May 17, 2022 • 45 mins
Hosted by 7-time champion Robert Horry and Jabari Davis, NBA Finals File dives deep into the greatest Finals series in NBA history, breaking down the best moments, storylines and matchups, using rare archival audio from the NBA, and the personal touch that only "Big Shot Bob" can give.
In this episode of NBA Finals File, we examine the 2000 Finals, Pacers vs Lakers. Howard Beck, who was a beat writer for the Lakers at the time, joins the show to discuss the start of the great Shaq and Kobe Lakers dynasty. We talk about the lob to Shaq vs Portland in the WCF, Kobe taking over Game 4 in OT and became a superstar, and just how dominant the "Big Aristotle" was during this season, and this Finals.
NBA Finals File is available on the iHeart app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. NBA Finals File is a production of iHeartMedia and the NBA.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:03):
Welcome to the NBA Finals File with Robert Or and
Jabari Davis. I am Jabari, former NBA writer, current podcaster,
and I'm joined by seven time champ big Shot Bob himself,
Robert Orrid Jabari. I'm so happy to be here that
because we've got a special guest coming home. I called
(00:24):
him Fred, but his name is not Fred, but I'm
gonna let you introduce it. Yes, as you mentioned, a
very very special guest. The specialist of guests joining the show.
Former Lakers beat writer for the l A Daily News,
current senior writer for Sports Illustrated, and the host of
The Crossover podcast, Howard Beck. Thanks so much for joining us,
our gentlemen, thank you for having me excited for this.
I'm very excited. Only Rob can call me Fred. By
(00:46):
the way, I love the fact that your your your
your podcast is called the Crossover. I'm not even going
because you don't think I could pull across myself your repertoire,
but we'll let that slide. That's for another day. It's
a metaphor. It's just a gonna tag the guests as
we as we introduce them. But you know this, this
(01:09):
is the thing that I have so much love for
all those guys who covered us back when I was
with the Lakers, because these guys that we had covered us,
they were good guys and they will come to you
if there was something that was kind of sketchy and
talk to you about it before they went to press
with it. So that's why I got to love with
a lot of love for these guys. I can completely
understand that. Okay, so let's go ahead jump into it.
(01:31):
On today's show, we're going to deep dive into the
two thousand NBA Finals between the Los Angeles Lakers and
the Indiana Pacers. This is m v P peak shack
number one in scoring number two and the rebounds number three,
block shots for us. Since the game almost and only
three people played more minutes as you were leading her
(01:52):
team to six seven victoration. It's a pleasure to watch
you grow. Congratulations U, NBA m v P Shaquille Dale.
From this day on, I would like to be known
as the Big Aristotle, because it was Aristotle who said
(02:12):
excellence is not a singular act, but I have it.
You are what you repeatedly do and still young, crazy
talented Kobe along with you know, the one and only
Robert Ory versus Reggie Miller, Jalen Rose and Mark Jackson
leading to pacers. So guys, let's go ahead and jump
into the historical significance of this matchup. We've got Phil Jackson,
it's its seventh NBA finals, the head coach. If I'm
not mistaken, it's Larry Bird's first shot on this side
(02:35):
of things. It's Shock and Kobe it's their first finals together.
Obviously it's Shack second. But Howard, let's go directly to you.
What was the general feeling about this matchup heading into
the series, at least amongst the media. Well, you know,
it's funny to think about this, uh looking back with
you know, twenty two years of of gap in between,
(02:55):
because as Rob will attest, like, we look back now
through this rose colored prism of it was a dynasty.
We know that and all that's all people today, if
they didn't live through it, would know they won three straight.
So they were dominant. They weren't always that dominance. Total
(03:17):
domination by the experience you patcast as your palidate Los
Angeles Lakers, and nothing was ever assured. And the thing
I remember most about the first championship in two thousand.
Is that this thing always felt like it was like just,
you know, a fraction away from falling apart um. Did
everybody pick the Lakers to beat the Pacers in the finals?
(03:39):
I think probably close to unanimous outside of the state
of Indiana. And the Lakers had won sixty seven games.
Certainly that's a dominant number. No team that had ever
won that many games or more had ever not won
a championship. I believe they had winning streaks within that
season of sixteen games, nineteen games, eleven games. And it
was the first year under Phil Jackson. But listen, at
(04:01):
the beginning of that season, it was the triangle offense
takes time. It's gonna take time to adapt to Phil Jackson.
Don't expect a championship in year one. Kobe is still
really young at that point, uh And that Dy won
sixty seven games was already I think a bit of
a surprise for a lot of people, because the Lakers
of Shack and Kobe in their early years had been
seen as kind of underachievers. On top of that, this
(04:23):
is this is the premise for going into the finals.
This team was flirting with disaster the entire postseason. First
round back then is the best of five. They beat Sacramento.
It's a one eight matchup. They beat him the first
two games, they lose the next to its Sacramento. Suddenly
they're facing a possible elimination in game five at home,
but they blew them out. It was fine, but still
(04:43):
flirting with disaster. Round two. They go up three. Oh
on the Sun's get their butts just kicked out of
the gym in game four, can't close it out. Phil
Jackson has the world's shortest press conference after that one
and then of course the Western Conference Finals against a
very deep, very talented port the Trailblazers team Shack doesn't
do it today. Everything he's accomplished this year goes up
(05:04):
and smoke. That's what the m v P is all about.
They're up three to one, can't close it out in
game five, can't close it out in game six. Suddenly
it's game seven, and oh, by the way, game seven,
as we know, they're down fifteen points in the fourth
quarter at home. This is the Lakers are at their
mercy right now. They totally collapse. The Trailblazers have blown
(05:27):
it open. The Staples Center is sitting in stunned silence.
Incredible comeback, capped by, of course that iconic Kobe is
Shack Love tell me on the mode loud, throw me
Bryant work and the right hand burner put the champagne
away to get off the bottle of water. Look at
(05:48):
that's all we're gonna tras come our way home. There
was Shakill again, like he white, like we had written
his back all year, found a way to catch it
and bring it down and come out of that crowd
under the basket, you know, as animated as ever, and
you talk about growing up and conquering demons all in
(06:09):
one one twelve minutes swoop, but still flirting with disaster.
So did we just assume the Lakers would beat the
Pacers in the finals. They were favored. Dad Shack and
Kobe had some pretty nice favorite man your favorite you
know we you know it's l a You need to drama,
(06:30):
you need to suspense. So we were just trying to
keep it with all the jones is because all the
actors that would come to the game. We just wanted
to't hey, we know how to ask a little drama
to the thing, just like you do. You guys, you
guys did it well. And thank you for the compliment earlier,
Rob when you say that we weren't looking for selation stories.
We didn't have to look for them or dig them up.
You guys just provided them naturally. So you know, I
(06:52):
gotta be honest with you. I was kind of thinking
the same thing because I was like, Hey, I watched
this as a fan, and I remember a ton of stories.
He's that with you. Okay, you came from those teams, Tames,
but to kind of to the point some of the
points that you just made. You know, given the fact
that you were a beat writer, that you're covering your team, Well,
let me ask this, did you cover the previous years
prior to this one? You were you were you covering
(07:12):
and and so on. Yeah, So my first year covering
the Lakers for the l A Daily News was the
ninety seven ninety eight season. So that's Shack of Koby's
second year together, but kind of the first one where
a lot of a lot of the key role players
had come in. Like the the outline of what we
think of that era where it's just not just Shack
of Koby, but d Fish, Rob Rick Fox, Brian Shaw,
(07:33):
Ron Harper, like all that's It's it's all kind of
coming together piece by piece over those those couple of years.
But yeah, I started in so I got to see them. Sorry, Rob,
I'm gonna give you a lot of PTSD on this
on this podcast. But like God, saw them swept by
the Jazz and ninety eight saw him swept by the
Spurs and ninety nine everybody was saying, but I can
honestly say we weren't close to many championship caliber team
(07:57):
del Harris being fired, Kurt Rambis being installed, and then
Kurt being pushed aside for Phil Jackson. A lot of
tumult in those first couple of years. Plus was the
lockout season, and so that was its own brand of weirdness.
And oh yeah, Dennis Rodman came and went for about
thirty days. Oh I was gonna say, don't forget the
Dinnis Ryme experience, because that was an adventure in itself.
(08:17):
Oh yeah, I'm actually I asked both of you guys this,
with the added pressure of those previous playoff failures, was
there a sense of that there was an added level
of pressure given the expectations, especially after such a dominant
regular season in Phil Jackson's first year with the team.
