The Lakers Season: Out of Their Misery

First, allow me to congratulate for doing something that most of the American viewing public never thought they were going to do, making the playoffs. Even more impressive, they weren’t the 8^th seed. But the Spurs-- yes the Spurs-- who are almost as old or decrepit as a spur swept them, destroyed them, ran them out of any and all building they entered. The casual fan may ask how this could possibly happen. Well, casual fan, if you’re dying to know, there are about 8 people in the world who can help you; The NBA “Analyst” on the ESPN family of networks are going to chop, slice, grate and generally

parse the Lakers season in to delightfully bite-sized morsels of highlight film and heaping entrées lowlight film.

The good people at ESPN do love the Lakers. Ever since moving to LA the late night Sports Center almost always have some sort of conversation about the Lakers and their struggles, or their attempts to turn their season around, and all the injuries.

It’s impossible to say that the Lakers season wasn’t beset on all sides by the inequities of the selfish and the tyranny of evil men (LA media and Lakers players themselves) but it’s hard to not point the blame all over the place. That’s the hard thing about trying to sum up the Lakers season. This is where ESPN will come in, they will continue to show the Lakers and try to melt down their miscues, the teams injuries and how they’d be champs if they didn’t get hurt. It will go on and on.

Without the Lakers as a central focus of the ESPN NBA coverage what could possibly fill the void? Continual coverage of the Heat and their inability to lose based solely on the fact that LeBron James still draws breath seems to be the most logical choice. 

I sincerely hope that the Lakers continue to struggle. It’s not some Schadenfreude; it comes more out of an interest in how ESPN covers sports. As a young man I never really thought about what the acronym ESPN stood for; now that I know that it is Entertainment and Sports Programming Network it really is clear, the sports comes second, not just in name. ESPN only cares about a small batch of storylines and drama and doesn’t actually focus on the sports and the teams that are continuing to play. Heaven forbid they showed highlights of the Golden State Warriors who actually have played well start to finish and actually have lasted in the playoffs longer than the Lakers but it’s highly likely that the Lakers will get more analysis and more notice than the Warriors.

Despite all the expectations for the Lakers after signing Dwight Howard and Steve Nash the Lakers couldn’t turn that hype into actual results. Finishing the season over 500 is something that is close to measurable results but everyone seemed to have booked the story solid before anyone even stepped on the court. It was supposed to be Heat vs. Lakers final but the good people at ESPN build that house of cards, not its their responsibility to explain why their neat little world didn’t come to fruition.