Kobe Bryant and the Los Angeles Lakers are the defending NBA Champions, but last year’s win still left many unanswered questions. What if Kevin Garnett had never gotten hurt, what if the Boston Celtics were in the Finals? Would we see a repeat of the dismantling of the Lakers such as we saw in 2008?

This year KG is healthy, the Lakers and the Celtics meet for the 12th time in the NBA finals, and the only question that remains is if Kobe can notch a title win over the Lakers’ archrivals, the Boston Celtics.

The NBA odds makers have set the NBA Finals Series price with the Lakers as the -190 favorites, while the underdog Celtics will pay +155 if they should continue to defy the critics and win their 18th NBA championship.

NBA Finals Odds
Boston Celtics +155
Los Angeles Lakers -190

Kobe Bryant wants to join the Showtime Lakers of the 80’s as the only Lakers team able to beat the hated Celtics in the Finals. In eleven Finals matchups, the Lakers have only beaten the Celtics twice, both under the leadership of Magic and Kareem in 1985 and 1987.

Despite being the best player since Michael Jordan, there have always been question marks around Kobe Bryant. Kobe isn’t a player’s player, he spent half of his formative years in Italy, and he’s a soccer fan and the son of a former basketball player. He has lived a privileged life, and that made it hard for him to relate to other players and other players to relate to him. The hardest part for Kobe is that because he’s been the closest to MJ, he’s had the most to prove to every fan of the game.

In 2008, Kobe Bryant won his first MVP award after sports writers finally relented and accepted he was the man in the NBA, at least for 2008. That year he lost the Title to the Celtics and their Big-3 for the new Millennium of KG, Ray Allen and Paul Pierce. Sports writers and fans ridiculed him for not taking the team to the promised land and raised more questions about his ability to lead to a championship.

In 2009, Kobe was finally able to shake the Robin syndrome as the Lakers beat the Orlando Magic to win the Larry O’Brien trophy; it was Kobe’s first title without Shaq leading the way.

In the 2010 NBA playoffs, Kobe had to go head to head with the next one, Kevin Durant. Sports pundits were already suggesting that Kevin Durant had passed Kobe as the best player in the Western Conference, and those whispers turned into shouts as Kobe had a bad beginning to the Lakers-Thunder series. Things changed when the team went back to Los Angeles for Game Five with the series tied at two games each, when Kobe started playing Kobe’s game and the Lakers won the next two in convincing fashion to close out the Durant threat.

After disposing of the Jazz in four games, Kobe and the Lakers ran into another playoff nemesis, Steve Nash and the Phoenix Suns. The last two times the Suns and Lakers met in the playoffs, the Suns dumped the Lakers, and it was this first-round dumping that forced Kobe’s hand to ask for a trade or some help in Los Angeles. This year, the Lakers handled the Suns in six games and Kobe was at his best all series long, scoring 40 points in the first game and averaging 37 in the series to dispose of the Suns and cross off another question mark on his greatness.  

A championship win over Boston will allow him to join Magic Johnson and Kareem as Celtic-beaters and his fifth title will put him one away from Michael Jordan on the title list. This series will be billed as the Celtics vs. Lakers, but it will be all about Kobe and his quest to answer questions about his greatness.

 

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