I go first on this um. For us, we were
just happy to get out of the West. You know
(08:38):
what we said, we get out of west the East,
there's no problem. So it wasn't any pressure. Their pressure
is like, okay, we need to go out and perform,
which everybody, everybody has that pressure. But I think it
was so much pressure playing at home. It was so much,
you know, put upon us, because it's like, hey, Philip Jackson,
he had Michael Jody had Scottie Pippen, He's gonna win
(08:59):
a championship. Now we got you know, Shock, we got Kobe,
we should win a championship. And so you had that pressure.
And people think that we worry about you know, the fans,
the media, and that actually we worry about each other
more going out and performing for your fellow teammate because
you never want to let them down. You want to
go out and do your best. And we were that
(09:21):
type of team. You know. You hear all the rumors
throughout the years about the Shock Kobe feud, and for me,
I and as teammates, we never experienced that in the
locker room. We never experienced that on the bus, We
never experienced that on the floor, because if you look,
when you're in championships, the person you closest with, that's
the person the first person you hug. And every time
(09:42):
we won a championship, you know, Shock and Kobe hug.
So it was to me there was really no pressure externally.
It was always pressure internally. What was the dynamic between
Shack and Kobe at this point in their respective careers.
Obviously Kobe still very you know, very early in his career. Shack,
you know, we had a couple more years in the league.
What was the actual dynamic. No, the dynamic was good. Um,
(10:03):
they understand it's just a thing about sports, and especially
in basketball. We all know a pick and order. Um
we know who to go to guys, and whose second,
who's third and fourth and so on and so on.
And I think Shaq understood down the stretch when we
need a creative basket. He was always breaking up play
and going to set a pick and roll for Kobe
because think about it, Shack and Kobe and a pick
(10:26):
and roll, that's hard to stop. And Kobe also knew
when Shaq had, you know, the best matchup, go to him,
and thinking about it, Shaq was averaging thirty five plus
points in this series, so he knew the match. It
was always a pick and order, so there was no
There was never any you know few when it came
to that, because each and every guy on the team
(10:47):
knew their place. I do want to note one other
quick thing, because you had asked about pressure going into
that first year. Once Phil Jackson arrived, did it raise
the expectation level because of Phil's resume? Yes, But I
wrote this a couple of years ago when I was
writing about the lob and in that Game seven against Portland.
Before the season, Sports Illustrated had picked the Spurs to
(11:08):
win the championship. They were they had Duncan and Robinson,
they had just won. They picked them to repeat the Lakers.
They ranked third in the West behind the Spurs and Portland.
Vegas had the Spurs over the Lakers. Um A lot
of teams, a lot of places had picked either the
Blazers of the Spurs. The l A Times, the l
A Times, the hometown paper ranked the Lakers fifth in
(11:29):
the West before season, behind San Antonio, Poland, Utah and Phoenix.
I think they were enamored with that Jason Kidd, Penny
hardaway backcourt or something um, but that like the good
thing I had to read the paper back then. Sometimes
sometimes sometimes I wish I would have not to have
(11:50):
more motiv bastion. But it's just to say that, um,
Phil plus Shack plus Kobe plus great role players, yes,
equals three championship. But at that time it was still
people were still kind of a wait and see thing
with the Lakers. There those those flameouts. I think we're
still fresh in people's memories. You know. It was so
(12:11):
weird how that you sell this stuff and everybody put
so much onus on the triangle and oh, it's gonna
take a time to learn, And it really wasn't that
hard if you knew how to play basketball, and think
about our team, if we had a lot of veteran
smart players, so the triangle is pretty easy. It's just
that we tried to please feel so much and run
(12:32):
it to a t that sometimes we let that slow
us down. Because you can see when we played sometimes
we was like robots, like get here, get there, cut there,
And as you go through the years you can see
how guys got more comfortable and got the no field.
It was like, oh, nobody's perfect. We make mistakes, so
be it so I think that hasn't had a lot
to do it the first years, and everybody's like putting
(12:53):
so much onus on the triangle and being so difficult.
If you have smart players, there's nothing that's difficult to do.
All right, Let's get to the match up. The path
to the finals for the Lakers. Obviously, the previous year,
as has already been mentioned, they were swept in the
second round by the Spurs. This year they finished sixty
seven and fifteen and finished first in the Pacific Division
in the postseason. You know, as Howard, you know eloquently,
(13:15):
you know, broke down three two over the Kings, four
one over the Suns uh and then four three in
that epic showdown in in in the in the Western
Conference finals against the Blazers. You know what, I know,
we're running long. Let's go, let's go there really quickly.
Is that actually the start of this thing? I think
I think it was. It had been forming um. If
(13:36):
you look back at that last game in the form,
and to hear the spurs um talk about how we
shut the form down, we beat him the last game
in the form, it hurt because we know the history
of the Lakers and what has started in the form
and now we're going into a new building. So we
was like, oh, you know what, we gotta start our
(13:58):
own thing. We gotta started out history. You know it
is even though this is not not showtime, you know,
we got to start starting his new Laker dynasty and
his new image in the Staples. And I think that's
what that was in the back of my mind. I
can't speak for every but that was all in my head. Hey,
we got to start something new and we have the
team to do it. Yeah. I think that come back
(14:18):
against the Blazers, given as I was saying earlier, how
shaky the whole postseason had been and you're still not
sure they're gonna break through. So the comeback in the
fourth quarter of Game seven against the Blazers and that
Kobe too Shack lab. I mean, listen, I'm a writer.
I could not have uh created out of my head.
Nobody the best screenwriters in America, and I'm not that
(14:39):
uh the most creative uh novelists. I don't think it
could have scripted a better encapsulating moment than Kobe Too
Shack and that lab they already had. I think it
was a three or four point lead. The comeback had
already been completed in a lot of ways, but that
was this dagger that was the fatal blow to the
Blazers in that game. But it was also this moment
(15:00):
it that I felt like sealed the Kobe Shack partnership.
They had already been kind of up and down as
a twosome and as a team, but that moment, the
emotions of that moment, the intensity of it, the way
the crowd responded, the way Shack responded, the way I
think it just galvanized this Lakers team. Like if everybody
(15:21):
believed they were going to win the championship at that moment,
it's because of that moment, right, Like that's where the
confidence I think amongst the Lakers and of Laker fans
comes from. It's like, oh man, this is it. Like
these guys cannot be stopped. And even though we know
the next couple of years had their own bumps along
the way, especially with Shack and Kobe Um and they
flirted with disaster again in a seven game series in
(15:42):
the third year of the three pat against the Kings
in another conference finals, But that, to me, everything traces
back to the lab the Kobe to shack Lab I
think encapsulates pretty much that entire era. Yeah, I'm gonna
be honest with you. So you know you you watch that,
you're covering the team. Obviously, Rob you played in it.
I watched it as a just a fan and observer
(16:03):
of the game, and you know your lover of the game.
And I'll tell you for me, that was that was
absolutely the moment. That was the moment when I believe.
So let's say a quick break, say goodbye to Howard
from now, but he'll be back in part two when
we give out the series awards. When we come back,
it's time for Game one. All right, we're back here
(16:26):
on the NBA Finals following rob Let's go ahead and
jump in the Game one, which was basically a nightmare
for the Hall of Famer Reggie Miller. But the conversation
on this has to start because really this series was
all about Shaquille O'Neil for me. Uh and I mean
no disrespect. Obviously, you know a lot of you guys contributed,
But I'm talking about his physical presence because he was
the most physically dominant player I've ever seen. And that's
not taking anything away from Will Chamberlain. Or any of
(16:48):
the any of the priory big men that came before him,
because I didn't I wasn't privileged to see them. But
Game one of this, you know, for me, was all
about Shack absolutely enforcing his will on the Pacers front
line and and pretty much doing you know, whatever he
wanted out there dominantly started. You talk about dominant, you know,
(17:09):
he was the most dominant player to play the game.
You know, that's it's when we say dominant and talented,
you know, those two different things. The fact that you
had to send four or five guys at him to
stop him shows you his dominant kept saying, there's not
double the shock, and I kept saying good and stop
(17:30):
mentioning that want to hit you. And they saw why
you should always send three and four people after. And
I think this series was was gonna be hard for
them because they didn't have Antonio Davis from the previous season.
