Category Archives: Phil Jackson

Dwight Howard, Kobe Bryant, Los Angeles Lakers, Mike D'Antoni, NBA, Orlando Magic, Phil Jackson, Shaquille O'Neal, Stan Van Gundy

Howard’s Hotel California


Dwight Howard never wanted the Los Angeles Lakers. 
He knew he would never match up to the expectations, the history, the legacy. Yet true to his personality, Howard smiled on the outside in the preseason following his trade from the Orlando Magic to the Lakers. He said mostly all the right things, mostly because there’s no way he’d say the wrong things.
Howard told us he wanted to win a championship. As opposed to telling everyone he doesn’t? And that’s the thing with Howard: his actions have always spoken louder than words.
From arriving as such a fresh-faced teenager who spoke about his Christian faith and all that he hoped to accomplish until this moment, wearing the famed Lakers purple and gold nearly a decade later, Howard’s hopeful words have never changed.
He always says what you want to hear, you just can’t tell if he believes it or only says it because he longs to be liked.
Howard had it all in Orlando: a small-market team that embraced him as Shaq The Second, willing to let him run the roost and act like a kid, because, that’s what he was. 
The Magic had a coach in Stan Van Gundy who exhausted all options in making Dwight’s strengths obvious, while hiding his weaknesses. Van Gundy protected Howard, both on and off the court. He defended him in the media. He surrounded him with shooters.
In Orlando, it was all about Dwight – and mainly only the good parts. Taking cues from Disney World just down the street, it truly was Dwight’s Magic Kingdom.
Just four short seasons ago, it looked like it couldn’t get much better: there was Howard, strong, agile and dominant in his own way, the centerpiece of a team that reached the NBA Finals. 
In retrospect, Stan Van Gundy did more for Dwight Howard that even Dwight Howard. 
Van Gundy put Howard at the rim, drawing defenders and creating a defensive scramble that forced help and freed up shooters like J.J. Redick, Courtney Lee, Hedo Turkoglu and Rashard Lewis to fire away or attack the rim themselves. Throw in Jameer Nelson and Mickael Pietrus, the Magic had athleticism, shooters and tons of ball movement.
It was perfect for Howard, who was allowed to control his environment, in the middle of the paint, and took the spotlight off his offensive weaknesses, like creating his own shot, developing a mid-range jump shot or a series of post-moves.
But nothing lasts forever. And everything ends badly or it wouldn’t end. Yet it’s still perplexing why exactly Howard grew so sour on Orlando. Or on Stan van Gundy.
Howard got SVG canned and himself traded out of town. He was indeed the second coming of Shaq in that regard, but nothing like him on the court. Which is why following Shaq’s path to L.A. is a big problem.
The Lakers are the complete opposite of the Magic, and it shouldn’t take much knowledge of professional sports or the NBA to know that. The Lakers are the Yankees of pro basketball, and therefore, everything is magnified. Every comment, every missed free throw, every loss and win. Howard’s worn out on the drama already – and we’re barely 50 games into his stay in L.A.
This could be Heaven or this could be Hell for Howard. If he committed himself to the Lakers, it would end part of the merry-go-round and media circus. But he only perpetuates it with his non-committal attitude. He thinks he’s being coy; he’s just being annoying to Laker fans and the media.
Likewise, it could be heavenly if Howard would develop the parts of his game that were masked by the Magic and Van Gundy. But he hasn’t shown signs of improvement and remains very limited offensively. You still have to have Howard close to the rim to be effective. You can’t just toss him the ball in the post and let him go to work. He’s not Shaq. He’s not Ewing, Mourning or Olajuwon, gifted big men who could score in a variety of ways.
Howard doesn’t need to shoot threes, even though he likes to joke about it. None of those guys did. But he’s got fewer offensive capabilities than Dikembe Mutombo. Howard’s also missing something else nearly all of the great and dominant centers have had: a mean streak. All of the best go into beast mode, where they physically take over games, snear and mean mug it down the floor, their presence known and felt. Howard just smiles, afraid that someone won’t like him.
