I still think that the blazers lack the veteran leadership, playoff experience they need to make it past teams like the lakers/spurs.

I agree that denver is the biggest competition for the lakers, the spurs could be up there if duncan and ginobli stay healthy which is a long shot.

Kobe did work against the grizzlies

40 points is 3 of the last 4 games

however they need bynum, and gasol left

what is up with the spurs?, they havnt had a great start?

Eh, the Spurs have always started out slow for as long as I can remember.

Towards mid season, and after the All Star break however, they get extremely hot heading into the Playoffs.

ah, i was worried cause everyone was hyping them up to win, or at leat chalange the lakers

The spurs are still probably the biggest challenge for the lakers.

The Spurs really showed their age last season although they are a different team in some aspects.

Still though, Duncan hasn't gotten any younger.

The Nuggets are easily the Lakers biggest competition in my opinion.

This message was edited by Mr Matthews48 on Nov 07 2009.

Nugs are tearin it up (minus the recent losing streak). I think they'll get back on their feet when JR and Martin are back and healthy.

Ty Lawson has been exceeding my expectations so far. Its good to see someone take a lil pressure off Billups for a change.

Suns are looking good so far. It's a surprising start and they currently own the best record in the west. I'm sure Lakers will overtake that in no time.

The suns look good, but they have a lot of older players on that team

the key for them is too stay healthy

I'm surprised too at how well Suns are doing. I was thinking they would be somewhere around 5,6,7 but they're number 1 right now.

the lakers are going to more consistent throughout the year though.

The big early test for them is tonight-Phoenix. Right now it looks like the Pacific will be between those two.

Breaking out of New Orleans-there's a report out that Hornets coach Byron Scott is OUT. Fired. No word on a replacement. New Orleans is 3-6.

Hornets GM is now the head coach. I don't get why they did this now. He was a good coach and it was only 10 games into the season. I know they expected better, but Emeka had to gel into the new system and they didn't give Byron enough time to do that.

Anyway, we Ripped the Suns and fatigue had something to do with it. I think i heard the commentators say they played seven games in the last 10 days and that is ridiculous. Anyway, we play the Nuggets tomorrow, so I'm hoping that 4th quarter rest was enough to keep us fresh.

Shannon Brown for dunk contest please.

Regarding the Scott firing, there were some rumblings that he had lost most of the players...like when he was pushed out of New Jersey. Other than Chris Paul (who refused to speak at the press conference announcing Scott's firing), few of the players were willing to stick up for him.


Guess management figured that with Paul locked up for the next three years, they could take a chance on firing a coach he was very close to. [shakes head] They could lose him over this...