston Rockets Sunday night, Lakers coach Phil Jackson revealed that Bryant has a groin injury. The Lakers have a busy stretch ahead with four home games in seven day...

DENVER -- The Denver Nuggets zoomed past “statement” and went directly to “historical accomplishment.” They held the Los Angeles Lakers to 23 points after intermission, L.A.’s lowest-scoring half in franchise history, in the process of dismantling the champions, 105-79.

There are plenty of good golf courses in Southern California, and it’s possible Scott could wind up back there when Phil Jackson decides to leave the Lakers. Scott’s on the list of potential replacements, along with Minnesota Timberwolves coach Kurt Rambis and Lakers assistant Brian Sh...

Dan Bickley of The Arizona Republic: "Already, this reshaped basketball team has become the talk of the NBA, just like it did in 2004. That's when the run-and-gun Suns were formed, a team that sparked a revolution in the NBA. This team is much different. These Suns are gritty, committed and so...

Now that All-Star voting is so digital, why are only 60 players on the ballot again? Can't every NBA player be eligible? Ink is free on the internet. TV reporter dunks on toddler, makes him cry.Houston guard Kyle Lowry has been on TrueHoop a lot. Not only is he one of those players who couldn't st...

The common links are: Western Conference teams from the Central time zone. The league wouldn't do this for Eastern Conference teams that visit the Clippers and Lakers only once each during the season, the same way it wouldn't schedule a Western Conference team in back-to-back games at th...

They won't often say it to the media, but you know they're thinking it. The people who run bad NBA teams watch the good teams and think: If I had those players, everyone would think I was a genius. I'm not saying the teams that let these players go made mistakes. Often they just have different prio...

LeBron James won't rule out playing for the Clippers or any other team.Kevin Durant missed some big shots that could have sealed a win against the Lakers, and an emerging commitment to defense played a role. Darnell Mayberry of the Oklahoman: "Although Durant wouldn’t use it as an excuse Th...

Mike Bresnahan of the Los Angeles Times: "Yet some Lakers think it's not out of the question to try to top 72. Lakers veteran forward Lamar Odom, whose name now resonates among gossip-magazine groupies because of his rush-to-the-altar marriage last month to reality-TV star Khloe Kardas...

Broderick Turner and Mike Bresnahan of the Los Angeles Times: "Derek Fisher, 35, in his 14th season and the final year of a contract that pays him $5 million, said he plans on playing beyond the 2009-10 NBA season. 'I'm definitely not shutting it down after this season,' Fisher said after th...

Monday night at Staples Center, Houston employed that defensive flexibility. The Rockets clogged the passing lanes. They successfully pushed the Lakers' big men off their spots. Most of all, Houston's defensive strategy induced an ugly 32 point effort from Kobe Bryant, if such a thing is...

Ross Siler of the Salt Lake Tribune: "We've been here before. Sad to say, it's the Jazz's identity. They've played three absolutely critical games for their playoff fortunes on the road the last week-and-a-half and lost to Portland, Denver and Dallas by an average of 20 points. It's unbelie...

That's a little different. If you take the seven other teams, they each have some chance of winning. If you add all those slim chances together, who's the favorite, the Lakers -- or the Nuggets, Spurs, Rockets, Blazers, Hornets, Jazz, and Mavericks combined?

In this case, Laker assistant Jim Cleamons is quote talking about how the Lakers play defense. I bring this up because how well the Lakers play defense could well determine who wins this year's NBA title. Here's Friedman, quoting Cleamons, who sounds like he thinks the Lakers could get bett...

The Lakers defense needs to turn up the intensity. The Rockets' reserves turned in a stellar effort in the Big Easy. The Celtics turn the ball over way, way too often for a championship-caliber team. Take a turn for the better through the TrueHoop Network:  

We made those picks shortly after the Lakers had whomped the mighty Spurs in the Western Conference Finals. At that moment -- the night of the picking -- it was hard to picture the Lakers losing a game. They had been so dominant against such a good team.

