The REFS and the magic strike again

Accountability, that's the word of the day. Sadly, I continue to watch Laker games and can't help but feel infuriated and ripped off by the 3 smallest assholes on the court. In case you didn't notice the title, I'm talking about the refs. WTF is going on that the referees feel the need to screw the Lakers over at nearly every chance they get?

Sure, being a ref is not the easiest job and there are always going to be missed calls and errors but it's getting to the point now where I dont even want to watch the games because I know that if the lakers don't completely destroy a team, the refs will probably destroy them.

There are always going to be those tough calls that could be easily and honestly missed but where is the consistency? One would think that since the lakers can be consistently victimized by bad calls throughout whole games that just as often they would get the benefit of some bad calls.

I hate to say it but I'm at the point where I would like to see the opposition get screwed by little whistle-blowing nazis every time they meet the Lakers.
All I'm really asking for is fairness and consistnecy. It's a sad day when myself, a die-hard Lakers fan could referee a Laker game more fairly.

Where's the accountability? I know that there are people whose jobs are to review all the calls made by all the refs but do they actually do anything? I've never once heard of a ref getting fired for suspicious, or neglegent conduct(obviously besides that moron Tim Donaghy, who was cought gambling on games that he worked)

Tim Donaghy is a prime example of what could possibly happen when some little jerk with a whistle has too much power. Was he just the tip of the iceberg? Who knows, but something is going on here. Maybe its just hatred for particular teams, maybe it's betting, or maybe there is some form of sydrome that seems to impair the vision of referees 4 feet away from a player like Pau Gasol getting hit on the arm by the huge hand of Dwight Howard. Now unless Dwight's hands (and ELBOS) are visible only by t.v. I'd say somone has one of those problems listed above. It is somewhat magical how that same ref that goes blind when the lakers had the ball can suddenly view the most minute of touches when Orlando had the ball.

I can't even count the amount of times I have seen Gasol or Kobe get hammered with no whistle only to send a player on the opposing team to the line for a weak foul or no foul at all.

The NBA needs to make some friggin changes. Maybe do like the NFL and give the coaches a few challenges to use when they see fit. Or some limited instant replay. I hate anything that slows down the game too much but I am sick and tired of seeing teams getting shafted by one or many bad calls.

I guess the Lakers just have to step their game up and stomp teams so badly that the refs can't determine the outcome. In the end, things will probably never change, unless it starts to loose money for the league. As I type this line, the replay airs on the news and is over as soon as it began, if only karma worked that fast.

I just hope that the Lakers and the refs do a better job when they meet Boston or whoever it might be in the Finals(I'm still pissed about games 1 and 2 last year).

Lamar Odom : Injury Update

It looks like there might be a silver lining in what appeared to be an ominous black cloud looming over the Lakers. Yet another Laker player suffured an injury during last nights 116-105 loss to the Hornets.

Lamar was examined today by the Lakers physician Dr. Steve Lombardo and MRI results show a bone bruise to the knee which is relatively good news as opposed to the previous inclination that it was a hyper-extension of the knee.

Lamar is listed as day to day and will not play in tonight's road game against the Warriors, who might prove to be a tough matchup for a back to back game considering their fast paced offense.

Hopefully the Lakers will do what they didn't last night and power the ball into Gasol and Bynum.

Analysis: Hornets prove to be worthy adversary for Lakers

By Dave McMenamin, NBA.com

LOS ANGELES -- The Hornets got their third shot to audition for the role of the Western Conference's supporting lead. This time, New Orleans came away with the part after a 116-105 victory over the Lakers on Tuesday night at Staples Center.

"I thought over there they probably felt that we couldn't beat them and I thought we had to try to prove a point to not only them, but to ourselves," Hornets coach Byron Scott said.
Not that you can blame Los Angeles for that arrogant line of thinking after it went into the Big Easy twice already this season and rode big early leads to two easy victories.

