The Lakers look out of sync and un focused on the first 2 games of the road trip due to the loss of Pau Gasol . It seems as though there saying to there self's "here we go again" . After looking so promising the Lakers have dropped 2 straight and now find themselves in the 2 spot looking up , when they should be looking down . They seem to have lost the intensity and fire they once had . Maybe we should give them some good news " Hey Lakers , the season isn't over , and you are getting back 2 of your best players real soon " , some one relay that message to them for me . The problem is they seem tired and there playing flat , they look good for 3 quarters , then in the 4th quarter they play prevent like in the NFL and end up loosing the game . They had there chances in both of those loses to win the game , but lack of execution when it matters kills them , they start turning the ball over and stop playing defense , they take contested shots , and by the time they realize that there out of the game and jacking up three's . This team has the ability to still win these last 2 games on the road if they play like a team and recognize what the teams are gonna give them and execute , they dont have to play flawless but they have to play perfect and keep the game close , "that was a joke " , but they have to bring there A game every night . Kobe is the one that really needs to up his game , he needs to realize when his shots not going down and get to the basket , also I think the ball has to go through Kobe every possesion , and let him make plays for everybody else . In Utah Lamar is also gonna be a key going up against Kiralinko and getting to the boards with Boozer , we know Fisher isn't gonna stop Deron Williams by himself so we are gonna need to collapse on him as a team and commit some hard fouls on him so he'll think about comming in the lane .So go lakers and to Pau ,"hurry up and come back "

I hope the Lakers Heard the Battle roar from Kobe Tuesday night as he willed the Lakers to victory with his amazing play , and energy . He has been playing the bulk of minutes in the last few games trying to keep his team in it , and has been playing like the MVP since the start of the season . I think Kobe wants to send a message to the leauge that he is , and has been for quit some time , the MVP .and hopefully his team mates got the message as well . The bench has provided much of the scoring load for most of the season and played important minutes durning our run , but not of late . Kobe cant be the only starter to come to the game with the energy and the intensity every game , it has to be balanced , now of course there are gonna be some off days , and some shooting slumps , but the weight of our championship run is on the starters shoulders and I know Kobe feels it , but do the other 4 starters , yeah they talk about it , but it hasn't really shown much .........

 Pau Gasol has been tossed around in recent games , and has shown that he can get his salad tossed by big players on the box , and not so good ones at that . He needs to man up and play like a 7 footer , and push his weight around , get a little dirty and play ruff . I was hoping he would of shown a little more emotion against Brad Miller , Im not saying he should have punched him , but at least push him or something , get a tech to show you have heart , Kobe does it , why not Pau . Even though the game was really sloppy , they showed they can pull off wins even when there playing like crap . against Dallas , you kinda expect for those types of games to be sloppy because there 2 great teams and some times they make teams look like that , but against Sacramento you expect a little more , granted it's a rivalry game and records don't matter in those games because you can never count out one teams hate for the other , and I think we seen that on tuesday night . So basically all I'm saying is the Lakers as a whole need to be on the same page , and bring the same fire and intensity to every game no matter who were playing and what there record is , and we have done better in those types of situations , but we shouldnt just be barely winning those games is what I'm saying , they should be 20-30 point wins . We cant just think , "well we have Kobe , he'll win this one for us " , even though he can , every player on the team needs to do there part and just play there roll . We need to play at higher level to keep pace with the western conferance . Every one has up'd there game since the all star break and we need to be even better than that because of the talent the west has . Our goal right now should be the  #1 seed in the west and we'll go from there , we can start thinking about a championship once we get passed the 1st round for the first time in quit a while . So I hope the team has got the message and comes out and plays like it tonight against the lowly Clippers . Roar on #24 , and lets start another winning streak . 

The Lakers cant come out flat against a team that probly should have beat us at home just a couple of days ago . This is a dangerous team with some pretty talented players , that we cant take lightly . Realistically we should have smashed this team , especially with out there star player , but we got relaxed and thaught this was gonna be easy , and it was a battle till the end . I know Kobe likes to get everybody involved and share the ball , but not tonight , he needs to put a stamp on the game and be aggressive , take the snake out of the cage , whatever you wanta call it . The Black Mamba needs to show up in a big way 2 nite . Its been a while since I can remember the Lakers winning at the Rose Garden , I think it was when Kobe hit those 2 last second three's , one in regulation , and the other in over time . So we cant play with this team , we gotta try to put them away early and get some rest . The game on Tuesday , we had our chances , and we couldn't close them out and turned out to be a dog fight . The Fact is that this is a dangerous team and they feed off there home crowd where they play well , so the Key is to take the life out of the crowd , play some D , and get turn overs . I heard Avery Johnson say "lets make them call the first time out " , and thats what we need to do , attack the basket , get them in foul trouble , and put the pressure on them the whole game and save the jump shots for the fourth quarter . This is a young team , if we take them out of there game early , they'll start thinking about what there gonna have for breakfast , if not were gonna be feeling the same way we felt after that horrible Atlanta game . If were gonna start considering ourselves Championship contenders its gonna start with beating the teams we know we can beat .Remember Laker fans we havent won nothin yet . Our goal is to be playing in June , and celebrating at a Laker Parade .