U9O.net: You and I Know.

i got the FUNNIEST call from my mother right now.. “okay so have a very very safe trip…. ” pause pause pause… “and be VERY CAREFUL OKAY???? those foreign girls will CHASE your VISA okay???? very very dirty!!! when i was in vietnam i had to watch my entire male staff be CHASED by those girls OKAY??? don’t have TOO MUCH SEX… wear condoms!!! you don’t WANT std do you???!?! doesn’t matter if you pay or not pay they all dirty…!! wear CONDOM OKAY???”

“We got a little complacent,” acknowledged Bryant, who finished with 23 points, seven rebounds and seven assists.

Lakers coach Phil Jackson’s assessment?

“Poor coaching,” he said. “That’s what it was tonight. Putting too much trust and faith in a younger group—a second unit. They just can’t hold it on the road. They can’t withstand the fury or the intensity of the fourth quarter. I’m going to have to change it up a little bit.”

[from yahoo! sports]

a few days before, [from the la times]

“The second unit played well, got a 16-point lead in the fourth quarter. We were all taken out with six minutes to go in game,” Bynum said. “We didn’t get any rebounds [after that]. I don’t know what to say about that.”

He was asked why he was taken out of the game, considering how the Pacers out-rebounded the Lakers 50-41 overall and 19-8 on the offensive end.

“I don’t know,” Bynum said, who turned 21 at the end of October. “That’s a question for Phil.”

a quick opinion on what actually happened, and reading between the lines: just days after bynum complains about pjax’s substitution patterns, more specifically, that the second unit should have been left in there, pjax brings the game almost to the wire on purpose.

with that little game of chicken, when the lakers are sitting high on top of the western conference and a loss that would not really count much except for bellyaching in the newspapers and by fans, he ensures that bynum, NOR the deflated ego of the second unit, will not open their mouthes for the next few months about the second unit in relation to pjax’s substitution. and by that time, the natural instinct of this laker’s team, which comes from kobe on down, will lead to working harder so that nothing like this happens again. you can bet in about a month or two, pjax will play the same game again, and leave the second unit in to field test them. I don’t think he’ll use the Christmas day game against the Celtics, since victory is needed against them for a lot of good reasons, but look for this to happen against a good team with a good record– detroit pistons, cavaliers, for example.

pjax really understands power dynamics in social situations and knows how to play the game of ego management, inflating and deflating at will. you think the second unit will work harder on their game and defense? which is really the only way to control the flow of the game ensuring a maintained lead? you betcha. you think bynum is gonna complain about pjax’s sub patterns? hell no. is this going to be a learning game for the second unit, to show them the dangers of complacency? yes.

he’s leading by example, and in this case, showing as opposed to telling.

i always watch phil jackson when he speaks and he’s one of the few coaches that I actually think plans long term.