Volume 67, Issue 4  

“Beat L.A.” – Are the Kings Ready?

by Alexander Chester

Much like the American League behind the juggernaut New York Yankees, the NBA in recent seasons has been a one-sided affair.  The West is so much better than the East that it is possible that no Eastern Conference team would even make the playoffs in the Western Conference.  But beyond depth, the true disparity between East and West can be found in the Staples Center, where the best two players in the league play together on a nightly basis, to the frustration of every other team in basketball.

Shaquille O’Neal and Kobe Bryant have been the two greatest players in the world for a couple of years, and it is difficult to comprehend how any other team could compete with the Los Angeles Lakers for that reason alone.  There is no big man that can do so much as contain Shaq for even half a game.  Kobe, while less dominant, is undisputedly the game’s premier swingman – when he is on one can’t help but see Michael Jordan in his prime.

However, in addition to Shaq and Kobe, the rest of the game’s top players are also in the West – specifically the big men.  Tim Duncan, Kevin Garnett, Chris Webber, and Dirk Nowitzki would easily lead any team in the East to the Finals every year.  But the nightly toll of playing against each other, not to mention Karl Malone, Elton Brand, Pau Gasol, and even Shawn Marion, has meant that each of these competitors is usually too exhausted come playoff time to pose a real threat to the Lakers.  Anyone who witnessed Webber’s 45% free throw shooting in the Conference Finals (he shot 75% during the season) – not to mention his disappearance at the end of Game Seven – understands this.

So, entering the 2002-03 season, it seems difficult to predict anything but a Lakers’ four-peat.  But such a prediction would ignore the strange happenings around the sports world in the past year.  The Yankees’ run came to an end in shocking fashion at the hands of the Anaheim Angels (who?).  The St. Louis Rams were shocked at the end of Super Bowl XXXVI, then started this season 0-5.  It seems as if their dynasty is coming to an end.

The Lakers barely survived the Kings last season, and then Sacramento went out and signed Keon Clark, another big man to try to handle Shaq down low.  It seems like the Kings have finally reached the point where they are ready to dethrone the Lakers and become NBA Champions.

In the Eastern Conference, the who-gets-to-lose-in-the-Finals contest will be a close one.  The conference has been a virtual crapshoot since Michael Jordan retired (for the second time), with New Jersey, Philadelphia, Indiana, and New York sneaking into the Finals before being quickly deposed.  This season more unpredictability can be expected, with the new-look New Orleans Hornets making it out of the East behind top-ten player Baron Davis.  The Hornets won’t take Sacramento past five games, but at least it will be a change of pace in both conferences, where exciting postseasons won’t have to conclude with another Lakers ring-fitting ceremony.

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