The WGOM

The Miami Heat have won the NBA Championship to end the greatest NBA post season I have ever seen. I must say that while I wanted to see the Diesel win his fourth ring, I take no particular delight in seeing Dallas on the short end of the stick. As crazy as he seems to be, Mark Cuban is a breath of fresh air in professional sports. I hope that he can get his team to the mountain.

However, this has to be sweet for the Daddy. It was a "him or me" situation for Shaq in LA and after Kobe "won" the feud, Shaq went to Miami and delivered a championship to South Beach. Meanwhile, the Lakers are still justifying their decision. In some levels, it made sense, I suppose to trade Shaq and keep Kobe. After all, Shaq is much older and he tends to break down. And now, this is Wade's team, although I don't think Wade gets there without Shaq. Meanwhile, what the Lakers never figured out was that Kobe doesn't understand team. He may pass once in a while, but ultimately, it's all about Kobe. It's always been about Kobe. While Shaq is getting fitted for a fourth ring, the last time we saw Kobe, he was quitting on his team in the second half of a game seven blowout against the Suns.

Now, and forevermore, the Lakers franchise will have the Shaq trade as one of the darkest moments in franchise history.

Oh, and one more thing. With the season hanging in the balance, Dirk Nowitski disappeared in the fourth quarter, with only 2 points. Is that a fair thing to say, considering that he had 28 points and 15 rebounds and carried this team all year? Of course it isn't.

I read an article by Scoop Jackson last week that posited that the problem with Kobe is that he's always going to be compared to Michael Jordan and be found lacking. He suggested that if there were no Michael Jordan, we'd be celebrating Kobe Bryant instead of criticizing him. Good try Scoop. No dice.

It's not Michael Jordan that will define Kobe Bryant, it's Shaquille O'Neal. The Lakers and the LA press keep telling themselves that the right choice between Kobe and Shaq was Kobe. The problem is, it should never have come to that. In one of his trademark palaver sessions, Bill Walton made that point last week. He said that Kobe had everything in basketball terms, but he didn't want that. He wanted it to be about him. Bill shook his head as he said it. Damning words from the Big Man. Damning, and accurate.

And so, the Lakers traded O'Neal. Even though he's no longer the Most Dominant Ever, he's responded in Miami by being named 1st team all-NBA each of the past two seasons and is showing in the playoffs why he's still the best big man in the game. As Hubie Brown said, it's amazing how Shaq can simultaneously defer to Dwyane Wade and be the leader of the team. I wonder if Lakers owner Jerry Buss is watching.

The L.A. Times had this beauty this week:

"I thought the deal was fair," said [Pat] Riley, the Heat president and coach, of the July 2004 trade that sent Lamar Odom, Caron Butler and Brian Grant to the Lakers. "Giving up all three of those guys? Dwyane was the one guy that we didn't want to let go. Not that we had a crystal ball, but we felt there was something there that might be better even than what we'd seen."

Those are the words of a man who knows he fleeced his trading partner. Brian Grant and his suffocating contract? Tell me Riley wasn't smiling when he said that.

Update: Miami wins easily and goes up 3-1. I believe Shaq Daddy will be in the finals. Can you dig it?

But, he gets to eat crow.  From his mailbox:

Does an MVP throw in the towel during the second half of a Game 7? I don't know if Kobe was trying to make some kind of statement or what, but that's not what an MVP does. Period.
-- Alex, Provo, Utah

SG: I knew what was happening within four minutes of the start of the third quarter, mainly because I had just watched a similar game: Game 7 of the 1976 Western Conference finals between Golden State and Phoenix. In the first quarter, Phoenix rookie Ricky Sobers started a fight with Warriors star Rick Barry at midcourt; some of the Suns jumped in to break it up, and Barry felt like his teammates hadn't jumped to his defense. At halftime, he probably watched the highlights, confirming his beliefs, so when the second half started, Barry decided not to shoot anymore. It's one of the weirdest games ever, Barry playing hot potato for the entire half, never looking for his own shot, perfectly willing to let his teammates hang themselves to prove a point. The Warriors ended up losing by eight.

Sound familiar? After the third quarter in Game 7, as the Suns pushed their lead to 25 points, I started wondering to myself, "Wait, Kobe's not pulling a Rick Barry, is he?" He was lingering beyond the 3-point line, giving the ball up every time it swing around to him, never even thinking about attacking. And he kept playing like that, and he kept playing like that ... and then the fourth quarter started, and suddenly he was 35-40 feet away from the basket, and the Suns weren't even really paying attention to him anymore. Finally, with four minutes remaining, Phil Jackson yanked him from the game. That was that.

Was Kobe frustrated? Yeah, probably. His team pulled a collective no-show. But how can you not try to save a Game 7? Would MJ have done that? Would Bird have done it? Magic? Anyone? And with a worn-down Nash obviously hampered by an ankle injury, if there was ever a game for Kobe to score 30-plus in a half and save a lost cause, this was it. Was Kobe proving a point to the Lakers' front office, namely, "Get me some freaking help?" Was he proving a point to everyone who criticized him for playing selfishly all season, almost like, "See, this is what happens when I let these losers run the show?" Was he so frustrated with the no-shows of Odom, Brown, Walton and Parker that he wanted nothing to do with them, even though there was 24 minutes of hoops left?

My theory: Kobe acted like the me-first guy on a team that's had winners in a pickup game for over an hour, the guy who hears someone complain that they aren't getting enough touches and thinks to himself, "Wait, these guys have the gall to complain about ME?" So they petulantly stop shooting the rest of the game and walk off the court defiantly when it's over. Anyone who ever played pickup hoops has played with someone like that. And the thing is, you know when it's happening -- after a few trips down the court, everyone stops paying attention to him. Kinda like the Suns.

Do I wish I could take my MVP vote back for him? Yeah, I do. If Kobe truly thought things were hopeless in the second half, he should have punched Raja Bell in the face early in the third quarter and gotten himself kicked out. Not only would he have saved himself the "you quit on your team heat," he would have gotten the satisfaction of punching Raja Bell in the face. No downside there. But he packed it in, proving once and for all that he's not MJ and never will be. So Kobe, stop stealing MJ's patented fist clench after big baskets, and stop pretending that you "tried" in the second half of Game 7, or that you were "just trying to get everyone else involved," because neither of those things were true. You quit. And I wish I had voted for LeBron.