2001 Kobe maybe most underrated season ever

[ThePhantomCreep]

Kobe's a great player but lets not act that he didn't benefit massively from teams not being able to double team him, because if you did that you-know-who would go to town in the paint like a T-Rex ripping a little lamb apart.

People seriously think Kobe saw no double teams?

It's not like his production dropped on his own. Hell, his best scoring seasons were with Kwame Brown in the paint.

Kobe was constantly breaking defenses down with his dribble penetration and fed Shaq plenty of easy baskets because of it. They both benefited. Hell, the famous alley-oop to Shaq only happened because Grant left him unguarded to stop Kobe's drive.

[The-Legend-24]

01 Frobe had a better post season than Bran has so far. And against WAYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY better competition.

[Inferno]

01 Frobe had a better post season than Bran has so far. And against WAYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY better competition.

[Artillery]

01 Frobe had a better post season than Bran has so far. And against WAYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY better competition.

lol at better competition.

The Jailblazers - the worst behaved team in professional sports history. They had more locker room issues than all the other teams in the NBA combined.

A Kings team that relied on ball movement but had one of the worst point guards in NBA history running their offense(Jason Williams). No coincidence they got much better a year later when they replaced that moron with a competent point guard in Bibby.

The 2001 Spurs - a one-man team with one of the worst backcourts in SA history. Hilariously bad wing rotation. Old, undersized has-beens that were injured(Derek Anderson) or had medical conditions(Sean Elliott battling kidney disease). None of these guys would even be good enough to be benchers on the 2014 Spurs.

And then you have a typical inefficient Finals performance for Kirby, relying on big daddy to do most of the heavy lifting(like in every Final he played in with Shaq).

[The-Legend-24]

lol at better competition.

The Jailblazers - the worst behaved team in professional sports history. They had more locker room issues than all the other teams in the NBA combined.

A Kings team that relied on ball movement but had one of the worst point guards in NBA history running their offense(Jason Williams). No coincidence they got much better a year later when they replaced that moron with a competent point guard in Bibby.

The 2001 Spurs - a one-man team with one of the worst backcourts in SA history. Hilariously bad wing rotation. Old, undersized has-beens that were injured(Derek Anderson) or had medical conditions(Sean Elliott battling kidney disease). None of these guys would even be good enough to be benchers on the 2014 Spurs.

And then you have a typical inefficient Finals performance for Kirby, relying on big daddy to do most of the heavy lifting(like in every Final he played in with Shaq).

You're right. Bobcats, old ass Nets, and the Pacers >

[ThePhantomCreep]

You're right. Bobcats, old ass Nets, and the Pacers >

Compared to the Blazers (50 wins), Kings (55 wins) and Spurs (58 wins). That "one man team" had the best record in the NBA and the series was widely considered the real NBA Finals.

The 2001 Lakers best as many 50 win teams as the Heat in their four Final runs combined.

Kobe-haters are idiots. All of them.

[GimmeThat]

I'm pretty sure Kobe/Shaq made all of the players who played with them worse.

Just look at their stats.

Mama, there goes that TEAM

[ImKobe]

Kobe led the Playoffs in WS and had a .260 WS/48 in the POs, same as Shaq. Put up 33/7/7 in the WCF, b2b 45+ pt 10+ reb games on the road against the Kings and the Spurs, nuff said.

[allball]

Compared to the Blazers (50 wins), Kings (55 wins) and Spurs (58 wins). That "one man team" had the best record in the NBA and the series was widely considered the real NBA Finals.

The 2001 Lakers best as many 50 win teams as the Heat in their four Final runs combined.

Kobe-haters are idiots. All of them.

Kobe's performance against Sacramento and San Antonio was legendary that year. didn't have the greatest finals on offense but Philly was a tough Larry Brown coached defensive team. He still held his own for such a young player and his defense was on point.

[STATUTORY]

Kobe's performance against Sacramento and San Antonio was legendary that year. didn't have the greatest finals on offense but Philly was a tough Larry Brown coached defensive team. He still held his own for such a young player and his defense was on point.

the real finals were always the WCF in those years because the east was such a joke. and it was always Kobe that carried the lakers in those series

[Ne 1]

Kobe's performance against Sacramento and San Antonio was legendary that year. didn't have the greatest finals on offense but Philly was a tough Larry Brown coached defensive team. He still held his own for such a young player and his defense was on point.

