DEI99662

Not a big KG fan.

I hope Kobe fails miserably this year.

goose25

What the hell is he feeding his family? Steak, Caviar and Lion testicles each meal? This clown has no idea about public relations and is complaining about earning a salary that the average person will never approach, even after working for 40 - 50 years. What a dumbass. Perhaps if he sold some of his cars or his auto business then he'd be able to feed his family. What a moron.

On Sunday, Sprewell demanded a trade because it was "insulting" — that was his word — that the Wolves offered him a three-year, $21 million contract extension. It prompted him to say, "Why would I want to help them win a title?'

Stern had a spin of his own after hearing Sprewell suggest he might not play his hardest. Stern told reporters Tuesday such talk was "corrosive'' and, lumping Sprewell in with what he described as "a few players who spotlight themselves as being so individualistic that they are threatening not to play as hard as they can,'' the commissioner indicated he would take action against them if they "step over'' the edge.

goose25

Kobe won't fail but his team will. He'll get his points and start scowling and whining at around the All-Star break about having crappy teammates, that is, unless they play Les Nougats each night. Also, there is no freaking way that Kenyon Martin is worth $90 million.

sipark

Can he shoot? No.
Can he score by himself? No.
Can he stay healthy? No.
Can he make his teammates better? No.
Can he lead a team? No.
Can he dominate big men in the west? No.
Can he shoot free throws? No. <---- I find this pathetic for a professional b-ball player.
Can he endorse a product? No.
Can he generate fan interest? No.
Can he be the best player in this team? No.


Ok.. some positive thoughts..
Can he whine about his paycheck? Yes.
Can he get in foul trouble? Yes.
Can he lead the league in flagrant fouls? Yes.
Can he ... mmm...

corbs

Did you see stats from Fakers game? Only two players with more than 8 Field goal Attempts (Kobe & Odom) and only SEVEN assists for the ENTIRE TEAM FOR THE ENTIRE GAME! One guy from Utah had more assists than the entire Lakers team.

I like Andrei Kirilenko alot, kind of reminds me of a Scottie Pippen. Not best scorer, not best anything, but a guy who'll do whatever the team needs on any given night. For example, he finished with 16 pts (5-6 and 6-7), 6 rebs, and 8 Blocked Shots. That's a lot of blocked shots for a Small Forward.

teg_to_bike

K-Mart is not worth 90 Mil.
Boozer is not worth 60ish Mil.
Jamal Crawford is not worth 50ish Mil.
and no one is worth 130 Mil, especially Kobe.

Jeez.. 10 years ago Jordan was getting paid 4 mil a year.

jlukja

He can dunk an alley oop like a motha.

jlukja

Is Shaq worth $30M/yr. Just wondering, cause he thought the Lakers' offer of $28.5/yr. 3 yr. extnsion was not showing him "respect".

sipark

Yeah forgot about that one.. That itself has to be worth like what.. 86 Mil?

goose25

These two players have comparable stats, which one do you think is the better deal for his respective team?

Carlos Boozer stats:

Salary:
2004/05 - $10,967,500 2005/06 - $11,593,816 2006/07 - $11,593,816
2007/08 - $11,593,816 2008/09 - $11,593,817 2009/10 - $12,657,233
Stats with Cleveland Cavaliers
02 - 03 PPG - 10.0 Rebounds - 7.5 Blocks - .62
03 - 04 PPG - 15.5 Rebounds - 15.5 Blocks - .73

Kenyon Martin:

Yearly Salary:

2004/05 - $11,000,000 2005/06 - $10,687,500 2006/07 - $11,875,000

2007/08 - $13,062,500 2008/09 - $14,250,000 2009/10 - $15,437,500

2010/11 - $16,625,000

Previous stats with NJ Nets
00 - 01 PPG - 12.0 Rebounds - 7.40 Blocks - 1.66
01 - 02 PPG - 14.9 Rebounds - 5.30 Blocks - 1.23
02 - 03 PPG - 16.7 Rebounds - 8.30 Blocks - .91
03 - 04 PPG - 16.7 Rebounds - 9.50 Blocks - 1.26

DEI99662

Yeah he was getting paid only $4 million a year. It averaged out to be a little more than $48,000 a game...a little over $1000 a minute in a game.

