Official Whine, Moan, Complain Thread 19/20-CLOSED "WE CHAMPS!"

Sat court side tonight, awesome experience but the lakers effort ruined it a bit. Few things.
-Lebron was talking sh** to Kuzma the entire game. Nothing crazy, but def riding him
-When kuzma got hurt NOBODY from the lakers came over to help, in fact they could care less.
Patrick freaking beverly (even zu came of the bench to check on him) came over to check on him. Then some lakers walked over.
-The play where hart got the block but nobody else ran back to help was terrible
-The Clippers were talking a TON of sh** to lebron. Nobody is scared of him like they were of kobe
(captain obvious over here i know)
-I talked to Ashley brewer and Im in love...lol
-Lebron literally plays no defense. Its more evident courtside

 

Shut everyone down, call up Bonga, get the best pick possible.

 

yeah the last several years have just been painful to watch

at least during the 90s you had guys like van exel, ceballos, jones, divac, campbell, etc who made the team fun to watch and they were actually competitive. same with the couple down seasons in the mid 2000s where you had kobe playing at a ridiculous level

the last several years have just been downright atrocious. no fun at all. there's been zero commitment to defense for years now with this team and they still haven't addressed it. there was a glaring hole in the shooting department and magic/rob failed to address that. i know getting lebron was huge after years of striking out on big name FAs but when you have such major issues like defense, no shooting, and a coach who doesn't know what he's doing, you get what we're seeing right now

i'm tuning out for the rest of the season. i wish they'd just shut lebron down and tank but no way he'd let that happen. looks like we have to wait yet another season to hope this team starts making its way back to the top

 

Team plays with 0 heart or fire. Disappointing to watch. Despite injuries and poor roster construction, the team had a lot more potential than what this season ended up being. I hope they come back with some renewed fire.

 

We have an inexperienced front office...Dumb and Dumber part 2 is not better than Dumb and Dumber part 1 (Kupcrap and Jim)

 

Why don't these guys lace their shoes tight before they go out there and step out of them or roll their ankles?

 

I'd be curious to hear what exactly LeBron was saying to Kuzma? And what the Clippers said to LeBron... just for the lols

 

I think this is a little revisionist tbh. Mitch was actually a very overrated GM by our fan base. Our organization has been disappointing for a lot longer than most people realize, but we were very fortunate to have a top 5 all time player in Kobe, and one lucky trade for Pau, to cover it up.

I'm going to start at some very big errors he made, going all the way back to his first major move.

1. Traded Shaq for peanuts. No meaningful young assets or picks other than Odom, who we all know underperformed till 2011. No all star or potential all star talent.
2. Traded away Caron Butler, who soon became an all star, for Kwame Brown.
3. Signed guys to very long contracts with little to back it up. Remember Luke Walton's wonderful deal?
4. Wasted most of Kobe's best years, and refused to get good players and instead was trying to hoard cap space for 2010. Remember the 2010 cap plan we were all talking about way back then? Most seem to forget. It took Kobe literally demanding a trade for a fire to be lit under the FO's a** and for them to abandon the plan in place of acquiring a star (the Jermaine O'Neal and Garnett rumors, then eventually Gasol).
5. Traded away multiple draft picks for cash just to be cheap. Patrick Beverly was one of these trades, btw. Most didn't notice because those were during our contending years.
6. Got no value for the Vujacic trade exception when we desperately needed the help. Instead let it expire to save money.
7. Hired Mike Brown to save money.
8. Fired most of our staff during the 2011 lockout, and refused to rehire them after it was over. Ever since then, our training staff has sucked and we've had major injuries to our guys pretty much every year. Don't forget this.
9. Gave away way too much for a 40 year old Nash (yes there is hindsight involved here, I know)
10. Hired a misfit in Mike D'Antoni instead of Phil Jackson. Definitely saving $$ involved here too
11. Got no value for Pau and let him walk instead. Again, cheap.
12. Of course, signed Mozgov and Deng to those ridiculous deals.

I didn't even get into a lot of the questionable draft selections. As well as the fact that he REFUSED to adapt to the times and was reportedly the only GM who wouldn't contact FAs before July 1st when everyone else was clearly doing it. Just too old school there. Of course the first call he made that one July 1st was to... you guessed it! Mozgov.

