Los Angeles Lakers: Should Laker Nation be worried about the Clippers?
By Ronald Agers
The Los Angeles Lakers for the first time in history actually will embark in a real rivalry with the Los Angeles Clippers. The question is, should the Lakers fans be worried? Lake Show Life shows interesting behaviors that lead some to think so!
The Los Angeles Lakers start the NBA season this week in their quest to make a run at the NBA Finals and possibly a championship. With the addition of Anthony Davis and the complete reconstruction of the roster to serve LeBron James‘ “strengths”, excitement in Laker Nation is at its highest since the turn of the decade.
The excitement transcends Los Angeles to the rest of the NBA as the era of the “Dynamic Duo” is rampant throughout the league replacing the “Superteam” tenure.
But even with all of the stars moving around the league, most eyes will be focused on the Staples Center, where four of the top ten players of the league reside.
Los Angeles might have replaced New York for the time being as the “Mecca” of basketball. The city of New York may still be a Knicks town, but the combination of futility, along with comments from Kevin Durant on Hot 97, New York doesn’t have the potential rivalry Los Angeles has.
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The two LA teams, the Lakers and Clippers, had no problems getting superstars to play with their franchises. The Lakers got what they wanted grabbing Anthony Davis (The second time around!) to join LeBron James on the Lakers via trade. The Clippers, on the other hand, provided the biggest shock of the free agency landing Kawhi Leonard and Paul George like a thief in the night.
With oddsmakers in Las Vegas picking the Clippers to win the NBA title and the Lakers return from playoff exile thanks to LeBron James’ “Revenge Season”, Los Angeles basketball is in the unprecedented territory of being the most exciting basketball area in the world.
With the storylines between the four superstars, the city’s two teams could form one of the NBA’s most heated rivalries. Something Danny Green doesn’t believe yet according to an interview he had with Wosney Lambre of The Athletic.
"Lambre: Do you see the LA Clippers as rivals? Seeing as you share a city, a building, and you’re both chasing a championship this season. Green: No. We’re not worried about anybody but us. We feel like we have what we need (for a championship) and if we do things the right way like we’re supposed to, we feel like the only team that can beat us is us. So we just need to stay healthy and do things the right way. But they obviously have a good team, as well as some other teams in the west. We’re definitely not sleeping on anybody. But were just worried about reaching our full potential. If we reach our full potential and don’t win, we can live with that. We can’t let small things like rivalries distract us from our goal of being the last ones standing."
Let’s take a deep tissue massage into this statement from Danny Green. What was stated is what most NBA players, coaches and executives say to avoid putting up bulletin board material going into the season on opening night.
But Green is wrong on so many levels. The Lakers fanbase will throw out two numbers every time these teams take the hardwood this season to play each other or debate which LA team is better.
The numbers are 16 (The number of championship trophies the Lakers have) and zero (The number of trophies the Clippers have). History teaches us that overall, the Lakers own the Clippers.
But, has the pendulum swung the other way? For the last 30 years, the Lakers wouldn’t even bat an eye about a threat from across the hall, even in the “Lob City” days. Now, there are full-on debates in social media that actually gets nasty. The more interesting question is, is Laker Nation actually worried?
Should Laker Nation be worried? Strangely, the good fortunes that all belonged to the Lakers in the past have been spread out more evenly between the two franchises. In the old days, the Lakers delivered on all of the superstars. The Clippers, well, was a temporary stop for players to get to the next franchise.
In anticipation of the biggest game on opening night, the Lakers playing the Clippers in Staples Center, Lake Show Life looks at the potential paranoia of the fans of the Lake Show.
Let’s take a look at the two players the Los Angeles Lakers missed out on and the Clippers landed.