You know that I gave him some extra motions. They
just had, you know, Dale Davis and Rick Smith. When
you look at the Indiana Pacers, they're not a team
(17:51):
that has great depth on that front line. You're talking
about a Dale Davis, a Smith. You come in with Perkins.
Other than that, they don't have the big bodies to
be able to waste those kind of foul if. They
have to be very careful with that. And the other
big toy had sound Perkins. You know, he's a three
point shooter. He wasn't the guy that having the physicality.
So they were they were going to be in trouble
and it was going to figure out a scheme to
how to stop him. And in Game one they didn't
(18:14):
really know how to stop him. He was trying to
play him one on one, and he just straight up dominated,
big time dominated. It's like a man against boy. He's
here tonight, the scampiship. It's a lot of teams have
come up with strategies and defending against you, and none
of them have worked. How would you defend against yourself?
(18:39):
I wouldn't. I would just go home. I would think
of injury or something. And can you speak to the
mindset you know, of your mindset hidden into this series,
you know, considering you split with them in the regular
season and especially coming off of what it was a
bit of a grooming battle with the Blazers. Yeah, we
we would. We were battle tested because of that series
(19:00):
with the Blazers, and the Blazers was a team that
knew the triangle to a t because Scotty was on
that team, Scottie Pippen and he knew exactly what we
was running and how we were running, and so that
kind of threw us off kilted. But now we were
going to a situation even though Phil had came from
the East and coaching Chicago Blues was still running triangle
and um, the Pacers were familiar with this triangle, so
(19:21):
we were a little bit worried about that, but they
didn't really handle the triangle like we had to try.
And I mean we had a dominant big and not
just two outstanding guys on the perimeter. So when you
look at this matchup, we knew it was gonna go
to shack early in Alton, and that's what we did
from starting from game one throughout getting into the action.
It was interesting to see Jaalen Rod score the first
(19:42):
bucket of the series, only to have Kobe go right
but you know, right back to the baseline on the
other end with a turnaround over Reggie Miller the baseline.
Here's just turnaround shot. It was really kind of a
fun reminder of the competitors that he had. But you know,
from the start, you know, it just wasn't something that
started with you know, the twenty four Kobe, you know
he was that entering the league. Yeah, Kobe was. I
(20:05):
remember when I got traded to Lakers and we're going
through a shoot around and shoot arounds when you're a vet,
you don't even want to have on your shoes. You
want to have on your slides. And Kobe is going
a hundred miles of power doing shoot around. He because
he's man, this is we're doing a walk through, right,
were like, yeah, so in the games, we don't walk
through it, so we got as simulate it like they
were like, no, young fella, we we we don't do
(20:25):
it that way. But that was just his mindset. He
wanted to be battle tests that he want to be ready,
and he came out each and every night trying to
be ready because he had just put into work in
the in the locker room, in the weight room to
prepare for every moment on the court. And then on
the very next play down, shock you basically the shock
attacks started. And not to be anti cloomactic at the
very started this one, but it was all it was
(20:46):
pretty much all over, you know, but the shouting at
that stage, and now Harper looking for shock. He checks
it in deep and stop Ron Harper find Shack on
the block. He dropped steps on Dale Davis dunkster over
the top of Rick Smith's and got the foul rob.
I'm not even being hyperbolic about this, and I actually
think that we should add shacks drop step to that
(21:08):
group of all but unstoppable moves. When he had, you know,
when he had it rolling pretty much like the guyhood.
Do you agree with that? I totally agree with It's
not like most big men who operate on one side.
He could operate on both sides. He got to the
left block, he could do what he wants to. He
got to the right block, he do his jump books.
So you know he was done because when he spent
(21:28):
on you and he got his body on you, there
was nothing you could do. Be the file him and
get dunked on, or just let him dunk and get
out away and hope that you can get him back
on the other end. So he was just straight dominance
in the pain. Like we said, Oh, puts it down
it you love it. First quarter point, he's on his
way to forty point night and in that first quarter,
you guys almost doubled him up and you had ended,
(21:49):
you know, thirty three eighteen, and as mentioned, the game
was pretty much, you know, pretty much a route after
At that point, Regie Miller goes one for sixteen from
the floor. Was that a matter of strategy or was
just one of those crazy nights where he just couldn't
make a shot? Miller for three way off and I
whistle on the rebound. He has now one for fourteen.
And there's nothing worse than being on the road having
(22:11):
a kind of game that Reggie's having, and then happened
to be in that city for two more days before
you can play a game. That's all you're gonna hear
on TV, the radio, the newspapers. But Reggie Miller, we
know one thing. He will bounce back. He's done it
so many times before. Making it worse though. For Reggie,
this is his whole town. He told us yesterday, I'm
not taking calls from any friends. It's family. Only. Family
(22:35):
gets the tickets. All on the requests get a deaf ear.
I'm focusing on one thing and one thing only at
each play. I think if you look at who Reggie
Miller is as a person, as a competitor. He wanted
that game so bad, had been to the finals, playing
in his hometown. I think he put too much pressure
on himself. Can you watch guys play and you see
(22:56):
them like searching for shots, stressing now, trying to do
too much instead of letting the game come to them.
That's how Reggie was in that first game. He didn't
let the game come to him as normal, and he
didn't seek out shots to get himself going. But after
we saw he shot one for sixteen, he was like,
oh long, we're gonna be in trouble, because when a
guy goes one for sixteen like that, they normally come
(23:18):
out on fire the next couple of games. And you know, honestly, Rob,
that's an excellent point because that I hadn't even thought
about that. And you know what, for the listeners state,
we sometimes as as fans, we forget and I know
this is gonna sound crazy, and I mean no disrespect.
You guys are human beings. Like he's in his hometown
for the first time in his you know, in his
first opportunity to play in the finals. But here here
I'm watching it saying like, man, what's wrong with Reggie?
(23:40):
You know, like what, what's what's the matter with? You know?
The human element of it is and and that that's
one of the things that I appreciate most about having
these conversations with you is definitely cute. Yeah, I think
a lot of people forget that there's a little thing
called pressure that can affect some people. And when I
say pressure, that I mean people can't handle it by seeing.
Sometimes pressure makes you try to do things too much,
(24:02):
gives you too much of drilling. You know. I'd love
to say, you know, you know, pressure combust the pipe
and make a diamond, right, and so you're either gonna
be either or And I think Reggie in that game
the pipe burst on him, but next thing, you know,
he turns into a diamond. So you have to you
have to look out for things like that. And that's
the part that people get. The athletes are human beings,
absolutely so. Mark Jackson was actually really one of the
(24:22):
few bright spots for the Pacers in this one. Mark
Jackson backing in slipping Bryan and scoring. He puts up
eighteen seven and five while student sixth or eight from
the floor. The Pacers put you know, They did try
to claw back into it, you know, they got to
within six and the fourth quarter, but once again Shot
came through and put it away with another dominant fourth quarter.
This game is as a refrigerator. It does close the light.
(24:43):
You're out the exit, pulling the better, getting hired the
yellow Jacklin. This is going to be a name. I
feel like we're gonna mention a couple of times throughout
the show. Austin Crozier. Sam Perkins misses the three, but
Crozier is there very first. Little player Crochrie is outside
range on his jumper, quick first out and after putting
up sporting pounds with the wait till the off season,
he's rugging enough to do some dirty work inside. He
(25:06):
was really good for them off the bench, and this
one he had sixteen and six. Yeah. Also Crozer was
their X factor because throughout the season he was in
and out of the lineup. He wasn't playing much. And
then next thing you know, he comes to Austin Crozer
taking Chris Mullen the Hall of famere men is taking
Derry McKee by former alumni and Alabama taking his minute.
Because that's what that's what it's about. You have to
(25:28):
learn the game, and sometimes the light switch goes on.
I think for Austin the light switch went on for
him and he was just killing in this series. From
not to this game, Austin Crozer, Wow, he has been
really aggressive. They've gone to him and at low poets
that whoever's guarded him, he's been able to get the advantage.
What a big lift off the bench, Bob, he's been
for these pacers, absolutely and on your side of things,
(25:50):
you'll shack. This is ridiculous. He tunes him up for
forty three nineteen and three blocks Kobe at fourteen, Harp
had twelve, Rick Fox had eleven off the bench and
you spread it around a little bit and you did
a little bit of everything. You had six points, four boards,
three steals on a block for good measure, and the
Lakers end up taking Game one, eight seven. Well, the
(26:10):
Lakers showed no after effects have that amazing come from
behind win against Port, and I think the biggest concerned
were they gonna have a hangover sh act if not
let that happen tonight. He dominated from start to finish.