2001 definitely wasn't a bad Finals for Kobe. He struggled in the game 1 loss, but he still had a solid all around series despite that, particularly after game 1, and the Lakers won in a 5 game backdoor sweep of course. In the 4 straight wins he averaged 27/9/6. Not a bad series at all, particularly against a defensive powerhouse like Larry Brown's 2001 Sixers. (#5 ranked defense and #1 ranked after the Mutumbo trade in February)
He contributed on both ends of the court, and had a few triple double type games. 31/8/6/2/2 in Game 2 to get the Lakers back on track and prevent an 0-2 deficit and also, his Game 3, he had a memorable streak, I think in the 3rd quarter, when he got hot and sank like 6 or 7 baskets without a miss, most from about 18 feet, making the traditionally tough Philly fans go "ooh". Not to mention the Sixers had strong, stifling perimeter defenders like Aaron McKie, Eric Snow and Raja Bell to guard him and Defensive Player of the Year Mutombo manning the paint.

[Rocketswin2013]

You don't understand, and I'm not surprised.

Pau was doing for the Lakers at that time what the Spurs big men are doing for them right now. Running them with high precision, like a well oiled machine. Look at where the Spurs are right now, without anyone on their team being a chucker like Kobe.

If you go back and watch both the ESPN and TNT crews during those final runs, every game they were saying "I don't know why the Lakers don't just throw the ball inside more, nobody can match up with their twin towers (pau and bynum) and their interior passing is great with Pau and Odom."

Kobe was trying to hog all the credit, take the iso, hog all the shots, be selfish... basically just doin Kobe. The reason they were WINNING is because of how smoothly Pau was working the offense from the paint, not to mention their bench was far better than stans like to pretend it was.

Imagine if you put Kobe on this Spurs team. Would they be "twice as good" as they are now? No, they'd probably be worse. Because he's a chucker who doens't play good basketball. You probably don't think anyone on the Spurs is any good because they aren't scoring 30 points a game. That's your understanding of basketball. Pau was playing at a higher level than anyone on the Spurs currently and it wasn't about SCORING the ball it was about team offense. He was legitimately making other guys better while Kobe was trying to show off against terrible defensive teams like the suns and jazz, then getting exposed against good ones like the Celtics.


Kobrick the most overrated player in league history

[Rubio2Gasol]

Specifically 01, it was like, you saw him grow on the court every game. After all the shit that happened that season w/ Shaw and the team wanting to.ostracise the kid, it was amazing.

[Ne 1]

the real finals were always the WCF in those years because the east was such a joke. and it was always Kobe that carried the lakers in those series

Well the 2000 Blazers were better than the Pacers, but Shaq was the MVP of that series, although Kobe came up huge in Game 7. 2001, Kobe was the MVP of the Spurs series in the WCF, but I'm not so sure I'd call that series the "real Finals" considering the Lakers blew out the Spurs in about every game and swept them. The Sixers actually were probably the stiffest competition they faced in the playoffs that year considering they stole game 1 and kept a couple of the games close iirc, the 2002 WCF vs Kings you can say was the "real Finals", but still l'd say Shaq was the MVP of that series, but after going back and watching that series again it was actually closer than the stats say. Kobe was just as important as Shaq in the wins but Shaq played better in the losses and Kobe had some awful shooting nights in the losses.

[riseagainst]

lol at better competition.

The Jailblazers - the worst behaved team in professional sports history. They had more locker room issues than all the other teams in the NBA combined.

A Kings team that relied on ball movement but had one of the worst point guards in NBA history running their offense(Jason Williams). No coincidence they got much better a year later when they replaced that moron with a competent point guard in Bibby.

The 2001 Spurs - a one-man team with one of the worst backcourts in SA history. Hilariously bad wing rotation. Old, undersized has-beens that were injured(Derek Anderson) or had medical conditions(Sean Elliott battling kidney disease). None of these guys would even be good enough to be benchers on the 2014 Spurs.

And then you have a typical inefficient Finals performance for Kirby, relying on big daddy to do most of the heavy lifting(like in every Final he played in with Shaq).

Those 3 teams are better than any team the Heat faced in the East. Be objective, maybe all the lebron c()m in your eyes are preventing you to see things objectively.