Lakerz ar da best. All you hataz recognize, after all he do this year Kobe still get no love from the media. Guy jumped a car for Kobe's sake. Only MVP? He deserves a three letter title but these boyz don't kno, Kobe da truth...Kobe is GOD. They gonna beat the Jazz by 100 points each game and Kobe is going to average 85 PPG cuz he is the best player in the history of the world. He had a cure for cancer but his fellow scientists sucked so bad they couldn't get it done. Can't believe all the hataz thinking Kobe will only average 30 ppg in the next series. Thatz disrespectful. Kobe no. 1, Kobe God, Ya'ay.

(Editor's Note: This post represents your typical Laker fans point of view. Thought they deserved this recognition in honor of their boy.)

Not so much a coherent blog as this is a rant: How you like 'dem apples Suns fans?! Been waiting for a whole year after your constant bickering about getting cheated and screwed by David Stern and the NBA conspiracies.

Amare Stoudamire and Boris Diaw played in every game. Shaq did an excellent job on Duncan in the low post. And Shawn Marion met his exact averages for every playoff game he's ever played against the Spurs [what's that you say, he was with the Heat? well it was hard to tell when he was on the floor while he was with the Suns during these series].

So now I'm wondering what excuses are going to get rolled out this year? The hack-a-Shaq a dirty move by a dirty team? Floppers? Foul Trouble? Spurs cheating? Or will you follow D'Antoni's lead and sneak in Tony Parker's little push offs?

It's going to be a fun offseason, regardless of what happens in the upcoming season. Why, because we don't have to watch overrate Amare Stoudamire and the horrible Suns fans complain at every opportunity--Except for the occasional drop in to mention how boring the playoffs are and how impossible the Spurs are to watch...I can live with that.

When looking back at Steve Nash's surefire Hall of Fame career, it will become apparent that both his biggest curse and blessing were all rolled up in a pair of explosive, surgically reconstructed knees.

Nash and Shaq will share the brunt of the blame when it comes to explaining Tony Parker's career night. Both former MVP's will be, no doubt, derided for their inability to play pick and roll defense. The calls for Shawn Marion will even pop up again.

But when you look at the trade that changed the Suns chemistry midseason, it was a move that had to be done. The Suns, as constructed to start the season, were not going to win in the playoffs. They had several unsuccessful opportunities to dethrone the Spurs and now only face a tougher west.

Now that the Suns stand on the brink of elimination thanks to their horrid pick and roll defense, everyone will pile on the Shaq trade for ruining their team. But before looking at the Suns veteran leaders, try pointing a finger at Amare Stoudamire.

For his part Shaq has done everything the Suns have asket him to, namely eliminating Duncan as a post option. It was never fair to expect Shaq and Nash to competently defend the pick and roll. If the Suns were going to take the next step it was going to have to fall on the wildly talented, but vastly overrated shoulders of Stoudamire.

As much a liability as Nash is on the defensive end, Stoudamire has been 10 times worse. After seasons of failed defensie rotations, failed positioning, and failure to improve, it's become obvious that Stoudamire is merely a one-dimensional player.

It was his inability to improve in the slightest that neccessitated the Marion trade. Any team with a decent big--of which there are many now in the West--would be able to match up the Suns. Worse, the physical capabilities are there to dominate on the defensive end.

Ask yourself how teh Suns can't exploit a Barry, Oberto pick and roll setup like the Spurs can any pick and roll defenders the Suns have. Shaq, at the very least, can guard Duncan in the post. He can rebound.

Nash is an accomplished charge taker, and not as bad a liability as you'd think. Stoudamire has proven so inept on defense that the Suns have brought everyone and the kitchen sink around him to hide his deficencies and keep him out of foul trouble. Eventually the onus will have to fall on him.

There's a reason the Suns tried to trade him for Garnett in the offseason.

For those that stayed up late to watch our guys dismantle the Argentina junior varsity team, Team USA offered quite a few treats.  The Carmelo Anthony dunk over two defenders ranks just below Vince Carter leaping over a seven-footer in all-time great Olympic dunks.

Jason Kidd is showing once again just how valuable a great point guard (i.e. not Allen Iverson, Stephon Marbury, and for the time being Chris Paul) is in influencing a game.  The failed alley-oop attempt to Lebron James off the glass in a half court set was just creative genius and still deserves a look on the highlight reel despite the botched dunk.

Indeed, if I ran Gatorade I would immediately look back to the edited moments in sports history advertising and show Lebron finsihing the play with the statement: Is it in you: if only Lebron drank Gatorade.

Because the presence of Kidd and Kobe Bryant, this may be the best team since the David Robinson, Shaq, and Hakeem patrolled the frontlines.  All this being said, does anyone else but me feel cheated during this tournament?

What defines a great team, with the exception of the Dream Team, is the level of competition it faces.  Staying up for last nights game, I had hoped to finally catch a spark of adversity for our guys.  The Argentines have perhaps the best run international team in the world and have hit a perfect storm of coaching and players at the right time to become a world power in basketball.

Even last night we saw Scola and his group exploit some of the weaknesses in Team USA, namely any big guy with a pulse (Suns fans, STAT is still horrible on defense), and teams that are proficient in running high post plays and backdoor cuts.