Big Game one victory here Port and Bob, Yeah, I
love the games, but I don't have to play that
much in this game rule around to the fourth quarter.
(26:31):
You know, this is a little inside information, right. I
used to always go to the starters and tell them
I don't want to play in the fourth quarter because
we had this thing where a C Green was start
and I wanted us to be up by so many points.
But I didn't have to play in the fourth quarter.
I'm not one of these guys. I'm not gonna try
to go get some stats. I care less about stat
I care about the dub and you know, preparing to rest,
(26:52):
uh what's saying this day day and age load management
on the bench. So I used to tell us that
I don't want to play in the fourth quarter. Well, honestly,
I'll be I understand that. And and this is something
that I probably should have mentioned at the start. You know,
you came into this series while yes, Shack had some
finals experience. You came into this series with hardware, you
had made runs already, So I can understand you you
(27:12):
bringing that mindset and kind of instilling it upon the team. Yeah,
that's the thing about you know, even though I was
still in my twenties at the time. Uh, you know,
everybody says, you know, it was twenty thousand. You was
about to be thirty, but who cared. I'd like to
think I was in my twenties, and we had We
had some championship predigrees on the team. Ron Harper had
won with the Bulls. We brought back A C. Green.
(27:32):
A C. Green had one championship with the Showtime Lakers.
B Shaw and Shaq had went to the finals when
they were in Orlando. So it was some championship experience
on our team. So I think that that was why
we were battle tested and we could perform during the playoffs.
Shout out to Spider, Sally, we we're gonna show him
some love too, right o, man, Spider was just over
to collect the check man. Fair enough, fair enough down.
(27:57):
We don't want to be down. TUESA episode, I think
the set emergency. All right, let's go in the game too,
because this is the game where Kobe goes down and
you know, Chack once again goes off. Indiana came out
firing in game two, you know, which definitely was expected
following the game one drubbing that you know that you
guys handed him. Reggie gets on the board first with
a mid range jumper, which absolutely had to feel good
(28:17):
coming off that one for sixteen Harris Miller. How long
they wait? It's not very very different result. And you
can feel the hush and the Staples Center here they
you know what this guy is capable up. He can
electrify his team with his shooting. That's what Rob. Have
you ever had a night like this and you know
where you simply just couldn't hit the broadside of a barn.
(28:38):
I'm asking it because sorry, I'm asking. I'm asking because
I want to know what you possibly, what Reggie's mindset
was coming into this. Well, you know, when you're the
top dog of the team, you're gonna get your shots.
You don't even think about it. You just said, Okay,
that was a bad night. You're gonna have one out
of a two games. And this is a playoff. I
know everybody's like, oh, the spotlights on you in the playoffs.
You you can't have those games. You're human. You're gonna
(29:00):
have those games. And I've had them throughout my life,
throughout my career, and you just brush it off, You
forget about it. As an athlete, you have to have
a really good short term memory. You almost have to
have amnesia. Sometimes when it comes to you gotta forget
about it because there's the next game, and next game
is always always the most important game. They came to win.
One game is the game tonight, backs at the wall
(29:22):
and they'll play a lot of energy. So build yourself
up to what this game is gonna demand. So they
the page was actually held a twelve seven leader to
start of this game, Killer Miller underneath play it up
and play. We've got a different ball game, right. And
I made this note because I don't remember really seeing
this very often. They had Phil calling an early time out.
(29:44):
Did he do that very often? No? He did not.
The thing about feeling is he was so into us
figuring it out for ourselves because he was like, if
you can go out and and and get yourself composed
and do what you need to get yourself back on track,
I can sell. But here relax and for us when
he hardly ever called time out, Um, you can go
(30:04):
back to previous series against Portland, he would sit down,
we might be the other team might be ona intend
to run. He was like, figure it out, because this
is gonna be who you are. This is going to
define who you are. Where in other games, because you've
got to think about this times when the team goes
on a twelve to run or something like that, you
might need that time out for later. So you've got
(30:25):
to figure it out for yourself, and veteran teams can
figure it out. That's exactly where I was gonna go
with it as a follow up. Is it was it
a matter of he simply knew that you guys had
already put it in the work prior to this, so
you you guys should have been able to figure it out.
Or was it also a combination of just understanding that
you know, he could he could respect the fact that
you guys have been there before, so you should be
able to uh, you know, he respected the process, he
(30:46):
respected the guys he that that were on the court,
and he says, Okay, you're smart enough. You've been in
the league long enough that you know that it's about
a game of runs. Um find a way to stop
a run, you know, pull it out. Because you can
see hart Ron Harper is our veteran leader on the
cod who had been in the triangle, had one championships
on the field. He would literally just hold the ball
(31:06):
and point and get everybody directs is almost like saying
to everybody, take a deep breath, calm down, les execute.
They clear it out on the hardwork. Still got it.
Now the dribble, now the faceline. The layout gone at
Miller explodes for six quick points Facer team and we surface.
(31:26):
So Kobe shows versatility just inside the six mark of
the first as he blocks Mark Jackson on one end
and then he sheds Reggie before jumping in the air
to draw Rick Smith so that he could dump it
down to a deeply rooted Shack for an end. Here's
Bryan six on Reggie defending shot Rob. Can you just
(31:48):
can you please just describe what it's like the face
Shack in the post, particularly when he had that post
defender on his hip. And I had face Schack previous
years and ninety five and the finals, and he was
dominant then, but he was a whole another beast at
this moment. He had got stronger, he had got faster.
So you've got guys on on the pacers that aren't
(32:09):
used to this. You know, you can try to immolate
Shack and practice, but there's nothing to it until you
really got them fill him. And Shack was the type
of guy once he got in that circle, that charge circle,
you might well get out of way, because unless you
grabbed him and held onto him tight, and that still
might not work. He was gonna go up and dunk
on you. And so Rick Smith's not the strongest guy.
(32:32):
We know how strong Dale Davis was, but it was
just a battle for them to try to stop Shack.
I'm not gonna lie. I actually felt for him and
in this series. So then Kobe rolls his ankle at
the three minute market, you know, as he comes down
on Jalen's foot after a jumper down his ankle hurt paint.
That's bad news for the Los Angeles Lakers as they
(32:54):
hold their collective breath. But the Stables not good folks.
That could be trouble in River City. First, what's going
through your heads? You know, as it's as it's clear
he can't continue, you know, it's it's we thought maybe
he just tweaked it and he failed because we continue
to play. You know, we went down and they actually
shot it. We went back. We went back down and
(33:15):
was like okay, because Kobe got up. You know, most
times when guys are hurting that bad, they're gonna stay
on the floor. They got up, he tried to run
back down, but then you know, he just he couldn't
do it. We had to file and get him out there.
I was like, oh, lor I saw I Hope it's
not bad. Hopefu's just smileth hope he can go in
and tape, retape and come back out. But the good
thing about that is we had started the season without
(33:37):
Kobe that year. Um he was hurt and so we
have been used to playing without him, so we had
to experience. And that's a good thing about having a
guy like a Glenn Rice. He was a former All
Star who could come out there and take over the outside,
the moving around. You know, he will go down and
pick up the story. That's the good thing about having
(34:00):
of veteran like a a Brian Shaw and a c
Green and Aron Harper, who all had that that pedigree
of being in the playoffs, so we wouldn't worry. We
kind of got together and say, hey, look, we all
want to keep players down, so we got to pick
it up. They're gonna sense that they're gonna have an
advantage because COBE's out, But we had to turn the
(34:22):
tables on that. Rob. Was there any part of you
guys that thought that Jayleen might have done that on purpose.
I know that he's he's kind of acknowledged that after
the fact, but I mean, in the moment, was there
any thought of that? In the moment, we didn't think
about it. And then you go back and look at
the tape because we watched film and we saw it,
it was like, did that look like he did that
on purpose? After this is when rule started changing because
(34:45):
Jalen just didn't do it to Kobe. You can see
a lot of guys the way he played, and I
played with a guy named Bruce Boyd. You know, that
was just the way he played. He I don't think
he did on purpose, but when he would contest, he
would do that. And he stepped under a lot of
people too. But it's just some guys. That's the way
they played defense. You know, I don't think they had
anything malicious intent behind it, but sometimes it happened. Man,
(35:06):
that's terrible. I mean it's terrible. Honestly, as a fan
of the game, you never necessarily expect to hear that.
