NBA: Lakers' struggles stem from ongoing Shaq/Kobe feud

By Jason Hirthler Sports Central, e-sports.com Columnist

The Lakers lost fifteen games last year. This year, the world champions have already reached that - four months before season's end. The reason they have lost so many games this year is because Kobe Bryant has come untethered from the triangle. More than even that, he has summarily rejected the basic premise of the Laker offense, that the ball ought to go to Shaquille O'Neal. That was the fairly obvious strategy that the Lakers ignored for years until Phil Jackson arrived and made the fairly pedestrian deduction that if one has a 330-pound phenom, one ought to use him.

Kobe Bryant is a prodigy on the basketball floor. There is almost nothing he can't accomplish with the ball. And now, as his talents unfurl themselves for the world, his appetite for fame is outpacing his interest in winning.

He will say all the right things. Insofar as a 22-year old kid can memorize the relevant cliches of his trade without veering into the splenetic, impolitic rants so native to young athletes. He will utter the right phrases, about team and togetherness, rings, and banners. But he doesn't, at the moment, have the right attitude.

Great as Kobe may be, Shaq is more dominan. Bryant ought to defer. At least until the fourth quarter, when Shaq's abominable free throw percentage makes him a liability. But ego is a hard thing to manage, and Kobe Bryant is simply an egomaniac. He desperately wants to be number one. All alone. By himself. At the top.

There's nothing unusual about this. In fact, it is nauseatingly common. In the megalomaniacal, macho world of sports, nothing, not even winning, is more important than impressing on others the depth and amplitude of one';s manhood. There is little gallantry in modern sports. The landscape is vacant of noble intent. Athletes are out for themselves. If winning interferes with the grand celebration of self, then teamwork be damned.

That's Kobe's functional credo. It would be futile for Phil Jackson to excoriate him for it. Bryant's spirit is cemented in contrarian mold. The machinery of self-promotion has woken up. And Kobe is a smart kid. He is creating more than a name. He's building a brand. He's attempting, it seems, to lift himself above the colloquial depiction of the dumb athlete with a series of commercials illustrating, among other heady accomplishments, his proficiency at foreign languages. He can diss people in Italian, too. One spot has him seated somewhere near the foot of Mount Olympus, speculating on the nature of man, the cosmos, and other decidedly unsportsmanlike things. He has an important looking book open in his lap, although he doesn't seem very interested in reading it.

Meanwhile, Shaq grumbles. Unwilling to recuse himself from the spotlight on behalf of the Kobe Express, O'Neal is at a bit of a loss as to how to handle the sudden diminishment of his Hollywood star power. He is being usurped by one of his own. One of his lessers, at least in the physical sense. Shaq has always been slow to anger. Only time will tell how long he will tolerate the self-involved chimeras of his point-guard.

Jackson, to date, has done nothing. And that is perfectly in keeping with his Zen opinions. One of the most salient points in Zen Buddhism is the notion of wu wei, probably best translated as "not forcing things." Authentic Zen masters suggest that we really can't anticipate the outcome of events. Possible consequences are too innumerable to know. So don't interfere with the course of events. Let things play out.

Likewise, Jackson sees there is nothing to be done right now. Kobe is intransigent. The Lakers have already lost as many games as they did all last year, a year in which they spent a number of games without Kobe. Instead of cracking the whip, Jackson is lingering, waiting to see how many loses will pile up before Kobe recognizes the need to make Shaq the main man again. It may never happen. The Lakers may go down in flames. Kobe may be traded. It is hard for two transcendent talents to play together - after all, there is only one ball between two stars who desperately want it.

By doing nothing, everything will get done. Kobe will recognize, whether he admits it or not, the need to share with the big dog. Shaq will be vindicated if the Lakers fail without him in the starring role. And Jackson will see his philosophy confirmed.

Unless, of course, Kobe single-handedly carries the Lakers to the championship. If that happens, I'll write an article on the valiant, courageous, and brave athlete that he truly is, that his appetite for winning is too great to be denied. And that Shaq should just stop whining.

You never know, it could happen.

Article courtesy of Sports Central