Make no mistake, Bryant and Anthony destroyed team Argentina.  But the South Americans also got a lot of clean looks at the basket which simply did not fall.  If you look at their dismal shooting percentage, one would assume that the Americans contested every three point shot.  But in watching the game, they missed a lot of open looks.

What's of more concern is that our defense, despite some great pressure, still allowed the offense to get deep into the paint.  Fortunately none of the players last night are nowhere near as proficient as their missing teammates in finishing contested layups.

While enjoying the win last night, realize that the open looks given up last night are only going to multiply when the real Argentina team returns.  And with Manu Ginobili, Andres Nocioni, and Walter Hermann taking the shots we can bet that they are more likely to go in.

And that's why I feel cheated.  Team Argentina is probably the most cohesive team in the world, and normally a true test for us.  But with the third string in last night, and Luis Scola in foul trouble, we missed an opportunity to witness great basketball.  Even the addition of Ginobili would provide Team USA with one player that they couldn't guard straight up. 
And for those absences, and to see how far we have really come, I feel robbed.

A thousand pardons if I am not in a hurry to enshrine Michael Vick's name in the Adolf Hitler Hall-of-Fame for the most dispicable men in human history as so many of you have rushed to do.  I suppose God will just have to forgive me.

Color me racist also, if you will, for not buying into the load about Vick being a marked man due to the color of his skin.  NAACP leadres and controversial televsion analysts be damned.  The idea of playing the race card in attempt to deflect accountability for a man's actions hinders a person's ability to really grow.

Vick and his cohorts may have committed a disgusting act, and compounded their troubles by setting up a gambling ring that crossed state lines, but they (well, Vick) do not deserve the amount of scrutiny they have received in the court of public opinion. 

What is deserved is the one to five years that the gambling charges hold.  A loss of reputation for sure.  But given the time that will be served, is Vick not also worthy of a second chance?  They were, after all, just dogs.

While those six words may send animals lovers and decent people in an uproar -- the thought that people have used that reasoning to defend Vick's actions is literally sickening -- when contrasted and put into context with some of the other actions found on the back pages of our newspapers, what does it say about our moral priorities?

Many have pointed out that while Vick has been so scrutinized, other, more serious crimes such as murder, rape, or abuse have largely escaped the national spotlight.  Some have even tried to shape that fact as evidence there really is an agenda to tear down successful black men. After all,  lots of people become victims each day without nearly a whisper.  But a black quarterback abuses a couple of dogs and it is a national scandal (other's reasoning, not mine).

But beneath the fold (aspring journalists should know this term), in the back pages, and on the side bars of websites are a couple of stories reporting crimes much more heinous than any Vick committed.  Yet the facts of each case hardly raise an eyebrow.  Is race a factor? Some may think so, but consider a few of the stories that have yet to break onto CNN.

Houston Rockets point guard Rafer Alston, he of AND1 fame, is about as hip-hop and black as you could get.  Yet we care little to read that he reportedly stabbed a man in the neck after a dispute in a night club.  That crime goes beyond cruelty to animals, it is attempted murder.  But while the story may still develop as we learn more details, newspaper have yet to pick up on the scandal as it only had a brief mention on the last page of today's San Antonio Express-News.

And while it may be responsible to get all the facts before causing a national scene, especially as it concerns the life of a man, contrast this reaction with the thousands of rumor and hate-filled columns reported on Vick before evidence was release.  Or consider the Duke Lacrosse Team.

Even better, applaud the government for stepping in on the nation's steroid problem when our drug and alcohol dependencies destroy so many more lives. Though he may not be cheered, Leonard Little has neither been persecuted nor prosecuted for his role in the death of another person while driving under the influence.  Not to mention the additional DUI's the defensive end has picked up since the incident.

Which brings us back to Vick.  Is what Vick did a dispicable act of cruelty and indifference?  Yes.  But does the young man deserve to rot in hell and have every limb torn to pieces by the very dogs that he helped torture for all of eternity?  That is not for us to decide, nor should it be up to a blog to tell.

That PETA has gained so much support for a good cause is an admirable thing.  But that PETA is a much more famous organization than, say, MADD (Mother's Against Drunk Driving) is disturbing.

They are, after all, just dogs.  Again, those words ring cold and cruel in our ears in the context of dogfighting.  But given how we treat the loss of human life does the same twisted logic not apply to us.  Alston stabs a man in the neck: It is, after all, just another night club stabbing.  Leonard Little takes the life of another person driving while intoxicated.  It is, after all, just another in a long line of such deaths.

The point of this post is not to make light of what Vick did, but rather to shed light on how desensitized we have become to violence in the world around us.  How little we truely value each other as human beings.  As cynical as it may sound, Vick's biggest mistake in regards to his reputation was that he went after dogs.  If he had, in fact, gone after another person it might have just escaped our attention in the background of an everyday police blotter.

When a quarterback indicted on felony gambling charges and misdemeanor animal abuse can carry national headlines while a war, corrupted health care policies, and increasing national debt remain secondary issues, it causes reason to give us pause.  They are, after all, just dogs.