So instead of being the awesome match everyone assumes it will be, it’s been Hell so far for the Lakers and for Howard. It’s exacerbating all of his flaws: his need to feel wanted and loved, his limited offensive ability, his cloak-and-dagger comments about the future.
Yet truthfully, the Lakers didn’t lose out on this trade, even if Howard doesn’t stay. The guy they traded, Andrew Bynum, has lost his knees and his mind (seriously, check out his hair). Bynum hasn’t played this season for the Philadelphia 76ers, and might not ever be what he once was – which was the No. 2 big man in the NBA.
And there’s the point: the Lakers needed to find someone to transition the face of the franchise to once Kobe Bryant retires. Howard could be that guy. And they didn’t really give up much to get him. If it doesn’t work out and he bolts town, then at the very least they have cap space to spend in 2014 on some other big name free agent.
Trust me, someone will want to play in L.A. and take over after Kobe is gone. The Lakers biggest mistake was in choosing Mike D’Antoni over Phil Jackson (which is still too weird to talk about). Jackson certainly would have made this work better and Howard would be more apt to stay. Then again, Jackson wouldn’t have stayed as long as Dwight, so you’d be right back here in a few years anyway.
Howard is an enigma, perhaps even to himself. He doesn’t know what he wants, and perhaps when he does, he’ll be too old to use it. He’s looking for what he already had and in the process of doing so, he’s created a beast, fed daily by the overactive L.A. media. But just like the Eagles sang, you just can’t kill the beast. This thing has spun out of control now.
Mitch Kupcheck says he’ll stand firm, that he won’t trade Howard today and that Howard will be another in a line of legendary Lakers.
At least someone believes that. At least someone wants that.
Problem is, it’s not the guy the Lakers need wanting and believing it.
Problem is, Howard can’t get out so easy now. There’s too much money on the table. Too much damage to Howard’s rep should he leave another team when times got tough. And that, for many reasons, matters to Howard. He may want things a certain way, but it goes hand in hand with being liked. You’re not well liked when you bail on the league’s marquee franchise, not when nearly everything for your future and the team’s is set on you. And he’ll have about $30 million extra reasons to make it work.
Howard just really hoped he would be able to recreate the magic he had with the Magic in some nondescript, less pressure-packed place like Dallas, Brooklyn or Atlanta, where he’d be revered as a much as he was for his first eight years in Orlando. But this is the Lakers. They focus on winning banners, not the happy pursuit of them.
In a way, he really did find the Hotel California.
Howard is caught looking for a passage back to the place he was before, and while he can check-out, he can’t really ever leave.
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Dwight Howard, Kobe Bryant, LeBron James, Los Angeles Lakers, Miami Heat, Mike D'Antoni, NBA, Pau Gasol, Phil Jackson

Showcase Showdown?


Now that football has entered hibernation period, and just before baseball begins its long warm-up to a long season, there is basketball of the college and professional variety to help us pass our weekend time.
And while the amateur ranks of college have produced a wildly entertaining and wholly unpredictable state of affairs, with the nation’s No. 1 ranked team losing each of the past five weeks, the NBA hums along toward its mid-way point with little surprise in its pecking order. As usual, you will find the San Antonio Spurs, Oklahoma City Thunder, Miami Heat, and of course, traditional powers like the Los Angeles Clippers and Indiana Pacers.
Wait, what’s that you say? The Pacers and Clipper aren’t traditional powers? You wouldn’t know the Pacers had won 15 straight at home until Friday night’s loss to the plucky Toronto Raptors. Hell, you may not remember Canada still has a team. Or that the New York Knicks – yes, the Knicks – have the second best record in the Eastern Conference, or that the Chicago Bulls are hanging around and doing pretty good without former MVP Derrick Rose, still out because of his knee injury suffered last year.
You might not know the aging Spurs are 40-12, and have only lost two home games all year or that the Golden State Warriors are an emerging young team out West.
