Lakers

The Lakers have the biggest (most inflated) team payroll in the NBA and their record to date is 9 wins and 13 losses after last night's loss to the lowly, 4 wins and 18 losses, Cleveland team.  Supposedly the Lakers have the best center (Howard) and best overall player (Bryant) and one of the best forwards (Gasol) in the NBA.  Yet their record is worse than mediocre, it's god awful horrible.  Watching them play Cleveland last night it's obvious they are not a playing together team and what's more they don't even play hard.  Howard looks to be highly overrated.  Maybe he's not fully recovered from his back surgery.  He has not been a defensive force and his overall offense is limited to dunking lob passes and put backs.  It doesn't appear he even has very good basketball instincts.  When he gets the ball near the basket on a pass or rebound rather than keep the ball above his head and go right to the basket with no wasted motion, he takes the ball down below the waist level while he gathers himself for a big jump and dunk usually with both hands.  Of course by the time he has taken to make these unnecessary moves the defense has collapsed on him and either slaps the ball away or fouls him.  He makes less than 50% of his free throws so fouling has become a weapon for the opposition, especially late in the game.  Furthermore he does not appear to even be very active around the basket either on defense or offense.  Fortunately the Lakers have not committed a long term contract to Howard and they can and may be  done with him at the end of the year unless he shows something between now and then.  Bryant provides the bulk of the Lakers offense, taking a third of the team's shots nearly every game.  This is less than optimal since he has bad games, and at 34 is no spring chicken, and the lack of scoring balance means even more trouble as the season wears on.  In fairness to Bryant, none of the other players seems to have a scoring mentality or touch.  Team defense is another glaring weakness as is the lack of foot speed across the board.  Overall this is a team with very big deficiencies.