But then again, you guys are competitors. I I can
see you know, folks. Sometimes folks will go to extreme lens. Yeah,
we've not debt extreme absolutely absolutely. So it's tied at
sixty at the midway point of the third and it
stayed that way for pretty much, you know, most of
(35:26):
the quarter. But when the last minute it kind of
felt like Shaq flipped the switch once again. He swatched
big Sam Perkins on one end, then he makes a
twelve turnaround twelve foot or on the other end. Then
he starts the fourth with a drop step lay up
over Perkins once again, Perkins inside, but you shot. You
can see it coming from our about the point. Even
if Perkins can't, Shack was closing round about him. There
(35:47):
was no way that shot was going to see the ram.
Perkins comes down and banks in at three on the
other end, only to have Shaq come right back down,
back him up under the basket even before you receiving
the past from Brian Shaw, and he dunked it over
the top once again. Something you don't turn around down
but you want that's all the lay up and that's
(36:09):
not a dome. I mean, really not to beat the
dead horse. There really just wasn't a good answer for
Shack at this stage in his career. Uh, it was
as his m v P year. He was showing his dominance.
He was trying to get his first ring. There was
so many things that he had on his mind that
he wanted to do for this team. You know, he
wanted to carry him to the promise. Then. You know,
(36:30):
he was that type of guy that had been there before,
tasted it, but didn't get the full satisfaction of that.
And now he was able to. He could see it,
he could see it coming down the pipe, and he
went down and just dominate those guys in the paint.
The Pacers, to their credit, they did keep fighting. This
one passed the fox perch years, got it loose, Austin
Urger picks it up, thirst for the lay up. Yeah,
(36:51):
hustle players that the Paciers must have had answered every
challenge of Lakers, but ultimately it was too a little
bit too late because you call a pass from Shackle
on the baseline and basically just flipped, you know, casually
just flipped the ball over your head for the bucket,
and the foul in the paint Beauliber Shaquille O'Neal, putting
(37:15):
the Lakers back up six with a minute ago. Well,
can can you can you walk us through that play?
Why were you being so casual, so cool about that? Man?
This is a reverse lay. You know you. Shack was
excellent passing. Um. People don't give him enough credit. How
he didn't mind passing. He would look for you on
the cut because he knew if he hits you on
the cut, not once, not twice, but three times, that
(37:35):
was gonna open up for him because nobody was gonna
leave us. And and he found me on the baseline,
a little flip of the wrist and you know it
was in. You know, just the flip of the wrist
and the bucket goes in. But you know, think about
that is we always talk about Shock and his dumbads,
and he was the one that helped us each and
every day get better because it's we always think about
point guards making the people around them better with their passing.
(37:59):
You know, Shock, that's what he did because we fed
off him, he was able to cut off him, and
he was an excellent passer. Now the Pacers are Firefox?
What Fox? What's it in the icebox? Folks? The two
teams basically just traded buckets in the final minute, and
your Lakers wind up taking it one eleven, one oh four.
(38:22):
Ryan equidial plays the pride toward the face file. Time
for one more break before we get to Game three,
when the series shifts to Indiana and the Pacers face
a must win Game three. Al Right, we're back here
(38:46):
on NBA Finals. Fire Rob, Let's go ahead and jump
into game three because this is Reggie's revenge. So Kobe's out.
You know, you guys are facing the team you know
that's gonna be desperate. They're trying to avoid going down three,
you know, three oh or oh three in the finals.
I guess it depends on your effective what's the tone
in the locker room and what was Phil Jackson's messaging
heading into that game in Indiana. Um, it was no Kobe,
(39:08):
no problem for us. You know, we started the season
enough without Kobe. We said we're gonna miss him, but
we got capable guys that's gonna feel his brow. You know,
Brian Shaw started that started that game. He's a guy
that has a great rapport shock when it comes to
doing the Shockshaw redemption was what they called it. That
means that ali the shock. So we didn't we didn't
really worry Abody too much, but we knew Reggie was
(39:29):
going home, and our key was to try to, you know,
keep Reggie at bay, keep him up the three point line,
make him a driver, and and pretty much not let
Austin Crozer get off even more because those were our
two keys. We even figured everybody else can get there.
But those two guys were like our focused in game three.
So with Kobe out, it looked like the Pacers were
(39:51):
focused even more on pushing tempo whenever possible, I mean,
for obvious reasons, you know, And they got off to
a really good starting this one. Taylor sent it download
of Perkins half better at Miller's. He's got an anger
on Folk, He's finally found an enemy. Reggie was back
to his normal self. Jalen was good for the Pacers
at the start once again, and they were really dictating
(40:12):
Pacer off that first quarter, and they were playing like
their proverbial playoff. Life was on the line, Reggie for
three blazing start. They were up pretty big in the
second quarter, but attend to run punctuated by a dunk
on the break from you, of course, off a Fisher pass.
(40:33):
It's a three on two break and already is there
to finish it. That's what I was talking about. Now
it's down to seven. As strongly as Indiana has played,
the Lakers are making a push. That's what great teams
do at the end of quarters and halves. It was fifteen.
The Lakers are on a tend to run. It got
you guys back to within striking distance. So they're up
(40:54):
eleven at the half. Now I'm wondering what figure like.
So you told me you no code, no problem going
in and what fills halftime conversation with you guys like now?
You know, Phil was always trying to keep light of
the situations. He was like, we have him right where
we want them, you know, and think about it. We
only scored fifteen points in that first quarter. It's not
that hasn't been us in the first two games. So
(41:15):
we wanted to come out and just focus on Reggie
because Reggie is that guy that know in his building
he's extraordinary, so we were really worried about him. Of course,
he was still worried about Jalen Rose because he was
that guy as they secondly, well was a leading scored
throughout the season, but at the time, you know, he
was like the batman to rob until Reggie Miller's batman
(41:37):
might set the Lakers have turnovers come close. We were
just saying, just focus sty out of foul trouble, just
keep pounding inside the shock and knocked down some shots,
(42:01):
lays out, shots out, and you guys definitely tried that.
But he was honestly more of the same in the
second half. It honestly, it just felt like they were
hitting you guys in waves. If they weren't knocking down
timely shots, they were really pushing pace and running whenever possible.
Unbelievable Lakers having unravel. You know, Reggie winds up putting
(42:23):
up thirty three. You know Jalen, you know, to your
to your credit, as you just mentioned, he chips in
with twenty one as well. But I actually want to
talk about this guy because Travis Best gave Indianas some
really good minute throughout this one. Travis Best plus the
Hulk to that. For Travis Best, we talked about his struggles.
He's got a lay up here in the game. Now.
The little someone might look at that box score and say, Okay,
(42:44):
he scored fourteen, But he scored fourteen off the bench,
and he hit some key shots at moments when you
guys were trying to get back in it alone. The
way can you speak to Travis Best in his game
and what it actually might you know, let's have some fun.
What would Travis Best look like in today's game as
well and this day? And as Travis would be a
beast um. He's a crafty player, he got great handles.
He can shoot it over the top with the best
(43:04):
of It's so many times I thought that Shock was
gonna block his shot, but he got up and over
Shock off the last into the into the buckets the gaga.
Don't get wrong. Fish is a heck of a defender,
and he was footstep for footstep with Best, but Best
(43:24):
was getting the best of him, sort of say, and
I think when you look at situations like that, you know,
sometimes better offense beats better defense. And he was Travis Best,
Austin Crows, Sam Perker's those two, those three guys off
the bench was to provide so much firepower for the
for the pacers, and then from the Laker side of things,
you know, Shock did still have thirty three and thirteen.
You know you've got some nice contributions, Harp. You know
(43:46):
through in fourteen you spread it around again. Ten seven
and six. Fish had a nice double double off the bench,
tin and ten. But he really just felt like you
were missing the second half of that one to punch. Yeah,
you know, when you end in finals, you have to
have a one to buch and which shock being there
and Kobe not being there. We missed that because if
you look at Reggie Miller and Jayalen Rose, they came
(44:08):
out with U fifty four points between the two and
them the way to it and Miller's got it on
the steel. He's gonna pull up out of the ark
and let it go fire a train. Yes, Miller work out.
