Lakers Fans Are Worried, Even In Victory

The Los Angeles Lakers just survived a tough Game 2 to take a commanding 2-0 series lead on the young Oklahoma City Thunder, showing that they have the necessary poise to pull out tough playoff games. It was a big win for them, because the series could have really been in danger if the Thunder pulled last night’s game out.

And yet ... Lakers fans on SB Nation’s Lakers blog Silver Screen and Roll are still worried. In his post-game recap, C.A. Clark writes that “the Lakers, as a team, Kobe included, look old and tired right now.” He pointed to Oklahoma City’s 17 blocks as evidence.

Tonight’s game is exactly why I was afraid of a match-up against the OKC Thunder. The one area OKC clearly has the Lakers out-matched is in the athleticism department, and it couldn’t have been any clearer in watching this game. OKC had 17 blocks on the night, which is just an ungodly amount. The reason they were able to run up such a high total is simple. They contested every shot the Lakers took tonight, and their team has players who can jump higher than our players. Serge Ibaka and Kevin Durant were the driving force behind as impressive a display of interior defense as you are likely to see in these playoffs, with 7 and 4 blocks respectively. But, as impressive as it was seeing the Thunder reject shot after shot inside the paint, it could not have happened but for one simple fact: The Lakers were playing below the rim, and they were doing so because they don’t have the capability to play above the rim right now.

Clark finally writes that “at this point, it’s near impossible to see the Lakers actually losing, but 7 games is still a very real possibility.”

The Lakers should definitely be worried, but for another reason entirely: the Thunder are a really good team. They won 50 games in a loaded Western Conference, doing so on the strength of their defense and one of the best scorers alive. They led the league in blocked shots and had as good a road record as the Lakers during the regular season. In other words, they were never a team that the Lakers were going to shove aside easily. The Lakers don’t look slow; they look slow in comparison to the super-athletic Thunder. They’ll be fine.

In other words, I wouldn’t be too worried if I was a Lakers fan. This was going to happen against the Thunder. Hell, adversity will happen to the Lakers sometime this postseason even if they win. The West is just too tough.