But as a casual fan coming out of a football coma wouldn’t know these things because no one is talking about them.
It’s all Los Angeles Lakers, all Dwight Howard, all Kobe Bryant and all the time.
The Lakers are a 24-28 team – good enough for 10th place in the Western Conference. They are old, injured and plagued by infighting. As I highlighted a few weeks ago, they aren’t really worth watching. Yet I couldn’t turn down the chance to watch at least a little of the ABC “Sunday Showcase” game featuring the Lakers at the Miami Heat.
For three-and-a-half quarters, the game was competitive and close. And then the Heat blew the Lakers doors off in the final six minutes before winning 107-97. Eric Spoelstra out-coached Mike D’Antoni, LeBron James continued to outplay everyone and Kobe Bryant tried to will his team back in the game, even as a five or six-point lead felt insurmountable.
You could glean several things by just watching the second half, where the Lakers couldn’t keep pace and allowed the Heat to score 29 in the final stanza. Even more telling – the Heat outscored L.A. 25-16 the final nine minutes.
First, LeBron James has no peers right now. It’s all come together and he’s at the peak of his prime. Google “LeBron James” and “shooting streak” and you’ll get a good idea of why. Efficient doesn’t even really begin to describe what James is doing, shooting 75 percent on his last 65 shots. He just broke the franchise record with five-straight 30-point games as well.
It’s a reminder of when Michael Jordan was in the midst of his reign of awesomeness: the only way James won’t win another MVP is if, much like Jordan, the voters get tired of it. No one else should win. He’s just that good.
The second thing you’d notice from yesterday’s game is just how dysfunctional the Lakers truly are. Steve Nash looks like a broken man who regrets agreeing to this trade. When they showed a close-up of his face, I pictured him with a thought bubble over his head: “I really think losing in Phoenix might be better than this.”
And for as great as Kobe is, as he himself has admitted recently, he is a difficult player to play with. He clogged up the offense good and gross down the stretch Sunday, using an array of back-to-the-basket moves, faders and leaners, appearing to me like a guy who’s legs were fading. This is understandable considering the Lakers were completing their long annual Grammy/Eastern road trip with the game in Miami.
Maybe Kobe was just tired. But he looked like a guy who was old, the one who’s shots at the end of the open gym are bouncing around the rim four or five times and falling out. And with each passing possession, his teammates are less and less interested in watching the same show. Keep in mind, Kobe’s heroics were half the reason the Lakers were even in the game midway through the fourth quarter, but the outcome was all too familiar: another loss.
We haven’t even touched on Dwight Howard (frankly because everyone else spends too much time on him). But Howard’s either not right physically, disengaged with all the drama mentally or most likely, a little bit of both. This week alone featured another round of media clips of Kobe calling out Dwight, Dwight responding and even Dwight’s dad getting involved to take a shot at Mike D’Antoni for not stopping it all.
But forgetting all that drama, the Lakers lack scorers, speed and aggression. They have no bench. There’s relatively little that’s likable about this team on our off the floor.
The Heat play, as do many of the aforementioned teams, with a sense of aggression and attitude. The Lakers have only Bryant with that mindset. Pau Gasol, currently out 6-8 weeks with a foot injury, attacks once every three weeks. Dwight Howard shows more aggression in trying to make his teammates laugh than he does on the court. Howard has one of the most forgettable 15-point, 9-rebound games I can remember. Howard ought to be getting 20 and 10, every night.
The Heat have let our out their inner beasts, the Lakers their inner child.
It’s clear the Lakers made a mistake in not bringing back Phil Jackson, who’s perhaps the best there ever was in the professional ranks at bringing massive egos like Howard and Bryant together under a common goal, while nurturing bruised ego’s like Pau Gasol’s and crazy-in-the-head egos like Metta World Peace/Ron Artest.
What does it say about Mike D’Antoni that the Knicks were a mess during his time in New York, yet a year later, they have the second best record in the Eastern Conference and seem to be playing quite well together? All you need to know about D’Antoni is what he said following the game yesterday: “We’re making strides. We can still do this. [Miami] set the bar and this is where we got to get to.”