He's dancing, he's trying sing up and down. And so
(44:29):
when you got your two top dogs scoring like that
half your points for the game, you gotta have another
guy who can get twenty plus points. And you know,
not no disrespect anybody on our team. We just didn't
have a guy who could create like Kobe Bryant could
and to get his own shot past the two games
to watch and these hoosherstat White for what said I
So the patients end up taking this one one and
(44:51):
ninety one in an effort to make a series of it,
and you know, of course we got a series now.
But on that note, let's go ahead and wrap up here,
but don't miss part two when Kobe Bryant becomes a
superstar and Howard Beck comes back for our end of
series awards. Mmmm.
Welcome to the NBA Finals File with Robert Or and
Jabari Davis. I am Jabari, former NBA writer, current podcaster,
and I'm joined by seven time champ big Shot Bob himself,
Robert Orrid Jabari. I'm so happy to be here that
because we've got a special guest coming home. I called
(00:24):
him Fred, but his name is not Fred, but I'm
gonna let you introduce it. Yes, as you mentioned, a
very very special guest. The specialist of guests joining the show.
Former Lakers beat writer for the l A Daily News,
current senior writer for Sports Illustrated, and the host of
The Crossover podcast, Howard Beck. Thanks so much for joining us,
our gentlemen, thank you for having me excited for this.
I'm very excited. Only Rob can call me Fred. By
(00:46):
the way, I love the fact that your your your
your podcast is called the Crossover. I'm not even going
because you don't think I could pull across myself your repertoire,
but we'll let that slide. That's for another day. It's
a metaphor. It's just a gonna tag the guests as
we as we introduce them. But you know this, this
(01:09):
is the thing that I have so much love for
all those guys who covered us back when I was
with the Lakers, because these guys that we had covered us,
they were good guys and they will come to you
if there was something that was kind of sketchy and
talk to you about it before they went to press
with it. So that's why I got to love with
a lot of love for these guys. I can completely
understand that. Okay, so let's go ahead jump into it.
(01:31):
On today's show, we're going to deep dive into the
two thousand NBA Finals between the Los Angeles Lakers and
the Indiana Pacers. This is m v P peak shack
number one in scoring number two and the rebounds number three,
block shots for us. Since the game almost and only
three people played more minutes as you were leading her
(01:52):
team to six seven victoration. It's a pleasure to watch
you grow. Congratulations U, NBA m v P Shaquille Dale.
From this day on, I would like to be known
as the Big Aristotle, because it was Aristotle who said
(02:12):
excellence is not a singular act, but I have it.
You are what you repeatedly do and still young, crazy
talented Kobe along with you know, the one and only
Robert Ory versus Reggie Miller, Jalen Rose and Mark Jackson
leading to pacers. So guys, let's go ahead and jump
into the historical significance of this matchup. We've got Phil Jackson,
it's its seventh NBA finals, the head coach. If I'm
not mistaken, it's Larry Bird's first shot on this side
(02:35):
of things. It's Shock and Kobe it's their first finals together.
Obviously it's Shack second. But Howard, let's go directly to you.
What was the general feeling about this matchup heading into
the series, at least amongst the media. Well, you know,
it's funny to think about this, uh looking back with
you know, twenty two years of of gap in between,
(02:55):
because as Rob will attest, like, we look back now
through this rose colored prism of it was a dynasty.
We know that and all that's all people today, if
they didn't live through it, would know they won three straight.
So they were dominant. They weren't always that dominance. Total
(03:17):
domination by the experience you patcast as your palidate Los
Angeles Lakers, and nothing was ever assured. And the thing
I remember most about the first championship in two thousand.
Is that this thing always felt like it was like just,
you know, a fraction away from falling apart um. Did
everybody pick the Lakers to beat the Pacers in the finals?
(03:39):
I think probably close to unanimous outside of the state
of Indiana. And the Lakers had won sixty seven games.
Certainly that's a dominant number. No team that had ever
won that many games or more had ever not won
a championship. I believe they had winning streaks within that
season of sixteen games, nineteen games, eleven games. And it
was the first year under Phil Jackson. But listen, at
(04:01):
the beginning of that season, it was the triangle offense
takes time. It's gonna take time to adapt to Phil Jackson.
Don't expect a championship in year one. Kobe is still
really young at that point, uh And that Dy won
sixty seven games was already I think a bit of
a surprise for a lot of people, because the Lakers
of Shack and Kobe in their early years had been
seen as kind of underachievers. On top of that, this
(04:23):
is this is the premise for going into the finals.
This team was flirting with disaster the entire postseason. First
round back then is the best of five. They beat Sacramento.
It's a one eight matchup. They beat him the first
two games, they lose the next to its Sacramento. Suddenly
they're facing a possible elimination in game five at home,
but they blew them out. It was fine, but still
(04:43):
flirting with disaster. Round two. They go up three. Oh
on the Sun's get their butts just kicked out of
the gym in game four, can't close it out. Phil
Jackson has the world's shortest press conference after that one
and then of course the Western Conference Finals against a
very deep, very talented port the Trailblazers team Shack doesn't
do it today. Everything he's accomplished this year goes up
(05:04):
and smoke. That's what the m v P is all about.
They're up three to one, can't close it out in
game five, can't close it out in game six. Suddenly
it's game seven, and oh, by the way, game seven,
as we know, they're down fifteen points in the fourth
quarter at home. This is the Lakers are at their
mercy right now. They totally collapse. The Trailblazers have blown
(05:27):
it open. The Staples Center is sitting in stunned silence.
Incredible comeback, capped by, of course that iconic Kobe is
Shack Love tell me on the mode loud, throw me
Bryant work and the right hand burner put the champagne
away to get off the bottle of water. Look at
(05:48):
that's all we're gonna tras come our way home. There
was Shakill again, like he white, like we had written
his back all year, found a way to catch it
and bring it down and come out of that crowd
under the basket, you know, as animated as ever, and
you talk about growing up and conquering demons all in
(06:09):
one one twelve minutes swoop, but still flirting with disaster.
So did we just assume the Lakers would beat the
Pacers in the finals. They were favored. Dad Shack and
Kobe had some pretty nice favorite man your favorite you
know we you know it's l a You need to drama,
(06:30):
you need to suspense. So we were just trying to
keep it with all the jones is because all the
actors that would come to the game. We just wanted
to't hey, we know how to ask a little drama
to the thing, just like you do. You guys, you
guys did it well. And thank you for the compliment earlier,
Rob when you say that we weren't looking for selation stories.
We didn't have to look for them or dig them up.
You guys just provided them naturally. So you know, I
(06:52):
gotta be honest with you. I was kind of thinking
the same thing because I was like, Hey, I watched
this as a fan, and I remember a ton of stories.
He's that with you. Okay, you came from those teams, Tames,
but to kind of to the point some of the
points that you just made. You know, given the fact
that you were a beat writer, that you're covering your team, Well,
let me ask this, did you cover the previous years
prior to this one? You were you were you covering
(07:12):
and and so on. Yeah, So my first year covering
the Lakers for the l A Daily News was the
ninety seven ninety eight season. So that's Shack of Koby's
second year together, but kind of the first one where
a lot of a lot of the key role players
had come in. Like the the outline of what we
think of that era where it's just not just Shack
of Koby, but d Fish, Rob Rick Fox, Brian Shaw,
(07:33):
Ron Harper, like all that's It's it's all kind of
coming together piece by piece over those those couple of years.
But yeah, I started in so I got to see them. Sorry, Rob,
I'm gonna give you a lot of PTSD on this
on this podcast. But like God, saw them swept by
the Jazz and ninety eight saw him swept by the
Spurs and ninety nine everybody was saying, but I can
honestly say we weren't close to many championship caliber team
(07:57):
del Harris being fired, Kurt Rambis being installed, and then
Kurt being pushed aside for Phil Jackson. A lot of
tumult in those first couple of years. Plus was the
lockout season, and so that was its own brand of weirdness.
And oh yeah, Dennis Rodman came and went for about
thirty days. Oh I was gonna say, don't forget the
Dinnis Ryme experience, because that was an adventure in itself.
(08:17):
Oh yeah, I'm actually I asked both of you guys this,
with the added pressure of those previous playoff failures, was
there a sense of that there was an added level
of pressure given the expectations, especially after such a dominant
regular season in Phil Jackson's first year with the team.
