Go Lakers Quotes

don’t think Justin realized the power he had in shaming me. I don’t think he understands to this day. After “Cry Me a River” came out, anywhere I went, I could get booed. I would go to clubs and I would hear boos. Once I went to a Lakers game with my little sister and one of my brother’s friends, and the whole place, the whole arena, booed me.

Clarissa, I was calling to ask if you wanted to go to the Laker game tonight." Now, Clarissa was hurt. "This is really last minute." "I know, I'm sorry. I just got the tickets." "As I see it," Clarissa said, recovering, "you have two problems: One, I have plans, and two, I hate baseball." "Basketball," Aaron said.

When I was a kid, Granny filled a bushel basket with her do’s and don’ts. She taught me never to start a fight but to know how to end one. To be wary of the rich and powerful. And to go through life doing the least damage possible. Thanks to her, I favor the underdog. I root against the Yankees, the Lakers, and the Patriots. If Germany invaded Poland—again—I’d take the points and go with the Poles.

If you’re not passionate enough about what your company does to find fuel for conversation every day, for hours on end, with as many people as possible, maybe you’re in the wrong business. Go general if you have to. Not everyone can be the Lakers, but anyone can talk basketball. When I started out, I didn’t have the name recognition of Robert Parker, or the clout of Wine Spectator, so I didn’t talk about Gary Vaynerchuk or Wine Library—I talked about Chardonnay. Social media gives you the opportunity to take your business to its fullest potential. Grab it.

More recently, Magic Johnson and Larry Bird faced each other on the basketball court as arch-competitors—first in high school, continuing through college, and culminating in the NBA, with Johnson playing for the LA Lakers and Bird playing for the Boston Celtics. The rivalry of these two champions became legendary—as did their dislike for one another, which seemed to grow in intensity with every passing year. Somewhere along the way Converse paid each of them to shoot a shoe commercial; they faced each other on the court, Bird wearing white shoes, Johnson wearing black. Bird insisted that they film the commercial at his farm in Indiana. The shoot began icily, with both superstars circling each other, but when they broke for lunch and started to go their separate ways, Bird’s mother announced that she had made lunch and invited everyone to the table. In Larry Bird’s words, “It was at the table that I discovered Earvin Johnson. I never liked Magic Johnson very much. But Earvin I like, a lot. And Earvin didn’t come out until I met him at Mom’s table.

In the Netherlands, unsurprisingly, they’ve nailed this by designating two types of road: flow roads and access roads. The former are through roads, on which you’d put a separate cycle route away from traffic. The latter offer no-through routes for motor traffic, allowing people in cars to access homes and businesses, but not cut through on their way elsewhere, making it safe for cycling. The current thinking is that if there’s more than a thousand vehicles a day or they’re going at more than 35mph you really need to do something about it if you want people to feel safe.

In one Globetrotter’s skit, it involved Globetrotter’s Captain Meadowlark Lemon collapsing on the ground, and Wilt threw him up in the air several feet high and caught him like a baby. Lemon weighed 210 lbs. Lemon, and other people including Arnold Schwarzenegger, said that Wilt was the strongest athlete that ever lived. On March 9, 2000, his number 13 was retired by the Globetrotters. Wilt’s NBA Career Accomplishments On October 24, 1959 Wilt finally made his NBA debut. Wilt played for the then, “Philadelphia Warriors.” Wilt immediately became the league’s top earner making $30,000 topping Bob Cousy who was making $25,000. The $30,000 is equivalent to $263,000 in today’s currency as per the year 2019. In Wilt’s 1959-1960 season, which was his rookie year, his team made the playoffs. The Warriors beat the Syracuse Nationals then had to go on to play the Eastern Conference Champions, the Boston Celtics. Coach Red Auerbach strategized his forward Tom Heinsohn to commit fouls on Wilt. When the Warriors shot free throws, Heinsohn grabbed and pushed Wilt to stop him from getting back on defense, so quickly. Wilt was a prolific shot blocker, and this allowed Celtics to score quickly without Wilt protecting the basket. The Warriors lost the series 4 games to two after Tom Heinsohn got a last second tip in to seal the win of the series for the Celtics. As a rookie Wilt shocked Warriors' fans by saying he was thinking of retiring from basketball. He was tired of being double- and triple-teamed, and of teams fouling him very hard. Wilt was afraid that he would lose his temper one day which he did in the playoff series versus Boston. Wilt punched Heinsohn and injured his hand. Wilt played for The Philadelphia Warriors, who then relocated to San Francisco, The Philadelphia 76ers, and The Los Angeles Lakers. He won one title with the 76ers then one with the Lakers. First NBA game Wilt scored 43 points and snatched 28 rebounds. Grabbed his rookie career high of 43 rebounds in a win over the New York Knicks.

