Los Angeles Lakers: Why Ego And Hubris Keep Them From Improving

Kobe Bryant (24) and Dwight Howard (12) were never able to raise the Lakers to expected heights. (Photo by Scott Mecum/Flickr.com)

In the NBA, it’s rare for a team to win without several superstars–or even one, for that matter, just ask Kevin Durant and the Oklahoma City Thunder. So by that notion, the more talent you have, the better your team, right? Not really, because too much of a good thing, even good players, is a bad thing. Case in point, the 2012-13 Los Angeles Lakers.

The Lakers were among the favorites to win the Western Conference and even the NBA Finals. That is, until the season actually began.

The 2012-13 Los Angeles Lakers’ season was marred by a litany of injuries, but it would be pretty naïve to simply attribute the disappointing season to just injuries. That’s me putting it nicely. The egos within the organization from top to bottom was ultimately the main component of their downfall and here are some key figures in the tumultuous season.

Jim Buss

Mike Brown was let go after just five games because his brand of basketball wasn’t sexy enough offensively. Then they brought in Mike D’Antoni, who isn’t exactly the most popular guy, especially considering who was available (cough Phil Jackson cough). And then came the drama.

Yes, when Brown was relieved of his services just five games into the regular season, there were murmurs that the Zen Master, Phil Jackson, would make a return. Turns out it was true, there were talks between the two parties and it was going or so well, until Jackson asked for control over basketball decisions. Translation: “I don’t want Jim Buss dictating what happens.”

Apparently, Jim Buss took it to heart and the Lakers walked, much to the dismay of the Lakers faithful.

Mike D’Antoni

On some level, you’ve got to sympathize with Coach D’Antoni. I mean one can only imagine how he felt when the fans were chanting for the 11 time champion.

It’s not his fault he doesn’t know how to handle his players or utilize the star power he had at his disposal or that he’s incapable of change. Oh, wait.

Mike D’Antoni’s system is all about offense, offense and then more offense. It’s as if he’s never heard of the word “defense.” In his last full season with the New York Knicks, the team ranked 28^th in points allowed per game and his best finish while in Phoenix was 23^rd in the same category.

Note: In Mike D’Antoni’s last full year as the New York Knicks’ coach, the team ranked 28^th in defense and ranked sixth in the Eastern Conference standings. In Mike Woodson’s first full year, the team ranked seventh defensively and New York finished second in the conference.

This year, L.A. ranked just 22^nd in points per game allowed. There’s no two ways about it. That has to change, particularly when he has a three-time Defensive Player of the Year protecting the rim.

His offensive mantra has also got to change. He simply does not have the personnel to implement his system. Unlike in his previous stops in New York and Phoenix, he didn’t have the 3-point game to save him. This year’s Lakers attempted the third-most 3-pointers (24.6 per game) in the regular season, but only converted 35 percent of their outside shots–good enough for 19^th in the Association.

Maybe I’m being a little unfair in terms of his inflexibility. After all, he made a couple of adjustments after Kobe Bryant went down for the season and he was playing through Pau Gasol, which showed glimpses of success as the team went 8-1 in the last nine games of the regular season.

Though the recent news that Dwight Howard felt marginalized by D’Antoni doesn’t do him or the Lakers any favors.

Kobe Bryant vs. Mike D’Antoni

Don’t let the title fool you, when you become coach of the Los Angeles Lakers, there’s a certain hierarchy: There’s owner Jim Buss, general manager Mitch Kupchak, Kobe Bryant and then the head coach.

Kobe Bryant promised the Lakers would make the NBA playoffs and he stayed true to his word… at the cost of his Achilles. (Photo Credit: Keith Allison -Flickr.com)

An example would be the flurry of minutes leading up to the unfortunate Achilles injury that ended Kobe’s season. The majority of the blame has to go to Bryant, who just wouldn’t come out of games, playing at least 41 minutes in the final seven games of the season.

With that said, Mike D’Antoni has to take some responsibility for not keeping his player in check. After all, what do you expect would happen to a 34-year-old in his 17^th NBA season averaging nearly 40 minutes a game for the season?

Though to be fair to D’Antoni, even Phil Jackson struggled with Bryant. At one point he even labelled him as “uncoachable..However, he was never really in control of his star player and I highly doubt Bryant really respects him or trusts him to them to a championship.

D’Antoni certainly didn’t do himself any favors by calling the Mamba “a fan.”

Dwight Howard vs. Kobe Bryant

The team was well below par, players were dropping like flies and I suppose it was just getting a little harder to get along with all the egos in the locker room. Kobe Bryant publicly (not for the first time) attacked his man-child of a teammate. This time, it was Dwight Howard.

Bryant came out and pretty much labelled Howard as soft for not playing through the pain of a torn labrum earlier this year even after he was supposedly medically cleared. Superman responded by saying: “How would he know [the pain I’m in]?” and  “He [Bryant] is not a doctor.”

Dwight Howard Sr. also stepped in to defend his son, criticizing both Kobe Bryant and Mike D’Antoni through an interview with The Atlanta Journal Constitution, saying:

“I told him before he said it publicly, ‘It’s your career. No person can say what you need to do or not do. You can’t worry about what Kobe or anybody else says. Nobody can say what Kobe said — that’s stepping into another man’s shoes. I understand what Kobe was trying to do, but he went about it the wrong way. He’s trying to win a championship. But Dwight has to tell Kobe, ‘I appreciate your opinion, but that doesn’t matter. We’re two men on this team. We need to be reasonable about this.

“The problem is the coach. (D’Antoni) needs to step in and say, ‘You guys have got to be quiet. We’re trying to secure something here. Dwight is probably looking at the coach, thinking, ‘What are you going to do?’ I promise, if that had been Stan Van Gundy, that wouldn’t have happened. (Howard) wouldn’t have been admonished publicly. I think the coach has a lot to do with who controls Kobe’s mouth right now.”

At least they had a sense of humor about the whole thing.

Blame the injuries, the coaching or even the execs but one thing is for sure, the players having a better attitude would have made things a hell of a lot easier. You’d have thought these Los Angeles Lakers would have learned from the failed Gary Payton, Karl Malone, Kobe and Shaq experiment back in 2004.