I go first on this um. For us, we were
just happy to get out of the West. You know
(08:38):
what we said, we get out of west the East,
there's no problem. So it wasn't any pressure. Their pressure
is like, okay, we need to go out and perform,
which everybody, everybody has that pressure. But I think it
was so much pressure playing at home. It was so much,
you know, put upon us, because it's like, hey, Philip Jackson,
he had Michael Jody had Scottie Pippen, He's gonna win
(08:59):
a championship. Now we got you know, Shock, we got Kobe,
we should win a championship. And so you had that pressure.
And people think that we worry about you know, the fans,
the media, and that actually we worry about each other
more going out and performing for your fellow teammate because
you never want to let them down. You want to
go out and do your best. And we were that
(09:21):
type of team. You know. You hear all the rumors
throughout the years about the Shock Kobe feud, and for me,
I and as teammates, we never experienced that in the
locker room. We never experienced that on the bus, We
never experienced that on the floor, because if you look,
when you're in championships, the person you closest with, that's
the person the first person you hug. And every time
(09:42):
we won a championship, you know, Shock and Kobe hug.
So it was to me there was really no pressure externally.
It was always pressure internally. What was the dynamic between
Shack and Kobe at this point in their respective careers.
Obviously Kobe still very you know, very early in his career. Shack,
you know, we had a couple more years in the league.
What was the actual dynamic. No, the dynamic was good. Um,
(10:03):
they understand it's just a thing about sports, and especially
in basketball. We all know a pick and order. Um
we know who to go to guys, and whose second,
who's third and fourth and so on and so on.
And I think Shaq understood down the stretch when we
need a creative basket. He was always breaking up play
and going to set a pick and roll for Kobe
because think about it, Shack and Kobe and a pick
(10:26):
and roll, that's hard to stop. And Kobe also knew
when Shaq had, you know, the best matchup, go to him,
and thinking about it, Shaq was averaging thirty five plus
points in this series, so he knew the match. It
was always a pick and order, so there was no
There was never any you know few when it came
to that, because each and every guy on the team
(10:47):
knew their place. I do want to note one other
quick thing, because you had asked about pressure going into
that first year. Once Phil Jackson arrived, did it raise
the expectation level because of Phil's resume? Yes, But I
wrote this a couple of years ago when I was
writing about the lob and in that Game seven against Portland.
Before the season, Sports Illustrated had picked the Spurs to
(11:08):
win the championship. They were they had Duncan and Robinson,
they had just won. They picked them to repeat the Lakers.
They ranked third in the West behind the Spurs and Portland.
Vegas had the Spurs over the Lakers. Um A lot
of teams, a lot of places had picked either the
Blazers of the Spurs. The l A Times, the l
A Times, the hometown paper ranked the Lakers fifth in
(11:29):
the West before season, behind San Antonio, Poland, Utah and Phoenix.
I think they were enamored with that Jason Kidd, Penny
hardaway backcourt or something um, but that like the good
thing I had to read the paper back then. Sometimes
sometimes sometimes I wish I would have not to have
(11:50):
more motiv bastion. But it's just to say that, um,
Phil plus Shack plus Kobe plus great role players, yes,
equals three championship. But at that time it was still
people were still kind of a wait and see thing
with the Lakers. There those those flameouts. I think we're
still fresh in people's memories. You know. It was so
(12:11):
weird how that you sell this stuff and everybody put
so much onus on the triangle and oh, it's gonna
take a time to learn, And it really wasn't that
hard if you knew how to play basketball, and think
about our team, if we had a lot of veteran
smart players, so the triangle is pretty easy. It's just
that we tried to please feel so much and run
(12:32):
it to a t that sometimes we let that slow
us down. Because you can see when we played sometimes
we was like robots, like get here, get there, cut there,
And as you go through the years you can see
how guys got more comfortable and got the no field.
It was like, oh, nobody's perfect. We make mistakes, so
be it so I think that hasn't had a lot
to do it the first years, and everybody's like putting
(12:53):
so much onus on the triangle and being so difficult.
If you have smart players, there's nothing that's difficult to do.
All right, Let's get to the match up. The path
to the finals for the Lakers. Obviously, the previous year,
as has already been mentioned, they were swept in the
second round by the Spurs. This year they finished sixty
seven and fifteen and finished first in the Pacific Division
in the postseason. You know, as Howard, you know eloquently,
(13:15):
you know, broke down three two over the Kings, four
one over the Suns uh and then four three in
that epic showdown in in in the in the Western
Conference finals against the Blazers. You know what, I know,
we're running long. Let's go, let's go there really quickly.
Is that actually the start of this thing? I think
I think it was. It had been forming um. If
(13:36):
you look back at that last game in the form,
and to hear the spurs um talk about how we
shut the form down, we beat him the last game
in the form, it hurt because we know the history
of the Lakers and what has started in the form
and now we're going into a new building. So we
was like, oh, you know what, we gotta start our
(13:58):
own thing. We gotta started out history. You know it
is even though this is not not showtime, you know,
we got to start starting his new Laker dynasty and
his new image in the Staples. And I think that's
what that was in the back of my mind. I
can't speak for every but that was all in my head. Hey,
we got to start something new and we have the
team to do it. Yeah. I think that come back
(14:18):
against the Blazers, given as I was saying earlier, how
shaky the whole postseason had been and you're still not
sure they're gonna break through. So the comeback in the
fourth quarter of Game seven against the Blazers and that
Kobe too Shack lab. I mean, listen, I'm a writer.
I could not have uh created out of my head.
Nobody the best screenwriters in America, and I'm not that
(14:39):
uh the most creative uh novelists. I don't think it
could have scripted a better encapsulating moment than Kobe Too
Shack and that lab they already had. I think it
was a three or four point lead. The comeback had
already been completed in a lot of ways, but that
was this dagger that was the fatal blow to the
Blazers in that game. But it was also this moment
(15:00):
it that I felt like sealed the Kobe Shack partnership.
They had already been kind of up and down as
a twosome and as a team, but that moment, the
emotions of that moment, the intensity of it, the way
the crowd responded, the way Shack responded, the way I
think it just galvanized this Lakers team. Like if everybody
(15:21):
believed they were going to win the championship at that moment,
it's because of that moment, right, Like that's where the
confidence I think amongst the Lakers and of Laker fans
comes from. It's like, oh man, this is it. Like
these guys cannot be stopped. And even though we know
the next couple of years had their own bumps along
the way, especially with Shack and Kobe Um and they
flirted with disaster again in a seven game series in
(15:42):
the third year of the three pat against the Kings
in another conference finals, But that, to me, everything traces
back to the lab the Kobe to shack Lab I
think encapsulates pretty much that entire era. Yeah, I'm gonna
be honest with you. So you know you you watch that,
you're covering the team. Obviously, Rob you played in it.
I watched it as a just a fan and observer
(16:03):
of the game, and you know your lover of the game.
And I'll tell you for me, that was that was
absolutely the moment. That was the moment when I believe.
So let's say a quick break, say goodbye to Howard
from now, but he'll be back in part two when
we give out the series awards. When we come back,
it's time for Game one. All right, we're back here
(16:26):
on the NBA Finals following rob Let's go ahead and
jump in the Game one, which was basically a nightmare
for the Hall of Famer Reggie Miller. But the conversation
on this has to start because really this series was
all about Shaquille O'Neil for me. Uh and I mean
no disrespect. Obviously, you know a lot of you guys contributed,
But I'm talking about his physical presence because he was
the most physically dominant player I've ever seen. And that's
not taking anything away from Will Chamberlain. Or any of
(16:48):
the any of the priory big men that came before him,
because I didn't I wasn't privileged to see them. But
Game one of this, you know, for me, was all
about Shack absolutely enforcing his will on the Pacers front
line and and pretty much doing you know, whatever he
wanted out there dominantly started. You talk about dominant, you know,
(17:09):
he was the most dominant player to play the game.
You know, that's it's when we say dominant and talented,
you know, those two different things. The fact that you
had to send four or five guys at him to
stop him shows you his dominant kept saying, there's not
double the shock, and I kept saying good and stop
(17:30):
mentioning that want to hit you. And they saw why
you should always send three and four people after. And
I think this series was was gonna be hard for
them because they didn't have Antonio Davis from the previous season.
You know that I gave him some extra motions. They
just had, you know, Dale Davis and Rick Smith. When
you look at the Indiana Pacers, they're not a team
(17:51):
that has great depth on that front line. You're talking
about a Dale Davis, a Smith. You come in with Perkins.
Other than that, they don't have the big bodies to
be able to waste those kind of foul if. They
have to be very careful with that. And the other
big toy had sound Perkins. You know, he's a three
point shooter. He wasn't the guy that having the physicality.
