Tomorrow is day 1, game 1 for the Lakers in their quest to defend the title. I am starting this post as I am a big Lakers fan (my favorite Lakers player is Magic, not Kobe, by the way).

We play the Clippers on TNT, and news is out that Blake Griffin may miss this game due to a knee injury .... hmmmm, curse of the Clippers isn't looking good for Griffin

Once the Lakers build on a lead, they will use their bench more, so it's a good guess that the Lakers will win by at least 10.  I won't be surprised if the Lakers win by less than 10 points, once guys like Kobe, Gasol and Artest take a breather on the bench.  And the Clippers can't be that bad......

Lakers won by 7? I'm surprised it realyl wasn't 10 or so. First quarter Lakers were killing the Clippers.

 Lakers first game was a bit of a downer once I found out that Blake Griffin was going to miss the next 6 or so weeks due to knee injury.

Today, Mavericks come into town, fresh off their surprising loss to Washington AT Dallas -- Cuban must be furious, lol.

On another note, I am shocked that the Cavs are not only 0-2, but have just played HORRIBLE. Sure, it's not a big deal to lose to the Celtics.

But losing to the Raptors? Yes, it was the second game of a back-to-back, and yes, it was in Toronto ....but, wow, just horrible offense.

It's Lebron, and everyone else hide

The problem with Cleveland is that Shaq really doesn't fit the Cavs style of play.  Sure he's a big body, but as the first two games show (especially against the Raptors) he hasn't helped the team win.  Notice that against the Raptors, when Shaq was on the court, the Raptors were beating up on the Cavs.  But when Shaq was on the bench, the Cavs made the game really close.  Then Shaq came back on the court and the Raptors finished off the Cavs.  Shaq is good, but I don't believe he's the one that will help the Cavs this year.  Now Boston is looking really good.

Man, did hte Mavs put a beating on the Lakers.  Dirk was being Dirk, just awesome.  Jason Terry killedfor the cuase as well. 

Shaq doesn't have the speed that he had many years ago, as he did put on more weight (muscle?).  I watched the Raptors game against the Cavs and Shaq was good when he was under the basket, but he couldn't catch up with the rest of his team when he was at one end of the court and had to run back to the other side of the court.  When Shaq got the ball, he either missed or was fouled.  And still wasn't effective on the free throw line.  I guess all that free throw practice didn't pay off since 1992.  I would have thought at least a double-double from Shaq, but he sat on the bench most of the time.

I give Cleveland credit for winning the last two games, but they do need a pure point guard that can help LeBron.  It's almost every game that LeBron had to be the one that gets the ball to his teammates and he's almost averaging a triple double a game.  I thought that's why Shaq was there to grab those rebounds, and Mo Williams for the assists. 

 Mavs pretty much kicked the stuffing out of the Lakers last Friday..... time to move on to the Hawks tonight.

As for Shaq -- he never cared much about conditioning early in his career to middle of his career....now, he cares.

but, it's too late.

he's slow; he doesn't have much of a post-up game ---- barreling over smaller-size players is not considered having a post-up game, can't make the 8-10 foot shots, and his free throw shooting is as atrocious as ever.

so sad that he didn't have the dedication of a Hakeem Olajuwon, Tim Duncan, or, going back a couple of decades -- Kareem Abdul-Jabbar

 a decent game by the Lakers, with Kobe going for 41 points, 15-29 in FG.

Game was decided by a 4-minute stretch in the 3rd quarter when Lakers scored 18 straight points. Without that, Hawks actually played a pretty good game.

Joe Johnson had a great 1st quarter and half of 2nd quarter, but then faded away.

Also, Lakers didn't offer Farmar or Morrison a new contract, making them unrestricted free agents (meaning Lakers could match any offer these 2 get from other teams).

I say we let go of Farmar at the end of the year -- a terrible defense player, and not that great on offense. Instead, keep Shannon Brown - a better, more athletic offense and defensive player.

 As for Morrison, he hasn't been used this year for more than just a couple of minutes. He'll have to take a massive pay cut from his $5.2M/year. And I don't think he'll go for it. Right now, Morrison is nothing more than a minimum wage player. He can barely shoot, can't play defense.

The win against the Hawks was really much needed as Atlanta has the players to always compete.  Kobe had a great game, and hopefully the loss against Dallas will wake them up.  The same wakeup call that the Cavs needed when they lost the Raptors.

Boston is still on a roll.

 right now, if the season were to end, Boston is my favorite to win it all, especially with news out that Pau Gasol possibly has a torn hamstring after an ultrasound was performed.

I have to say that Boston is playing tremendous ball....

but, it's still early in the season, needless to say

I agree that it's still early in the season.  I can't believe that New Orleans is starting to struggle despite Chris Paul and Okafor playing well.  Hopefully this team can turn it around.

 Stan - I agree with you regarding New Orleans

They got a great point guard in Paul, a decent shooter in West, a fairly decent big man in Okafor. They even got Posey (who played great for the Celtics in their title run 2 years ago).

but, of their 3 losses, 2 were NBA title contenders San Antonio and Boston, not to mention playing in the opponent's building.

However, the Hornets can't afford losses to teams like New York.

You gotta beat up on the little guys when you play in the Western Conference, where losses to Spurs, Lakers, and Nuggets are nearly inevitable. Not to mention dealing with the Magic, Cavs, and Celtics in the East. Have to beat up on bad teams to make up for this.

I didn't realize until I watched the score results that Nowitzki scored 24 points in the 4th quarter alone?  I thought he scored 24 points in the game, but 4th quarter?  Wow, that was amazing.

Dallas looks pretty tough, but had Nowitzki not scored that many points, it was looking like a Dallas loss as Utah was playing tough.  The Mavs were fortunate that Utah didn't double up on Nowitzki when he was scoring like crazy or at least score in the last 3 minutes.

Still impressive stat.

 Stan - while Nowitzki may do well in regular season, he has shown that he can be stopped dead cold.

Shooters can be stopped.

but players who can shoot from the outside, dribble drive and penetrate inside for 2-6 footers (aka Kobe, Lebron, Wade), these are the ones who lead their teams to NBA titles. You can't stop them because they'll hurt you in many ways.

I realized the Mavs beat the Lakers on the Lakers' home court....but, I would prefer to play the Mavs in a 7-game series, than to play the Spurs or Nuggets

I agree with you that Nowitzki can be stopped on any given night.  Case in point after he scored 40, the next game, he wasn't close to scoring that many points.  He's a big man that many people would like on their team, but I agree that it's guys like Wade, LeBron, Chris Paul, Steve Nash, etc.... that can carry a team to a championship (well only Wade did).

Still early in the season.