Before the 2012-13 NBA season started, the Los Angeles
Lakers had expectations of winning their 17th championship as they
acquired PG Steve Nash and C Dwight Howard in the offseason to give G Kobe
Bryant two stars to work with. At 30-30 and currently in the 9th
seed in the Western Conference Standings, the Lakers are wondering now if they
will even make the playoffs.
After
starting 1-4 this season, the Lakers organization felt that they needed a
coaching change and fired Mike Brown replacing him with Mike D’Antoni three
days later. Most Laker fans thought that Phil Jackson was going to come back
and try to win his 12th ring but GM Mitch Kupchak opted for D’Antoni
instead. The Lakers are 18-21 since D’Antoni has taken over as head coach. The
reason why the Lakers haven’t been successful is that they have been decimated
by injuries to F Pau Gasol, Howard, Nash, and PF/C Jordan Hill and D’Antoni’s
fast paced system doesn’t work with the group.
But this
team will make the playoffs. They are playing better basketball as of late and have
won 7 of their last 10 games and look like they are finally starting to gel
together as a team. Everyone keeps blaming Howard but he is still leading the
league in rebounds with 12 a game and does average 16 points per game but needs
to improve on his horrendous 48% from the free throw line. Laker fans, can you
imagine if we still had C Andrew Bynum? The guy isn’t even playing this year
and I believe Howard will re-sign with the Lakers. (He is a free agent after
this season.) The emergence of F Earl Clark lately and finally having Nash
healthy will help the Lakers in their last 22 games.
There is
one BIG reason why the Lakers will make the playoffs: His name is Kobe Bryant.
In his career, only once has Kobe not led the Lakers to the playoffs, coming in
2004-05. He is the most determined player in the league and now that they are
playing this season for Jerry Buss, who died two weeks ago, there is no way that
Kobe will not lead this team to the playoffs.
I believe
that the Houston Rockets who are currently in the 8th seed will make
the playoffs and the Utah Jazz who are in the 7th will not. If the
Lakers make the playoffs as the #8 seed, I believe they could win a seven game
series against the San Antonio Spurs, who I believe will win the West. They are
0-2 against the Spurs this year but Nash was out for the first game and Howard
the second.
With only
22 games left including tonight, the Lakers have some work to do and will need
some help and fortunately the Jazz have a tough schedule going forward. But
come late April, expect the Lakers to be in the playoffs.
image was used from espn.go.com
No comments:
Post a Comment