DEI99662

Yeah he can.

jlukja

Boozer averaged 11.4 rebounds, not 15.5


CAREER AVERAGES
REBOUNDS PER GAME
YEAR TEAM G GS MPG FG% 3P% FT% OFF DEF RPG APG SPG BPG TO PF PPG
02-03 CLE 81 54 25.3 .536 .000 .771 2.50 5.00 7.50 1.3 .73 .62 1.27 2.80 10.0
03-04 CLE 75 75 34.6 .523 .167 .768 3.10 8.40 11.40 2.0 .99 .73 1.79 2.70 15.5
04-05 UTA 1 1 34.0 .769 .000 .700 5.00 6.00 11.00 3.0 .00 .00 .00 1.00 27.0
Career 157 130 29.8 .530 .143 .768 2.80 6.60 9.40 1.6 .85 .67 1.51 2.70 12.7

teg_to_bike

Whew... all these stats are making me dizzy!

jlukja

Yeah, he had the same effect on the Lakers last night.

DEI99662

goose25

Did i say rebounds? I meant to say he looked up in the stands and found a cutie-pie at least 15.5 times per game last year!

goose25

That game was a definite laugher and i fell asleep on it in the second quarter. Here's your team Kobe, have at it

DEI99662

How many wins will the Charlotte Bobcats get this year? My guess is no more than 20 games.

iamhomin

K-Mart, Jamal, Allan, Kurt, Marbury, Vin Baker, PENNY HARDAWAY, are all over paid.

There's so many over paid players in the NBA that it seems normal now.

iamhomin

Kobe, by the way, isn't over paid.

Lets face it Kobe-haters, he's arguably the best player in the NBA, so he should be the highest paid in the NBA.

goose25

He's is a great player, no doubt, but I'd say he's the best perimeter player in the NBA. As far as the best player, i'd say that's either Tim Duncan or Kevin Garnett. Both of those players have the ability to get their teammates involved in the offense and at the defensive ends of the court, are unselfish and have both won MVP trophies. Kobe is definitely in the top 5 but i would be very reluctant to say he's the best player, though he does have that potential.

DEI99662

http://msn.foxsports.com/story/3059082?GT1=5713

DEI99662

IMO, I think Tim Duncan is the best all around player in the league. Kobe is too selfish. I am sure he will eventually show his true colors mid-season.

iamhomin

Well, you're half right and half wrong.

If you mix Kobe with the level of talent KG or TD has on their team, I'm sure his team will excel a lot more.

It's all about chemistry and how the team is managed, and apparently Kobe never played with a good chemistry.

goose25

With the level of talent? What exactly do you mean? Neither of those teams are superbly talented, they each have a superstar and 2 to 3 good players, the same as the Lakers are currently configured. I know it's early in the season, but look at the two games he's played so far, he went against his character and actually dished the ball and got his teammates involved and they won against the Nuggets, the next night, he reverted back to form and scored 38 points and had only 1 assist. and they lost to the Utah Jazz. He's too selfish of a player to ever be considered the best player in the league. It can be said that most of the chemistry problems on the Lakers originated from Kobe Bryant. He's the one who constantly isolated himself from his teammmates and consistently did his own thing, outside the offensive sets. Also, punching a teammate in the face on the bus does wonders for team chemistry.

iamhomin

Minnesota:

KG, Sczerbiak, Spree, Kandi, Cassel, Hassel, Hudson....

Spurs:

Duncan, Ginobli (sp?), Parker, Bowen, Barry, Horry, Nestervic, Rose

Lakers:

Kobe, Odom, Butler, Divac, Atkins, Jones.

Granted, Kobe is a selfish player but so is Allen Iverson. So is Paul Pierce, and saldy Antoine Walker (he's horrible). There are a lot of selfish NBA players with egos bigger than the whole basketball court, but if chemistry fits, it works.

I hate comparing Jordan and Kobe, but Jordan also was a selfish player.

iamhomin

It's always like that. Once the star player gets going individually, the other players don't have enough "confidence" to put up their best game. They shrivel.

Plus Utah's hell of a defensive team. Sloan probably used the strategy of shutting down other players but Kobe in that game.

DEI99662

How do you explain Scottie Pippen then? Without Jordan, Scottie's talents would still be back at Central Arkansas.

iamhomin

What does that have to do with Jordan being selfish?

See, most people think Pippen is nothing without Jordan, but he led them to the conference finals against the Knicks after Jordan's first retirement.

Pippen wasn't a great player, but he was damn good, both defensively and as a leader.