I suppose I don’t know what I expect D’Antoni to say. I really don’t expect that truth, which would be: “We’re horrible and we really aren’t getting better. We should be left alone to become an afterthought on what has been a compelling and entertaining NBA season.”
He can’t and won’t say that, I know. But it’s outlandish to think the Lakers are making strides. Or that they are close. Not only can this team not win a championship, it shouldn’t out of sheer principle.
But sadly, this won’t go away. They are the Lakers. It’s 2013. The media cannot not hammer this story, this team, even though there is more going on in the NBA than this mess. So I beg of you, turn on NBA TV, check out some other games this week and then All-Star Weekend. You’ll find so much more going on in the NBA than what you might have seen Sunday from the team in purple and gold.
Otherwise, March Madness won’t just be reserved for the college ranks, as I’m not sure how much more of this ongoing soap opera in L.A. we can take.
It certainly was a Showcase Sunday for both James and the Heat and Kobe and the Lakers.
Yet only LeBron and Miami can feel good about what’s on display.
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Dwayne Wade, Eric Spoelstra, LeBron James, Miami Heat, Phil Jackson, Scottie Pippen

The Heat’s Dis-Factor

Discombobulated. Disjointed. Disgusting.
Those are just a few of the words that were thrown around last night by NBA pundits and analysts after the LeBron James, Dwayne Wade and Chris Bosh, the Miami Heat’s “Big Three,” lost their opener against the Boston Celtics, 88-80, on Tuesday night.
And anytime you’re “dis-“ anything, it’s not good. In fact, with all the dis-ing of the Heat, I have expected the old “Oregon Trail” game to pop up and alert us of someone succumbing to dysentery on the wagon trail.
Let’s not overreact here. It was one game. The trio played a grand total of three minutes together in preseason. As Heat head coach Eric Spoelstra said, it’s going to take time to work out the kinks.
“In practice, it looked a lot different than this,” Spoelstra said. “There is going to be a process with this. There’s a lot of expectations and a lot of pressure out there, but we have our own timetable, and we knew this wasn’t going to be easy.”
Hold that thought. We’ll come back to it.
James noted that it was like they were trying to be too unselfish, which was a concern last July when “The Decision” was announced – who’s going to defer, who’s the alpha dog, what are their roles?  For one night, there was no alpha dog, just an ugly display of three guys who used to be “The Man” on their respective teams trying to figure out their spots, find their rhythm and when they should attack or defer.
Before we write it off as a massive failure, as some are trying to do, let’s give it time. For example, James did take over the game for a stretch in the third quarter with both Paul Pierce (who was hurt momentarily, as he always is in a nationally televised game) and Wade out. He ended with 31 points. During that time, it was obvious – at least to me – that he was playing the Scottie Pippen role perfectly.
If that came off as an backhanded compliment, well, it was.
Pippen used to do that perfectly. Defer to Jordan, create for Jordan, himself and others, then when Jordan was resting, take over for stretches. That’s James true calling now. Play the point-forward, create, slash, post-up. In fact, he’s better, talent-wise, in that role than Pippen. Essentially, however, that’s what James is going to have to be to make it work in Miami.
People forget how good Pippen was. During the year Jordan was out in 1993-94, Pippen was an MVP candidate that led the Bulls to a 30-5 record at the All-Star break. He averaged 22 points, 9 rebounds, 6 assists and 3 steals per game. He was the All-Star MVP and though everyone remembers him that season for the freak-out during the Eastern Conference semifinals, when Pippen refused to play when Phil Jackson drew up a play for Toni Kukoc for the game winner, Pippen was basically what LeBron James was in Cleveland.
(Side note: Jackson doesn’t get enough blame for that issue. Pippen waited for years to be “The Man” and all that came with it, including plays for game winners in the playoffs draw up for him. Jackson slapped him in the face with the Kukoc play. Did Pippen overreact? Absolutely. Did Kukoc hit the shot, making Pippen look enough more foolish? Of course. But Jackson’s gotten a pass on the way he handled the situation for way too long.)
