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Kobe Bryant led the L.A. Lakers to their first NBA title without Shaquille O’Neal this past summer, and the Lakers are favored to ruin Shaq and LeBron’s holiday when the Cleveland Cavaliers visit Staples Center on Christmas Day. Tip off is at 5 p.m. on ABC.
With just a couple weeks into the NBA season, the Lakers hold a league-best 23-4 record with Bryant, the NBA Finals MVP, averaging 29.3 points — second to Denver Nugget forward Carmelo Anthony’s league-best 30.3 points per game.

All eyes are going to be on the matchup between Kobe and LeBron James, the NBA MVP last season.
LeBron is averaging 28.8 points, third-best in the league, for the Cavs, who the Orlando Magic beat in the Eastern Conference Finals last summer to play the Lakers for the NBA championship.

By Teneshia LaFaye
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Kobe Bryant can opt out of the final year of his contract this summer and go help LeBron James and his former Lakers teammate Shaquille O’Neal to win Cleveland’s first NBA title.
But it’s very unlikely. Kobe is coming off an NBA Finals MVP performance and wouldn’t stoop to being a supporting player for league MVP King James. Plus, Kobe enjoys running the Lake Show too much.


However, two years ago, it was a different story.
Kobe hoped to be traded over to the L.A. Clippers or the Chicago Bulls in May 2007 because he was unhappy with the direction the Lakers were headed after a first-round playoff exit for the second consecutive season. Three years earlier, the Lakers’ front office traded Shaq to Miami and he went on to win his first NBA championship without Kobe.

Kobe felt duped after signing a new contract with the understanding that L.A.’s management would bring in marquee players to immediately put the Lakers back in contention for an NBA title, their first since Kobe and Shaq paired up for a three-peat from 2000-2002.
But when Kobe found out that the Lakers were actually rebuilding, he went to the national airwaves and expressed his desire to be traded on two national radio shows unless former GM Jerry West returned and the roster was upgraded to put the team in title contention.
It’s a good thing for Kobe the Lakers ignored his trade demands. The Lakers finally assembled a championship roster to win the franchise’s 15th NBA title this past season. And with the NBA Finals’ MVP trophy in his possession, Kobe is finally content to stay in L.A., where he was all smiles riding atop a tour bus with his wife, two daughters and teammates in a parade through downtown to celebrate the Lakers’ NBA title.


Actually, when Kobe was asking to be traded two years ago to avoid the team’s rebuilding, he remained optimistic that L.A. would come through with roster upgrades and he expressed a desire to stay in L.A. while voicing his desire to leave to win a championship.
And now that he’s led the Lakers to a coveted NBA championship and his team is likely to represent the Western Conference in the NBA Finals for a third consecutive year, it appears that Kobe will finish his career in L.A., unless the team becomes disloyal when his talent wanes and trades him after all.

By Teneshia LaFaye

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Nike’s individual campaign for LeBron James is “we are all witnesses” to his greatness.
Yet, Nike and James don’t want anyone else to witness the NBA MVP get dunked on. Jordan Crawford, who transferred from Indiana University to Xavier, recently threw down a one-handed dunk on James during a pickup game at Nike’s LeBron James Skills Academy in the Cleveland forward’s hometown of Akron, Ohio.

But immediately after the dunk on King James, LeBron ran over to a Nike representative who then confiscated video tapes from every camera guy in the gym. However, LeBron and Nike didn’t account for cell phones that shoot video.
Matthew Kennedy captured the infamous dunk on his cell phone and posted it to YouTube.

Nike’s excuse for confiscating the tapes is that it is the organization’s policy to restrict videotaping of players who are not in playing shape.
Apparently, LeBron hasn’t worked out much since walking off the Amway Arena court without shaking hands with Orlando Magic players after Cleveland was eliminated in the NBA’s Eastern Conference Finals.
So now LeBron is not only a sore loser, he is also a spoiled sport.
And Nike wants us to “Just do it”, just don’t do it at the expense of its players.

By Teneshia LaFaye

Follow me on Twitter: www.twitter.com/teneshialafaye
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LeBron James didn’t come through to deliver a No. 23 vs. No. 24 matchup in the NBA Finals, but Kobe Bryant continues to do his part and has the Lakers up 2-0 on the Orlando Magic, the team that outplayed and dethroned James and the Cleveland Cavs to win the Eastern Conference.
Bryant scored 29 points and made a fade-away jumper over Hedo Turkoglu for the Lakers’ go-ahead lead in a 101-96 overtime victory on Sunday to follow up on his 40-point Jordan-esque performance in a 25-point rout of the Magic in Game 1 of the NBA Finals.
Highlights from NBA Finals Game 2:

The best-of-seven championship series moves from Disney Land to Disney World when L.A. travels to Orlando for Games 3, 4 and 5, if necessary.
If Bryant delivers the Lakers’ 15th NBA title, he would likely be the NBA Finals MVP, which coupled with his fourth NBA championship ring, carries a lot more weight than James’ regular-season NBA MVP trophy. It also would be Bryant’s first NBA title without the help of Shaquille O’Neal.

