Celtics 4-Lakers 2

For the past few years I have been a vocal hater of the NBA. Above is an image of how the league and its players have changed since I was a kid. I tried to locate a picture of Larry Bird, Magic Johnson, or Michael Jordan thumping their chest in this manner, I don't expect to find one. I'm not putting this all on Kobe though, its pretty wide spread. It used to be if you hit a game winning shot you just ran off the floor and into the locker room to celebrate. I would love to go back to those days. Where is Doc Brown and his time-traveling Delorian when I need it?

Now to the series itself. I must say the matchup of Lakers v. Celtics got me interested. Obviously I wanted the Lakers to win, old habits die hard. But from what I saw Bryant was the only player who showed up, not to say he played particulary well, but he gave effort the entire series. I must hand it to the Celtics D. Kobe had nowhere to go. Probably the best team defense I've seen in a while. Isn't it curious though how he was actually criticized for not being aggressive enough offensively by all those TV guys? He clearly understood and stated as much that he needs Pau and Odom to be involved if they are going to win. The last couple of years they knocked him because he wouldn't trust his teammates, now he has more talent around him and they say he needs to shoot more. Damned if he does damned if he doesn't.

One more comment on the coaching of these finals. Memo to Phillip: Radmanovic can't guard Pierce! Feel free to make an adjustment. In fact feel free to leave him on the bench. He gives you about 7ppg but probably gives up three times that with his "Euro" defense. Doc Rivers was a step ahead of Jackson the whole series. They put Kobe on Rondo, Rivers brought in House to negate it. Although lets be honest Rivers only used one play the whole series, the pic and roll. If the wheel is not broke don't fix it right? Radmanovic and Gasol looked like they had never seen such a play. Perhaps communication is the problem. Maybe Vlad is speaking Serbian and Pau is speaking Spanish when the pic is set. Honestly it looked like the Tower of Babel out there. The Jazz run the best pic and roll in the land, but Fisher and Odom actually know how to play D so the result was a 4-2 win.