Counting those wins, L.A. was 19-1 against the West this season, having made quick work of Denver, Phoenix and Portland twice apiece and Dallas, Houston and Utah once each.
It was starting to look like the Lakers' only competition this season in the West would be the challenges that the 14 guys in purple and gold presented each other in practice.
Now they're 19-2 in the conference and maybe, just maybe, a worthy No. 2 has emerged.

"We try to tell our guys it's not a statement game, it's just a game," Scott said. "If we win the game we're still second best in the West right now, if we lose the game we're still second best, so really there was no pressure."
Sure, if the Hornets lost they would still have the second-best record in the West, but an 0-3 mark instead of a 1-2 showing against the Lakers would put New Orleans light years away from L.A., if only from a psychological standpoint.

During a stoppage of play in the first quarter, Chris Paul chatted to Jason Segal of Forgetting Sarah Marshall fame and went on to play like he had forgotten all about those previous two home losses to the Lakers.
Paul's 32 points, 15 assists and zero turnovers and David West's career-high 40 points and 11 rebounds might have been the lines that sealed it. But to be the team that's going to take the Lakers toe-to-toe when the rest of the conference has looked like not-quite-ready-for-prime-time players, it takes more than two guys.

"Their two All-Stars are going to do what they have to do, but they have complementary players around them that allow them to do what they do," said Kobe Bryant after his 39-point effort went to waste because of the Hornets' 22-6 run to finish the game.

New Orleans is fully equipped to contend with L.A. -- or any other team in the conference. From the transcendent star in Paul who finished second to Bryant in last season's MVP race; to the All-Star sidekick in West, whose 15 points in the fourth managed to somehow out-sparkle Kobe's 20 in the third; to the token feisty defender and the oop-end of the best alley-oop going these days in Tyson Chandler; to the guys who make the Hornets the third most accurate team (39.1 percent) from three in Peja Stojakovic and Rasual Butler; to the savvy ring-wearing vets in James Posey and Antonio Daniels. The pieces are there. Sure, they are thin in the depth department with their bargain-basement back-up big men bunch of Melvin Ely, Sean Marks and Hilton Armstrong. But even the Lakers' talent pool isn't looking quite as bottomless as it used to.

The recent rash of injuries -- including Jordan Farmar's torn lateral meniscus in his left knee, Luke Walton's sesamoiditis in his right foot and Lamar Odom's hyper extended right knee -- have transformed the Lakers' Bench Mob into the Bench Maladies.

The Hornets might not have started the season as sharp as last year when they snuck up on the league to the tune of 56 wins (the second-best record in the conference) and lost an epic seven-game series with San Antonio in the second round of the playoffs, but Lakers coach Phil Jackson still thinks they're a group that his team has to watch out for.
"I'm anticipating them somewhere in the [conference] semis or in the conference [finals]," Jackson said.

Los Angeles (27-6) was put on notice by New Orleans (21-10) and there's one more team in the conference the Lakers have to worry about: those perennial Spurs.

San Antonio (23-11) takes the casting couch against L.A. on Jan. 14 and will get its first chance to be the team to write in another main character into the West's script for this season.
"We know we're going to be chasing them the rest of the year," West said.
Before Tuesday, it wasn't much of a chase. But the Hornets just made their scene-stealing debut and the Western Conference should be real interesting until the end credits.

Luke Walton to miss 2 weeks with foot injury

Luke Walton, the recently starting small forward for the Lakers is back out of the lineup with sesamoiditis, an inflamation of two smal bones behind the big toe.

Walton should be out for at least two weeks while former starter Vladimir Radmanovic gets the chance to remind Phil Jackson why he was picked to be the initial starter.

Although Vladimir did not start in last nights game against Portland , he came in following Ariza and scored 16 points in 18 minutes.

It doesn't take a genius to figure out Vlad's role in the starting line-up, he's there to stretch the floor for the 2 bigs and Kobe, but he really needs to display a consistent work ethic while on the floor, particularly on the defensive end. The guy can sometimes show some very tough and energized play and then seem to disappear.

I like that Ariza was the starter in last nights game despite the fact that I think he's a better fit coming off the bench because competetion usually breeds tougher and more determined play.