I know, there were a few good moves, like the Howard trade (at the time) and the vetoed CP3 deal. But honestly, you can see we've been making poor, cost saving decisions for years now. It's just that Phil, Kobe, and Pau pretty much overshadowed that and helped us win. That bad pattern though, has continued to today, when without Kobe it's much more evident that we are not the same organization we were in the 90s. It wasn't just a one time thing with Mozgov and Deng. It's been going on since the Shaq trade, and it's clear that after Jerry West left and Jerry Buss took his hands off, things went south real quick.

 

Let's add some context here. 2016 was the first time in Kupchak's entire 15 year career as GM that he had such a percentage of cap space to play with (and btw Malone and Payton signings are attributed to personal decisions by those players to come over for peanuts, not Mitch's deal at all' just to get that out of the way) and with his big first shot to show us what he can do in FA, he got Moz/Deng.

One can say ownership is responsible for everything but let's be real; the fact is the GM IS responsible for FA and it is a standard duty of that position. It may be the coach in college but in the NBA the GM is responsible for players and contracts by definition of the job. That said, Kupchak has all the personality and charisma of a cardboard box. He's a terrible closer. I am not going to over-pump Maj/Rob here but I will give them at least until this summer to get us 2 FAs and a suitable support cast. They are not behind schedule, getting a second FA like AD @ the deadline was always a pipe dream given the logistics and players. Maybe LBJ would have come here with Kupchak here, it's possible as he didn't need to be further sold on the Lakers more than he had sold himself already. Whether he would have faith in Mitch for future FA signings though....

People are all over Magig right now. The fact is this crew they assembled was working when we were healthy. The Zu move was a huh? but we probably could not resign him this summer anyways with current plans in place and it's hard to get more than a 2nd or a serviceable bench player in those circumstances. As for PG and we didn't offer enough, we don't know that, the Pacers hate us and tagged us with the tampering allegations. I don't think they would have dealt with us considering that and over the deal they got. For me, Magic and Rob need to show their real skills this summer, to date, they don't deserve to be persecuted.

 

This team as constructed is just a bag of mixed marbles. Nothing comes together and work. And as a fan I'm frustrated we didn't keep forcing the effort to make this team better. It's clear we need help in many areas if we want a championship right now.

I think our FO thought just going out and getting LeBron will a few reliable pieces was enough.

 

This team, flaws and all, would have made the playoffs with better coaching.

 

you could make a comparable list for just about any gm save jerry west (whom we refused to bring back aboard). i could make a longer, worse one for daryl morey if i had ten more minutes.

also, points 1 and 2 contradict each other. shaq held us over a barrel. i didn't like that trade, but the only huge issue in retrospect was taking brian grant's contract instead of insisting they find a third team to provide an expiring. prime odom and about to be prime caron butler is a better haul than most superstars fetch now.

you're also mad about hoarding cap space in what seems to be a defense of the current FO (at least relative to the previous).

he traded away picks but also hit on some late ones over the years.

mitch made a lot of mistakes, but brushing the pau deal, the howard deal, and the chris paul deal under the rug is kinda silly. it's like saying that isiah thomas guy won those two titles, but i mean, he also lost a lot, had a relatively short prime, and was s*** after he tore his achilles. people forget that stuff. for a reason.

i don't think lakers fans are fair to mitch due to mozdeng, which was awful (i'd argue the mikes were almost as bad, but those are probably on jim as much as mitch). he was solid but not spectacular. no need to bring up letting patrick beverly walk 12 years ago (he spent time overseas before anyone picked him up again, btw, so it's not like it was obvious he was useful) to throw shade.

 

You know, I should be sad/mad, but I'm not. The incompetence of this organization has numbed me of those emotions. The Lakers suck so bad that it's not even frustrating anymore, it's the new normal. Genuinely starting to believe this franchise died when Dr. Buss did...

 

This has been in the back of my head for a minute. Dr. Buss is so missed right now.

 

*sigh*

 

Ownership is critical. Anyone read that piece on the suns? Ever read anything on the knicks? Know the ins and outs of why Dallas has been s*** since 2011? Ownership,

 

I also just think about how great the organization was from top to bottom. Dr. Buss to Jerry West to Riley and then later to Phil.

We really hit the jackpot on all levels when it came to the front office and the sidelines. Much of that was Dr. Buss and his awesome leadership but still.

That's really tough to replicate. As frustrated as I've been and as many criticisms as I've laid out there, I think this kind of funk for the franchise was somewhat inevitable at some point given all that we've lost on every level including the players.