Here, look, we’ll split this post into two sides of the coin. The first part will be glass half-full, the second part will be glass half-empty.
Glass half-full:
The Lakers recovered from early losses in their Grammy’s road trip to finish 3-3 with a win over the Raptors 94-92 Sunday. They were able to fend off a furious comeback by a very game and balanced Raptors squad who managed to take the lead inside a minute on a Jose Calderon pull-up jumper. But that special time is Kobe time as we all know and on his way to 27 points to lead the Lakers, Bryant got the ball and did what he does best. Be the clutchest son of a gun in all the land.
Like this:
Kobe. Bean. Bryant.
(OK, stop reading if you only like lollipops and gumdrops with your game recap, only care who got the win, and don’t care about efficiency, nuance, or context. Lakers win, Lakers win, Lakers win>)
Glass half-empty:
The once dominant, once invincible Los Angeles Lakers needed Kobe Bryant to his 9th shot out of 23 attempts in seconds remaining after gunning his team into losing the lead late Sunday in order to stave off a win from one of the worst teams in the league without their best player in Andrea Bargnani to make sure they finished 3-3 on their road trip.
Bryant was 9-23 and missed six straight shots in the 4th quarter, but did get excellent space on the game winner because Toronto for some reason did not think to hedge to the baseline where Bryant is absolutely deadly. Bryant also had 4 turnovers and missed a free throw late to give the Raptors a chance, which of course they blew by giving it to DeMar DeRozan instead of the en fuego Jose Calderon, because Bryant was blanketing him exceptionally well.
So to recap, the Lakers almost lost to one of the worst teams in the league because Kobe Bryant did not play well, but wound up winning because Kobe Bryant wound up playing well. Yup, everything’s fine in L.A..
Note: Who wants to talk about the five-seconds call?