Kurt Helin of Forum Blue & Gold: "The question of the day is not should Phil retire - he can and should do that on his own terms - but rather what follows for the Lakers? To me, that has to start with a basic team philosophy question: Do the Lakers stay a triangle team? Or do they go to another s...

For those who want to follow Lakers' basketball -- not the psychodrama, the theatrics, or even the mystique -- Kurt Helin of Forum Blue & Gold is your guide. There are countless outlets in Los Angeles that cover the Lakers.  Kurt is one of the few who covers the game.  He's been doing it sinc...

When athletes praise higher powers.ESPN's Chad Ford wonders how long John Paxson will keep his job running the Chicago Bulls.A new book that I'd like to read, Developing Basketball Intelligence, by Brian McCormick, promises to help players "choose the best option in less time; adapt to e...

Some of Synergy Sports' fancy statistics are now on the EA Sports website. Synergy's stats are informing the tendencies of players in the video game, which is pretty amazing.You know about black swans? The idea is that if you see something really really rare, you notice, remember, and talk...

Andrew Bynum says that the Lakers didn't get any rebounds after Phil Jackson took him out last night, and he implies that may have led to the loss. He has a point. By my look at the play-by-play, after Bynum sat with 5:31 left in the fourth, the Pacers proceeded to grab nine of the next 11 rebounds....

Nash walks the ball upcourt and immediately feeds O'Neal in the post against Pau Gasol. O'Neal manages a single dribble before Lamar Odom arrives for the double-team. The length of Gasol and Odom, along with the Lakers' weak side zone, cuts off O'Neal from Phoenix's shooters. O'Neal is ulti...

Congratulations to SLAM's Lang Whitaker, who, according to a press release, has a deal to write "a humorous, thoughtful, and knowledgeable fan's memoir of following manager Bobby Cox and the Atlanta Braves for the past two decades."Ryan Schwan of Hornets247 on one of the quietest GM's i...

A statistician takes a stab at figuring out how many points Kobe Bryant cost the Lakers by ball-hogging on the night he scored 81. 12, by the way. That's the answer. Passing more, says the Arbitrarian on Hardwood Paroxysm, would have delivered the Lakers 12 extra points in a game they won anywa...

LAS VEGAS -- Coby Karl tallied a game-high 16 points as the Los Angeles Lakers handed the Memphis Grizzlies their first loss of the 2008 NBA Summer League ... Pistons Down Lakers NBA.com NBA SUMMER LEAGUE: Lakers trim around edges in Vegas Las Vegas Review - Journal

If Darrell Arthur slipped in the draft because teams thought he had kidney problems, while in fact Arthur's kidneys had proven healthy in tests, who's to blame for that widespread miscommunication? The case that his agent has some explaining to do.As you consider Kevin Love in Minnesota...

Having lived, roughly, the Celtics' and Lakers' travel schedule for the last couple of weeks, it is my firm suspicion that both teams will be a little tired tonight. Which means, to me, that fresh legs will be at a premium. If I were Doc Rivers, I would get youngsters like Leon Powe, Glen "Big Ba...

Lakers vs. Celtics. Celtics vs. Lakers. I just watched both games, thanks to Synergy Sports. The first was November 23 in Boston, and the 10-1 Celtics beat the 7-5 Lakers 104-97. The second was December 30 in L.A., when the 26-3 Celtics beat the 19-11 Lakers 110-91.

By Henry Abbott, ESPN.com After planning a quick getaway to Los Angeles to prepare to face the Lakers in the Western Conference finals, the San Antonio Spurs instead spent the night on the ground in New Orleans, trying to sleep on a plane grounded by technical trouble.

Tonight, at 10:30 Eastern/7:30 Pacific, the Los Angeles Lakers will face the New Orleans Hornets in Tinseltown. Chris Paul is the insurgent. The new kid. The future that may or may not be here yet. And Kobe Bryant? He's the people's champ, even if he can't really jump over a car.