Playoff Time 2013: Dwight Howard

When Dwight Howard came to LA he immediately posted a picture on twitter of himself holding a basketball with a bunch of jerseys of former great Laker Centers such as Shaq and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar in the back round. If pictures are worth a thousand words then those are worth a few million. He put himself in the same class as some of the greatest centers to ever play the game of basketball. This postseason the Stage is all his with Kobe Bryant injured he can either rise up and become great or just post pictures about it.

As most of the Sports world knows the Lakers had a very up and down season.  Mike Brown got fired early, D'antoni was hired, Dwight and Kobe had chemistry Issues and the Lakers got off to a tough start. Through all of that the Lakers are still in the playoffs.

The Lakers enter the 1st round as underdogs vs a Familiar foe in the San Antonio Spurs Without Kobe Bryant which means it will allow Dwight to Give more touches in the offense . We need to see that guy who was dominant in Orlando and led the Magic to the finals. I want to see him stop being nice and dominate average 20 Points and 15 Rebounds. That's easier said than done though the San Antonio Spurs are one hell of a team and will exploit even the greatest players weakness.

Dwight has a great opportunity in front of him to truly become the great player the Lakers traded Andrew Bynum to get.  Now is not the time to make Friends nor is it the time to smile it's time to become a Champion. Can Dwight Howard help the Lakers upset the Spurs and lead them deep into the Playoffs?

The Playoffs begin for the Lakes today April 21st as they take on the San Antonio Spurs.

Throwback Thursday: Oscar Robertson The"Big O"

 Throwback Thursday.  Just wanted to remind everybody in case you forgot that next Thursday November 1^st is the big day being the release the Lebron vs Jordan. So make sure you say tuned for Hey it’s that time of week so happy that and check out the preview I wrote last week. Now I know most people that grew up in the 90’s to now think that MJ, Lebron or Kobe are the greatest of All-Time and I know I just wrote an extensive paper on MJ vs LBJ on who was better but I’m going to throw a curveball at you. Oscar Roberson is the Greatest Basketball player of All-Time! Yeah I said it and if you got a problem with that Tweet me @Thatboybtaylor. So today we are talking about none other then the “Big O” Oscar Robertson.

So when you Talk about All-Time Greats in basketball history you must mention Oscar Robertson. In the 1961-1962 Season he made history becoming the first and only player to Averaged Triple-Double for entire season at 30 points 11 assists 12 rebounds #CRAZY. What’s even crazier then that is he averaged a Triple-Double though his first 5 seasons in he league. Despite the great Numbers Robertson and he Cincinnati Royals  seemed to always fall short of reaching the Finals. He and his teammates suffered several losses in the playoffs to Bill Russell and the Boston Celtics. The most painful of these being in the 1962-1963 Eastern Conference Finals that went 7 games. So with all his postseason failures Robertson was then later traded to the Milwaukee Bucks in before the 1970-71 season. This was a fresh start for someone who had needed It after being accused of being selfish in Cincy. He now had a team that wasn’t decent at best the Bucks were contenders with the likes of Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Bob Dandridge. The increase in Talent around him proved to be beneficial as the Bucks dominated the NBA to a league best 66-16 record. The Bucks would do the same in the playoffs going 12-2 and Oscar Robertson was now a Champion. The thing I admire most about him was that he did all this in a time when racial tensions were still high. He was great person, Intense Competitor and just a great player. Oscar Robertson would finish his career with 181 career Triple-Doubles.

Kareem gets Statue (Finally)

After feeling like he was slighted and even sometimes belittled at times Kareem Abdul-Jabbar Will now get honored the same way Jerry West and Magic Johnson do. It was announced that sometime during this season the NBA’s all time scoring leader will get his own statue like Magic and West. This has been LONG overdue for a guy who is one of the games greatest players and arguably the best player in team history, its just great too finally see him get his due. Everybody who is a Laker fan  right now knows who Kareem is and with the statue Laker fans will never forget who he is. This man, Magic Johnson, James Worthy  and the “Showtime” Lakers of the 80s changed the game forever with there uptempo high octane style of play. They were a Dynasty and one of the models for greatness in the world of sports and are apart of what makes being a Laker so great. Kareem was a central part of those teams and its about time the Laker organization pay him with that gesture for his 20 years of longevity (If only they did the same for Elgin Baylor). If you don’t know who Kareem is or how great he was here are some of his many accomplishments.

38,387 Points

NBA’s All-Time Leading Scorer

19 Time All-Star

6 X MVP

6 Championships

2 scoring Titles

4X leading Shot blocker

Congratulations to Kareem-Abdul Jabbar

#Greatness