Here’s Nike’s puppet commercial of Kobe holding his three rings over LeBron’s head:

Former Lakers general manager Jerry West may want to retract his earlier claim that LeBron is greater than Kobe when it’s Bryant who is leading his team on the game’s biggest stage for the second year in a row and a chance at another ring while James waits ‘til next season to try again for his first ring.

Here’s video of Kobe’s and LeBron’s opinion of each other:

By Teneshia LaFaye
Follow me on Twitter: www.twitter.com/teneshialafaye
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Denver Nuggets forward Carmelo Anthony may be a little pouty, but he is not a sore loser unlike his 2003 NBA draft classmate LeBron James.
Melo pouted on the sidelines while watching the clock tick down in the Nuggets’ Game 5 loss to L.A. in the Western Conference Finals, and he looked dazed on the sidelines Friday as Kobe Bryant and the Lakers dealt the Nuggets a 27-point Game 6 loss to advance to an NBA record 30th NBA Finals.
Nevertheless, Anthony hung around to shake hands with the Lakers, and he and Bryant shared a five-second embrace before he headed back to Denver’s locker room. And while Denver players sorely boasted that they are “the best in the West” and more talented than L.A., Anthony disagreed.
“We can always talk, we can say it all day every day,” Anthony said. “But until we go out there and beat the Lakers, they’re going to be the best team in the West.”
NBA MVP LeBron James, on the other hand, behaved liked a sore loser after the Magic knocked Cleveland out of NBA title contention Saturday with a 103-90 victory in Game 6 of the Eastern Conference Finals to advance to Orlando’s first NBA Finals since 1995.
As soon as the final buzzer sounded to signal the end to the Cavs’ record-breaking season, James pulled out his shirt, bowed his head and made a beeline to the Cavs’ lockers. No wave goodbye to Cleveland fans who endured the Magic’s home crowd full of hecklers. No congratulatory handshake to Orlando center Dwight Howard for putting up the 40 points usually customary for James, who finished with just 25 after being held scoreless in the second quarter and mustering only four points in the fourth. And no appearance at the postgame press conference.
Once in the locker room, James mumbled to his teammates that they’ve got to get better and he put on big headphones and sunglasses and walked past Nike execs, his mom and friends who were all waiting for him after the game, said Cleveland Plain Dealer writer Brian Windhorst on The Dan Patrick Show. Windhorst added that James also threw a tantrum when he was overlooked for the NBA All-Star Team as a rookie.
Windhorst also revealed that Cavs guard Mo Williams beat James off the court after the season-ending loss to Orlando.
Yeah, but at least Williams had the guts to attend the postgame conference in spite of his pre-Game 4 guarantee that Cleveland would win the series to advance to the franchise’s second NBA Finals in three seasons.
James provided a bad example of sportsmanship for all of the kids and budding high school and college hoop stars who admire James, who many experts including Lakers Hall-of-Famer Jerry West consider to be on pace to be the greatest NBA player ever.
You can stick up for the 24-year-old James and say he was disappointed because the NBA Finals were supposed to feature his No. 23 vs. Bryant’s No. 24 after the Cavs’ posted the league’s best regular season record and swept their first two playoffs opponents only to be outplayed and outcoached by the Magic in the Eastern Conference Finals.
James finally spoke up for himself, a day after the Game 6 loss, and he mentioned that he emailed Howard to congratulate his Olympic teammate.
“It’s hard for me to congratulate somebody after you just lose to them,” James said. “I’m a winner. It’s not being a poor sport or anything like that. If somebody beats you up, you’re not going to congratulate them. That doesn’t make sense to me. I’m a competitor. That’s what I do. It doesn’t make sense for me to go over and shake somebody’s hand.”
Sounds like a poor sport.
Anthony could have used a similar excuse after losing to his Olympic teammate Bryant after the Nuggets avoided a sixth consecutive first-round exit to make the West Conference Finals for the first time since Anthony’s first birthday. Judging by his facial expressions and body language in the Nuggets’ final two playoff losses, Melo was obviously very disappointed. But at least he had the graciousness to suck it up, congratulate the winning team and slap hands with the fans before making his final walk to the lockers this season.
James could have done the same, but instead we are all witnesses to the Chosen One being a poor sport. But, he can redeem himself next year when he returns for the final year of his Cavs’ contract.

