J.J. VERSUS THE MONSTERS

Is this what the end looks like, punked by J.J. Barea?  His stat line showed 12 points in 17 minutes but the effect was greater, he disrupted our squad like a windup toy on crystal meth.  $1,815,000 versus $91,645,878.  Does anybody know how much it pains me to have a picture of this jerk on my blog?  And I’m gonna have to look at it every day?   That’s just cruel.  I’ll take it down when the season ends and put up something else.  Like blue skies and fluffy clouds.

This unlikeliest of heros drove relentlessly through every defender, threw up those stupid little running floaters that I hate, made ugly faces and finally, in the waning seconds, drew a forearm from Artest that was well-deserved.  Annoying little twit.

The Lakers have one bullet left in the chamber.  Just one.  We will not advance via the triangle, the inside-out game, the half-court sets or any other principal that I’ve butchered all year long.  We only win through fury, by attacking relentlessly, by playing 48 minutes of defense.  Their crowd will be louder than our crowd was, believe it.  We'll need to play better in their gym than they played in ours.  And we’ll probably need Kobe to go into hero-mode sometime around the first-minute mark.

I was watching a TV expert recently, predicting our summer roster moves.  This of course being before the series against Dallas began.  And, it was the easiest analysis in the world, yeah, they’ll keep all the major parts and make a few smart moves here and there.  That was when everybody was still predicting a championship.  If we lose in the second round, it all goes out the window.  Remember what happened after we lost to Detroit?  It wasn’t pretty.  Don’t piss off an old billionaire who likes to gamble.

When it comes down to it, we probably punted the season when we got rid of Sasha. Yup, I said it.  On a primal level, I’m fine with Artest's head-hunting.  Still, the suspension hurts - we can scarcely afford to lose our starting wing-man.  Sasha though?  Different story.  He would have gotten in Barea’s face, would have drawn cheap fouls and would have been grooming his eyebrows at the charity stripe.  Plus, he’s the Machine.

We’ve got a couple days to stew about this and listen to the pundits predict our demise.  Maybe it’ll light a bonfire or two.  I haven't heard whether the villagers have gathered with their pitchforks yet, they may simply be too stunned.  Personally, I’ll accept whatever fate awaits, as long as we leave all our monster-blood on the floor.