Kobe, Lakers Rolling But Have Many Issues to Address at Mid-season

With the NBA season approaching the All-Star Break, the Los Angeles Lakers have some important issues to address in order to improve their already fabulous team and make another run at an NBA championship.

First off, the Lakers need to focus on getting Pau Gasol more touches on offense, whether it is so that he can create his own shot, or at least draw the double team so that he can find the open man.

We all know that Kobe should have the ball majority of the game, because he draws the most attention of anyone on the team, or in the league for that matter.

But the thing is with Kobe on the team, opposing teams underestimate Gasol’s ability to score and make plays. He is a fantastic passer and has great hands cutting to the hoop.

As long as the person guarding him is not a great defender such as Tim Duncan, Pau should be able to control the offense and create plays along with Kobe.

This would propel our offense to extreme lengths, with Kobe controlling the perimeter and Pau controlling the post as long as the outside shooters continue to shoot the ball well.

This also leads to the number of shots Bryant takes in certain games which has led to ugly wins or even some losses.

For the eight games the Lakers have lost this season, Kobe attempted, respectively, 30, 21, 25, 24, 31, 22, 19, and 26 shots in each of those losses. When the team is struggling, Kobe still has this urge to take over and win the game by himself, which he knows does not exactly equal success.

On average this season, Kobe has taken 25 percent of the Lakers’ shots, which is a lot of shots for a player only averaging 36.4 minutes a game.

Kobe is the best player in the game, but the Lakers need him to be a facilitator and a great decision-maker because as the Celtics showed in the finals last year, some teams will have a game plan to only stop Kobe and let the rest of the team beat them.

When the Lakers are moving the ball and looking for the open man, that’s when they are unstoppable on offense, not when Kobe’s shot count is in the 30s.

Another issue the Lakers need to work out is Andrew Bynum’s play of late. Kareem has been doing a great job teaching Bynum some great footwork and low post moves, but what the Lakers need is a center who will clog up the paint on defense, grab rebounds and go to the hoop aggressively with the ball.

It seems as though he becomes too fancy under the hoop and it allows centers such as Dwight Howard to bully him around a bit, which pretty much cancels Bynum out for the game and gets him in foul trouble.

If Bynum can hold his own every game against big, strong centers, then the Lakers will be able to take more shots freely, knowing there’s a good chance Bynum will get the offensive rebound.

One very obvious problem the Lakers need to fix is when holding a large lead, the team needs to bring more intensity and try to extend the lead.

All too often, the Lakers have a lead of around 17 to 20 points, and the opposing team will come back within minutes and cut the advantage down to six or eight.

The key is to have the desire to destroy their opponent and embarrass them to the point where the team is afraid to play them again.

This will keep the starters off the bench and allow players such as Derek Fisher to get extra rest. Boston possesses this intensity and it has proven to be a pretty effective mindset to have.

Lastly, there is Lamar Odom. So much potential. So much talent, but it does not show up on the stat sheet, as it should for every game.

Lamar has always been one of my favorites. He’s passionate and will do whatever it takes to help the team win.

But he does not finish around the rim and is more of a liability to the team than an asset, as much as it hurts me to say. He turns the ball over at an alarming rate for his position, at 2.5 turnovers every 36 minutes played, which is third highest on the team.

If that stat doesn’t convince you, then his turnover percentage per 100 plays of 17.6 percent should, which is the highest on the team, except for rookie bench-rider Sun Yue.

Lamar also has a tendency not to show up in big games and big moments, such as the NBA Finals last year where he averaged 2.7 turnovers a game with a 64 percent free throw percentage.

In two of the six games played against Boston, Odom had zero free throw attempts, which is beyond ridiculous as a starter in the NBA. All of this shows that Lamar does not have what it takes and is just a tease in terms of being a great player for the Lakers.

What the Lakers need to try hard to do is trade Lamar for Shawn Marion somehow. If that trade could be made, everything that Lamar does wrong will be corrected and improved with Shawn Marion running fast breaks and grabbing tough rebounds.

Marion is an All-Star caliber player who is athletic as anyone in the league. I’m sorry, Lamar, but the trade needs to happen.