By Michael Bivins, as told to Gerald Narciso
With Bynum out for a few months, then now Ariza out, someone
else besides Kobe needs to step up for the Lakers - and it doesn’t look like
that person is going to be Kwame Brown.
I think watching the game the other night on TNT, and seeing
fans pay their money to boo a player who is a part of their team, means that
there some type of attitude going on with the fans with Kwame Brown.
We all have to remember that Kwame was a first round pick of
the Wizards, by ultimately the NBA
player of our generation, Michael Jordan. So when you look at Kwame Brown as a
ball player and you look at what he’s going through right now, you wonder what
Mike saw in him. Why hasn’t he grown into that vision yet?
If Kwame is going to hold it down until Bynum comes back, he
is going to stop playing scared and being sensitive to the booing. It’s just
like my boy Stephon Marbury and what he’s been put through in New York. You can’t come into the league
feeling like you are sensitive. The fans are going to pay their money, have a
couple of beers, you will get some hecklers.
That’s what it’s all about - winning and losing. Being liked
and disliked. There is no medium in the NBA. So, when you’re in the big boy
league and you getting big boy money, you have to have a big boy attitude.
But that’s Phil Jackson’s job to get the best out of his
players. Besides Red Aurbach, Phil is the number two coach in NBA history. He
gets paid to help Kwame get better. He’s won championships, now he’s got pull a
rabbit out of the hat to pull a solution.
L.A., they got peak and valleys. Even if they get it
together, I don’t think they can get past Phoenix
in the playoffs. Phoenix is looking really good, and this might be the year
they jump over the hurdle. There is just something about them. I think people
might be surprised that I think it will be Phoenix and Boston in the championship.
Check out Michael
Bivins on TNT’s Overtime at NBA.com . Click here to watch his January 21
interview with LeBron James