By Teneshia LaFaye
Follow me on Twitter: www.twitter.com/teneshialafaye
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Former Lakers general manager Jerry West injected himself into the debate of who is better: current NBA MVP LeBron James or last year’s MVP Kobe Bryant.
And West surprisingly switched sides and went with James, the former No. 1 overall pick out of a Cleveland high school. West brought Bryant to Los Angeles in 1996 after trading Vlade Divac to Charlotte for the Philadelphia high school standout.
West is credited for assembling the Lakers’ four NBA championship teams in the 1980s and the franchise’s three consecutive NBA champions from 2000-2002. The 70-year-old former All-NBA guard and former Lakers coach said that James can be “the greatest player ever to play the game”, even greater than Michael Jordan.
“LeBron James will do the same type of things because he’s getting better,” said West, now GM of the Memphis Grizzles. “He’s a much more effective shooter. When he’s making his shots from the outside, you can’t play him. He’s just too big, too strong, too quick. And he has incredible body control.”
But whoa, whoa, whoa.
Better than Jordan, who has won six NBA championships? And Bryant, who has three league championship rings?
Now, LeBron is a better team player than Kobe, and the 24-year-old Cleveland forward has better career averages in points, rebounds, assists and steals, but King James can’t be crowned until he’s won a NBA championship like the 30-year-old Bryant, who won three NBA titles a couple months before his 24th birthday.
First, LeBron has to lead the Cavs past Orlando in the Eastern Conference Finals that begins tonight. The Magic won the regular season series 2-1 and “beat the hell” out of Cleveland, according to James’ teammate Zydrunas Ilgauskas, in Orlando’s 116-87 home romp for the Cavs’ worst loss this season. But Cleveland, which posted the NBA’s best record this season, swept its first two playoff opponents to bring an 8-0 postseason record into the conference finals against Orlando, and James deserves most of the credit. He is averaging a playoff-best 32.9 points, 9.8 rebounds and 6.8 assists.
Bryant has averaged 28.4 points, five rebounds and 4.5 assists in 13 playoff games, including a 40-point effort Tuesday to help the Lakers to a 105-103 come-from-behind victory against Denver to open the Western Conference Finals.
Kobe and LeBron can settle the debate on the court if they deliver a Lakers-Cavs NBA Finals.
And if it comes down to the game-winning shot, who would West rather have the ball?
“If I had to have somebody make a last-second shot, it would be Kobe Bryant,” West said. “But…….. I do think LeBron has surpassed Kobe as a player.”
James has to get the Cavs past the Magic for a chance to close the case.

By Teneshia LaFaye
Follow me on Twitter: www.twitter.com/teneshialafaye
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If you’re an NBA fan, you’ve had the debate with your friends.
Who is the best player in the league? LeBron, Kobe or D-Wade?
My answer is King James, and the populous thinks so too because the Cleveland forward received 109 of 121 first-place votes to be crowned the NBA’s Most Valuable Player earlier this week.
Kobe Bryant and Dwyane Wade already have an MVP trophy. Bryant was the league MVP last season, and Wade, the league’s scoring leader this season, was MVP of the 2006 NBA Finals.
Bryant and Wade, who finished second and third in this year’s MVP voting, have another piece of hardware that James lacks – an NBA championship ring. Bryant won his three championship rings on the shoulders of three-time NBA Finals MVP Shaquille O’Neal before the big man left the Lakers to help Wade win Miami’s only NBA championship in 2006.
But LeBron James can distinguish himself by being the catalyst to Cleveland’s first NBA title. So far, the Cavs have cruised through the playoffs with a first-round series sweep of Detroit and a 2-0 Eastern Conference semifinals start over Atlanta. In the process, James has averaged 32 points – more than Wade’s regular-season leading 30 points per game, and he’s averaging 11 rebounds, 6.6 assists and two steals. The NBA Finals could match up James’ team versus Bryant’s Lakers, which Cleveland beat out by one game for the league’s best record this season and the most wins in Cavs’ franchise history.
Wade is out of the picture right now after Miami was eliminated by Atlanta in the first round of the NBA playoffs. In dominating performances against the Hawks and Pistons, James has posted better postseason numbers than Wade and Bryant, and he also has better career averages in points, rebounds and assists.
So if LeBron leads his team to an NBA championship this postseason, it’ll be hard to argue he’s not the best in the league.

By Teneshia LaFaye
Follow me on Twitter: www.twitter.com/teneshialafaye
Add me on Myspace: www.myspace.com/tlafaye