DEI99662

I am not saying Jordan was always unselfish, but compared to Kobe, he is a a saint. As for Pippen being a leader, do you remember that he refused to go back on the court during that Knicks series because the play was for Kukoc? I am not saying that Pippen wasnt a good player, but I dont think he would have been as good of a player without Jordan. Jordan would have won the title without Pippen, maybe not as many, but he would have one at least one.

goose25

PULEEEZZZEEE, dont ever try to make comparisons between Kobe Bryant to Michael Jordan. There is simply no comparison between the two players except in the minds of Kobe apologists. Early in his career, Jordan was selfish because he was surround by a horrible supporting cast and basically needed to do selfish things to keep his team competitive. Once his supporting cast improved and he matured as a leader and as a player, he really toned down his selfish tendencies and became the complete player that we all remember. Also there were countless big games where Jordan set his teammates up for the final shot, bypassing the glory for himself and letting them get some. Those players included: BJ Armstrong, Jim Paxson, Horace Grant, Bill Wennington, Luc Longley and others. How often have you seen selfish ass Kobe give up a shot, any shot, to a teammate? Just because that assclown tries to emulate MJ doesn't mean that he can be compared to him. A better fit would be comparing him to Tracy McGrady, another superstar who was stuck on a team by himself with little help, putting up great numbers but never achieving the level of accomplishment that he should.

goose25

It's sad that a player with such a great career will be remembered for not going back into that game because the shot was not meant for him. He was a good leader, in his own way, but not the type of player who should be the face of a franchise. There was a lot of tension between him and Jordan during the first three-peat, but once Jordan retired and Pippen got a taste of the spotlight by himself, he didn't care for it too much. During the second three-peat, he relinquished the mantle of leadership (as if he had any choice in the matter) and settled in as the second bananna once again.

teg_to_bike

Whoa there! There will be NO Pippen Hating on my clock!

It's sad that people will remember him most as the guy who sat out in the final seconds in a playoff against the Knicks. I will always remember him as the most unselfish player ever to play the game. He was a better leader than Jordan: When Kerr or any of the other guys were not playing well, Jordan would flat out yell at them. Pippen on the other hand would help them out defensively, set up plays for them. I don't think anyone has ever compiled the stat of FG percentage when the ball was passed by a certain player, but I guarantee Kerr's 3 pt percentage was somwhere around 60-65% when the passes were coming from Pip.

He may not have been the most explosive player on the court, but he was the ultimate teammate, and a hell of a defensive player. My fondest Pippen memory was game three of the '98 finals. Pippen was noted as the "one man wrecking crew" that led the bulls defensively in a 98-56ish blowout of the Jazz.

Besides... Pippen got a lot closer to a championship w/o Jordan than Jordan did w/o Pippen

goose25

Pippen's Accomplishments


# Six-time NBA World Champion (1991, 1992, 1993, 1996, 1997 and 1998)
# Name is scattered across the NBA’s all-time leader board: 40th in total points (18,940), fourth in steals (2,307), tied for 16th in steals per game (1.96), 23rd in assists (6,135), 13th in minutes (41,069), 16th in minutes per game (34.9), 32nd in three-point field goals made (978)
# Participated in postseason play in 16 of his 17 NBA seasons, making the playoffs in each of his first 16 seasons
# Second in NBA history with 208 playoff appearances (Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, 237)
# Member of the NBA All-Defensive Team from 1991-2000 (First Team member seven times)
# Selected as one of the 50 Greatest Players in NBA History in 1996
# Seven-time NBA All Star (1990, 1992, 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996 and 1997)
# 1994 All-Star Game MVP
# Made All-NBA seven straight years (1992-1998)
# Two-time Olympic gold medal winner
# Has recorded 20 career triple-doubles, including four in the playoffs
# Ranked atop the all-time All-Star Game leader board in 3FGA with 22 (second), 3FG made with 7 (tied for 4th) and steals with 17 (eighth)
# Career highs of 47 points, 18 rebounds, 15 assists, 9 steals and 5 blocked shots
# Ranked first in Bulls history with 664 three-pointers and 2,031 three-point field goals attempted
# Ranked second in Bulls history in: points (15,123), field goals (5,991), field goal attempts (12,444), free throws attempted (3,576), offensive rebounds (1,687), defensive rebounds (4,039), assists (4,494), steals (1,792), seasons played (12), games played (856) and minutes (30,269)
# Ranked third in Bulls history with 5,726 rebounds and 774 blocked shots

DEI99662

I am not hating, but IMO, Pippen wouldnt be as good as without Jordan.

Pippen had a better supporting cast than Jordan did in Washington, plus Jordan was like 40 when he cameback.

TSX 'R' US

Da Bullz...

Those were the days...

jlukja

OK, lets turn that around then. Would Jordan have been "as good" without Pippen?

DEI99662

Maybe not "as good," but he still would have won a title without Pippen. Maybe not six, but at least one.

iamhomin

He would've been the same player, but in terms of accomplishments, it would've been a lot less.

Every star player needs a right hand, regardless of how great he is.