So we get it. It’s a work in progress. It will take time. As Wade said post-game, “Sorry if everyone thought we were going 82-0. It wasn’t going to happen.” His sarcasm aside, Wade is right.
Then why are people so…annoyed?
Perhaps it’s because we expected more from James. We are all witnesses, right? He’s the Chosen One. The King. And he chose to play with the best instead of beat the best. James is entitled to do what he wants, listen to whomever he wants and play wherever he wants. It’s his life, not ours.
Yet when you take on the role of Chosen One and tell people you’ve spoiled them with your play, you’re going to get backlash. When you host a special called “The Decision” and spurn Cleveland for the beaches and bright lights of Miami, you’re making those people recall all the hurt and pain of losing big games and championship and years of futility. To make matters worse, it was a stone’s throw from your hometown of Akron.
Is it partly our fault? Fine, we’ll take some of the blame for it. We want athletes to act a certain way and do certain things and they don’t, so we get mad and turn on them. We can say that we would have done differently, but maybe that’s just because none of us have the option, so it’s easy to say how professional and classy we would have been.
I can tell you right now, without hesitation, if three or four of my friends and I played in the NBA and had a chance to join the same team, I would do it in a second. I play in a Y-League each winter with five good friends, who all played college ball, and we never had the opportunity to play real games together, due to the high schools or colleges we went to or our ages. It’s small potatoes compared to this, but we’ve won by 30 or more every time we step on the court. It’s really not fair, but it’s a hell of a lot of fun.
Though the talent difference and situation are not relatable, the feeling completely is. When you break it down like that, I’m not only a witness, but probably a hypocrite. We want to see Magic vs. Bird, Jordan vs. Magic, etc. We don’t want James and Wade against Kobe. It just doesn’t seem like a real slugfest, superstar vs. superstar, so therefore we feel cheated. And that makes us not like James very much right now.
That’s silly, I admit. The man can do what he wants. And our selfish reasons for wanting true greatness and the next Jordan are a part of this animosity and venom we have for James.
But there’s another part, the part where James isn’t helping himself. The latest Nike ad, for example. Is it cool? Oh yeah – a minute and a half of pure retaliation to all the haters. Eating a donut, winking and saying, “Hi Chuck” – and obvious nod to Charles Barkley, who called “The Decision” a punk move. It’s basically a sarcastic “What Should I Have Done Differently?” to the masses and for a little while, you kind of feel sorry for what James has gone through.
Then you remember: he brought this on himself. Though the whole process, the recruitment, the comments, “The Decision” and even what could be termed “The Unveiling,” when Wade, James and Bosh all donned Heat uniforms, posed, high-fived Miami fans and did a little press junket in July – James has gulped up and enjoyed nearly everything until “The Backlash.”
James has selfish reasons too. And he’s allowed. Just remember, the more he plays into it and continues to even respond, the longer it will take for people to get over it and just watch this team mesh in a possibly better overall version of Jordan, Pippen and Rodman. It won’t be easy, as Spoelstra said. It shouldn’t be easy, championships are supposed to be hard. And that was our original problem with James taking the easy way out.
We wanted to witness the struggle and the resolve to win a title as an alpha dog. But that’s our problem. 
James’ and his cohorts problem will be to not play this up as something larger or more challenging than it is. They can’t make this seem like some great struggle to gel together, find their roles and win. It may take some time, but it shouldn’t take until February. We’ll deal with this “poor us, we have to learn to play together” attitude, but only for a short time. The Heat really should be good and fun to watch. Watching James become the greatest distributor and creator in a hybrid Pippen/Magic Johnson role should be fun. The joy is in watching that transition.
If we can’t enjoy watching all of that happen with James and the Heat and all we’re waiting for is a train wreck because we want to witness the downfall, well, at that point, there’s another “dis-“ word in mind.
Disinterested.
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