But Cleveland sucks,” Fox said—referring to both the team (which went 42-40 in 1996–97) and the city (once ranked among America’s most dangerous metropolises by CBS News). “It’s a lot of money,” Strickland replied. “Bill,” Fox said, “tell them if they wanna pay me $42 million I’ll go to Cleveland. Otherwise I’m joining the Lakers.” Rick Fox joined the Lakers.

He considers this. “I remember after Gabe died, Margo wanted me to talk about Gabe and I just couldn’t. She didn’t understand how I could go to barbecues and Lakers games and seem like a normal person, but that first year I was in shock. Numb. I told myself, Keep moving, don’t stop. But the next year, when I woke up I’d want to die. I kept my game face on but I was bleeding internally, you know? I wanted to be strong for Margo and Gracie, and I had to keep a roof over our heads, so I couldn’t let anyone see the bleeding.

Inside the Lakers’ locker room, the reaction was subdued euphoria. Ceballos was an obnoxious brat who played no defense and went AWOL. Horry, on the other hand, was a 6-foot-9 outside gunner (he was a lifetime 34 percent three-point shooter) and low-post defender joining an operation in need of long-range shooting and low-post defense. It was a trade that, by NBA standards, generated little attention. It was a trade that changed everything. Suddenly, instead of being a towel-throwing pain on an 11-24 team going nowhere fast, Horry was a coveted piece of a first-place club that sat 17 games over .500. During his first four NBA seasons, all with the Rockets, Horry had learned how to play with Hakeem Olajuwon, the 7-foot, 255-pound Nigerian center. He knew his job was to feed off the big man, and that a box score where Olajuwon scored 30 and Horry scored 12 usually meant Houston won. Now, with the Lakers, he was more than happy to acknowledge O’Neal’s place as the center of the basketball universe.

Here was this high school kid, and he came out dressed as if he were a member of the Rat Pack,” recalled ESPN’s Jeremy Schaap, who was present. “What the heck was going on? He wore sunglasses. Sunglasses! And they may well have been drugstore shades, but they looked Armani on him. It was hard to accept the total lack of humility and the sort of Hollywood quality to it. I’d been around Michael Jordan, I’d been around Charles Barkley, but I’d never seen anything so show-offish.

The most noteworthy knock-Shaq-on-his-rear addition took place on June 26, 2002, when the Houston Rockets used the first pick in the NBA draft to select Yao Ming, the 7-foot-6, 310-pound center who had recently averaged 38.9 points and 20.2 rebounds per game in the playoffs with the Shanghai Sharks of the Chinese Basketball Association. Though he was just 21 and unfamiliar with high-caliber competition, Yao’s arrival was considered a direct challenge to O’Neal’s reign as the NBA’s mightiest big man. Sure, Shaq was tall. But he wasn’t this tall. Within weeks, a song titled simply “Yao Ming” was being played on Houston radio stations, and Steve Francis, the Rockets’ superstar guard, was being introduced to audiences as “Yao Ming’s teammate.” There was talk—only half in jest—of a Ming dynasty. Put simply, the NBA’s 28 other franchises were doing their all to shove the Lakers off their perch. If that meant copying elements of the triangle offense (as many teams attempted to do), so be it. If that meant adding Mutombo or Clark, so be it. If that meant importing China’s greatest center, so be it. And if that meant throwing punches—well, let’s go.

In his defense (sort of), Bryant looked around the league and saw peers firing away from all angles. The uber-athletic Vince Carter had the green light in Toronto, as did Allen Iverson in Philadelphia, Tracy McGrady in Orlando, Paul Pierce in Boston. There was an understandable sense of jealousy from Bryant, who aspired to not merely lead the league in scoring but fulfill an image he couldn’t possibly live up to. “There was a game against Toronto when Kobe decided he needed to go one-on-one against Vince,” Jackson recalled. “He had no space to operate, and he kept going right at him. Nothing kills team spirit like that.

Brian Shaw, the veteran point guard who was respected by O’Neal and Bryant, tried explaining to the kid that his words were unwise. Fox, also respected by both, did the same. It mattered not. Jackson was furious, and in a closed-door meeting he told the Lakers he had erred in giving them too much freedom. “I tried to let you guys figure it out,” he said. “Now I’m going to have to instill more discipline. You don’t get the respect of being champions.” But what did that mean? Would Jackson change anything? Would the approach shift? Answer: Not really.

Do Magic’s Lakers win five titles with Jordan before Jordan thriving in Denver and Walton’s feet holding up in Portland? I’m going out on a limb and saying no. What a shame.