OK, now that the season's over it's time for one final Stock Up, Stock Down.
Stock Up: Kobe!
Yes, this one is obvious. But Kobe did raise things to a new level with his performance. The 30 points per game were expected, but what really stood out were his leadership and his facilitating. He racked eight assists in all but one game, which would have sounded like crazy talk during the Shaq-Kobe Laker days. It looks like he learned whatever he was missing in terms of getting his teammates more involved. The only thing left for him to do is see how many more titles he can get before he's done. Congrats, Black Mamba!
Stock Down: Rashard Lewis
As game five wrapped up, I commented on my facebook page that Lewis shouldn't have gotten a check for the last two games. Let me revise that statement. He shouldn't have gotten paid for game one either. After torching whoever was guarding him during the the entire playoffs, Lewis ran into a wall in the Finals. His shooting percentage, which had gone up from 44 to 45 to 49 with each round, sane to 40.5 in the Finals. Yikes. His free throw attempts, at five per through the first three rounds, fell to two in the Finals. After making people like me want to eat everything we'd ever said about him being overpaid for three rounds, he made us feel great when it counted most. He is what he is: an excellent shooter who doesn't give you much if he's defended well. That ain't worth $100 million.
Stock Up: Phil
And not just for getting ring number ten. Phil out-strategized Stan Van Gundy, proving to all the haters like me that he actually knows what the heck he's doing. He figured out who his best five were and played them as much as possible; while that doesn't sound overwhelming it's better than most coaches do on the regular. He could have easily succumbed to a desire to play Andrew Bynum more minutes, or to sit down Derek Fisher for one his younger, faster point guards. But instead he stayed the course, played his hunches, and was proven right. The other thing he did was to devise an effective plan for neutralizing Dwight Howard. Howard, for all his physical talent, can be schemed into offensive ineffectiveness, and Phil pulled it off. I tip my hat to you Phil.
Stock Down: Stan Van Gundy
Not for any x-and-o thing, but for his rotation. He showed too much devotion to an ineffective Jameer Nelson, and not enough to Rafer Alston or Courtney Lee. Lee played 31 minutes per game in the conference finals but 17 per in the Finals, and Alston' minutes dipped from 33 to 29 per. Nelson came fresh off the injured list and was handed 18 minutes of run, including 23 in game one and 26 in game four. It isn't a coincidence that the one Magic win in the series saw Alston play for 37 minutes and Lee for 20 while Nelson only got 11. Nelson just wasn't ready to play and Van Gundy refused to accept it. For that, he loses points with me.
Stock Up: Trevor Ariza
I mention Trevor here because he is the example that people who are champions of early entry should hold up more than anyone else. Ariza came into the league as a run and jump guy (he could run the floor, jump real high, and dunk) and nothing else. Now he's a legitimate three point shooter and is good for double figure scoring on a regular basis. And he's a good defender to boot. In other words, he's actually worked to improve his skill set from the time he entered the league. That is commendable because I dare say that most early entry guys never get that far beyond what they could on day one. Ariza left UCLA after a year, fell to the second round, and looked like a roster guy early on. Yes, he always brought energy, but he had no polished skills to speak of at the offensive end. Now he does, and is about to get paid nicely for his work.
Stock Down: Dwight Howard
Yes, I'm still hating on Superman. I said before that he can be schemed into ineffectiveness at the offensive end. But there's actually more to it than that. He was guarded straight up by Kendrick Perkins in the second round and held to 16 points per game, and the Lakers held him to 15. What's worse is the pitiful number of shot attempts he took during the series. Over the five games he averaged eight attempts per night. Eight attempts. That's unacceptable for a so called franchise player, but it's going to stay that way until he gets better at catching the ball and warding off defenders from stealing entry passes that are made to him. He also needs some post moves to go along with the hook shot and the dunks; right now you can put a big body on him and shut him down in the halfcourt. The free throw shooting is unimportant in my book; he makes half of them and that's plenty good enough. In game two he shot 7 for 9 from the line and still only had 17 points because he only took 10 shots from the floor. The foul shots aren't what's costing him, it's his scoring from the field. Shaq in his prime was as bad as Howard at the line, if not worse, but it didn't matter because he'd still get his 40 regardless. Howard needs to polish his offense so he can do the same. Until then, expect more 15 point efforts when it counts.
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I hate Orlando even more after playing like crap in the Finals. They couldn't have had their crappy series against the Cavs. What we got was a terrible Finals and no one can argue differently.
I have to say, D12 and Rashard stank up the finals
Should've added stock up: Hedo. He's going to get paid next season.
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