It’s no secret that Kobe Bryant has always had talent around him. Shaquille O’Neal, Pau Gasol, Karl Malone, Gary Payton, Lamar Odom, Phil Jackson, to name a few. Make no mistake that Kobe understands the caliber of players that he has played with over the years, but he believes that the current team, housing names like Dwight Howard, Steve Nash and Pau Gasol, is the most talented team he has been a part of.
“On its face, it’s the best talent I’ve been around,” said Bryant. “Whether that translates into winning a championship, that remains to be seen. But just on paper, you’re obviously talking about defensive players of the years, MVPs, All-Stars. You’re talking about a myriad of things where guys are on top of their position and have been at the top of their position.”
I think Kobe has a case to be made. Steve Nash is arguably the best passer the NBA has ever seen and Dwight Howard is the most dominate big man in the NBA right now. Add in the skilled play of Pau Gasol, the heart and defensive ability of Mett World Peace and the fact that the Lakers have a guy (Antawn Jamison) who averaged 17.2 ppg coming off the bench and it seems as though the sky may be the limit for this squad.
I tend to agree with Kobe about the talent aspect. Sure, Dwight Howard is not the player that Shaq was when he was in LA, but the Lakers never had anything close to the caliber players of Gasol, Nash, Jamison and World Peace when they managed a three-peat back in the early 2000′s. Their next best player after Kobe and Shaq was Fisher or Robert Horry. Neither of those players can hold a candle to Steve Nash or Pau Gasol.
I’d even go as far as to say that the Lakers EASILY have the best six-man rotation in the NBA. But that doesn’t mean they will be able to beat the Miami Heat, or the Oklahoma City Thunder. Chemistry matters in this league and Kobe knows it. That is why he said that this was the “most talented team on paper”. He understands what LeBron and Wade went through their first season together. Bryant gets the circus that is the NBA season and the hurdles the Lakers will have to overcome if they want to mesh in time to win it all in 2013.
Getting used to playing with a guy like Dwight Howard may prove difficult for Kobe. Howard begged for more touches for YEARS in Orlando, and that was when he was the number one option. He’s not likely to see more shots now that he plays with Gasol and Bryant. Can Howard handle being the second scoring option?
It’s an 82 game season and the Lakers are surely loaded with talent. They’re sure to win a lot of games, but making wins translate into championships can be an entirely different game.
The post Kobe Bryant says this Lakers’ team is the most talented he’s been on appeared first on Pass The Pill.
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October 05, 2012