So they were they were going to be in trouble
and it was going to figure out a scheme to
how to stop him. And in Game one they didn't
(18:14):
really know how to stop him. He was trying to
play him one on one, and he just straight up dominated,
big time dominated. It's like a man against boy. He's
here tonight, the scampiship. It's a lot of teams have
come up with strategies and defending against you, and none
of them have worked. How would you defend against yourself?
(18:39):
I wouldn't. I would just go home. I would think
of injury or something. And can you speak to the
mindset you know, of your mindset hidden into this series,
you know, considering you split with them in the regular
season and especially coming off of what it was a
bit of a grooming battle with the Blazers. Yeah, we
we would. We were battle tested because of that series
(19:00):
with the Blazers, and the Blazers was a team that
knew the triangle to a t because Scotty was on
that team, Scottie Pippen and he knew exactly what we
was running and how we were running, and so that
kind of threw us off kilted. But now we were
going to a situation even though Phil had came from
the East and coaching Chicago Blues was still running triangle
and um, the Pacers were familiar with this triangle, so
(19:21):
we were a little bit worried about that, but they
didn't really handle the triangle like we had to try.
And I mean we had a dominant big and not
just two outstanding guys on the perimeter. So when you
look at this matchup, we knew it was gonna go
to shack early in Alton, and that's what we did
from starting from game one throughout getting into the action.
It was interesting to see Jaalen Rod score the first
(19:42):
bucket of the series, only to have Kobe go right
but you know, right back to the baseline on the
other end with a turnaround over Reggie Miller the baseline.
Here's just turnaround shot. It was really kind of a
fun reminder of the competitors that he had. But you know,
from the start, you know, it just wasn't something that
started with you know, the twenty four Kobe, you know
he was that entering the league. Yeah, Kobe was. I
(20:05):
remember when I got traded to Lakers and we're going
through a shoot around and shoot arounds when you're a vet,
you don't even want to have on your shoes. You
want to have on your slides. And Kobe is going
a hundred miles of power doing shoot around. He because
he's man, this is we're doing a walk through, right,
were like, yeah, so in the games, we don't walk
through it, so we got as simulate it like they
were like, no, young fella, we we we don't do
(20:25):
it that way. But that was just his mindset. He
wanted to be battle tests that he want to be ready,
and he came out each and every night trying to
be ready because he had just put into work in
the in the locker room, in the weight room to
prepare for every moment on the court. And then on
the very next play down, shock you basically the shock
attacks started. And not to be anti cloomactic at the
very started this one, but it was all it was
(20:46):
pretty much all over, you know, but the shouting at
that stage, and now Harper looking for shock. He checks
it in deep and stop Ron Harper find Shack on
the block. He dropped steps on Dale Davis dunkster over
the top of Rick Smith's and got the foul rob.
I'm not even being hyperbolic about this, and I actually
think that we should add shacks drop step to that
(21:08):
group of all but unstoppable moves. When he had, you know,
when he had it rolling pretty much like the guyhood.
Do you agree with that? I totally agree with It's
not like most big men who operate on one side.
He could operate on both sides. He got to the
left block, he could do what he wants to. He
got to the right block, he do his jump books.
So you know he was done because when he spent
(21:28):
on you and he got his body on you, there
was nothing you could do. Be the file him and
get dunked on, or just let him dunk and get
out away and hope that you can get him back
on the other end. So he was just straight dominance
in the pain. Like we said, Oh, puts it down
it you love it. First quarter point, he's on his
way to forty point night and in that first quarter,
you guys almost doubled him up and you had ended,
(21:49):
you know, thirty three eighteen, and as mentioned, the game
was pretty much, you know, pretty much a route after
At that point, Regie Miller goes one for sixteen from
the floor. Was that a matter of strategy or was
just one of those crazy nights where he just couldn't
make a shot? Miller for three way off and I
whistle on the rebound. He has now one for fourteen.
And there's nothing worse than being on the road having
(22:11):
a kind of game that Reggie's having, and then happened
to be in that city for two more days before
you can play a game. That's all you're gonna hear
on TV, the radio, the newspapers. But Reggie Miller, we
know one thing. He will bounce back. He's done it
so many times before. Making it worse though. For Reggie,
this is his whole town. He told us yesterday, I'm
not taking calls from any friends. It's family. Only. Family
(22:35):
gets the tickets. All on the requests get a deaf ear.
I'm focusing on one thing and one thing only at
each play. I think if you look at who Reggie
Miller is as a person, as a competitor. He wanted
that game so bad, had been to the finals, playing
in his hometown. I think he put too much pressure
on himself. Can you watch guys play and you see
(22:56):
them like searching for shots, stressing now, trying to do
too much instead of letting the game come to them.
That's how Reggie was in that first game. He didn't
let the game come to him as normal, and he
didn't seek out shots to get himself going. But after
we saw he shot one for sixteen, he was like,
oh long, we're gonna be in trouble, because when a
guy goes one for sixteen like that, they normally come
(23:18):
out on fire the next couple of games. And you know, honestly, Rob,
that's an excellent point because that I hadn't even thought
about that. And you know what, for the listeners state,
we sometimes as as fans, we forget and I know
this is gonna sound crazy, and I mean no disrespect.
You guys are human beings. Like he's in his hometown
for the first time in his you know, in his
first opportunity to play in the finals. But here here
I'm watching it saying like, man, what's wrong with Reggie?
(23:40):
You know, like what, what's what's the matter with? You know?
The human element of it is and and that that's
one of the things that I appreciate most about having
these conversations with you is definitely cute. Yeah, I think
a lot of people forget that there's a little thing
called pressure that can affect some people. And when I
say pressure, that I mean people can't handle it by seeing.
Sometimes pressure makes you try to do things too much,
(24:02):
gives you too much of drilling. You know. I'd love
to say, you know, you know, pressure combust the pipe
and make a diamond, right, and so you're either gonna
be either or And I think Reggie in that game
the pipe burst on him, but next thing, you know,
he turns into a diamond. So you have to you
have to look out for things like that. And that's
the part that people get. The athletes are human beings,
absolutely so. Mark Jackson was actually really one of the
(24:22):
few bright spots for the Pacers in this one. Mark
Jackson backing in slipping Bryan and scoring. He puts up
eighteen seven and five while student sixth or eight from
the floor. The Pacers put you know, They did try
to claw back into it, you know, they got to
within six and the fourth quarter, but once again Shot
came through and put it away with another dominant fourth quarter.
This game is as a refrigerator. It does close the light.
(24:43):
You're out the exit, pulling the better, getting hired the
yellow Jacklin. This is going to be a name. I
feel like we're gonna mention a couple of times throughout
the show. Austin Crozier. Sam Perkins misses the three, but
Crozier is there very first. Little player Crochrie is outside
range on his jumper, quick first out and after putting
up sporting pounds with the wait till the off season,
he's rugging enough to do some dirty work inside. He
(25:06):
was really good for them off the bench, and this
one he had sixteen and six. Yeah. Also Crozer was
their X factor because throughout the season he was in
and out of the lineup. He wasn't playing much. And
then next thing you know, he comes to Austin Crozer
taking Chris Mullen the Hall of famere men is taking
Derry McKee by former alumni and Alabama taking his minute.
Because that's what that's what it's about. You have to
(25:28):
learn the game, and sometimes the light switch goes on.
I think for Austin the light switch went on for
him and he was just killing in this series. From
not to this game, Austin Crozer, Wow, he has been
really aggressive. They've gone to him and at low poets
that whoever's guarded him, he's been able to get the advantage.
What a big lift off the bench, Bob, he's been
for these pacers, absolutely and on your side of things,
(25:50):
you'll shack. This is ridiculous. He tunes him up for
forty three nineteen and three blocks Kobe at fourteen, Harp
had twelve, Rick Fox had eleven off the bench and
you spread it around a little bit and you did
a little bit of everything. You had six points, four boards,
three steals on a block for good measure, and the
Lakers end up taking Game one, eight seven. Well, the
(26:10):
Lakers showed no after effects have that amazing come from
behind win against Port, and I think the biggest concerned
were they gonna have a hangover sh act if not
let that happen tonight. He dominated from start to finish.
Big Game one victory here Port and Bob, Yeah, I
love the games, but I don't have to play that
much in this game rule around to the fourth quarter.
(26:31):
You know, this is a little inside information, right. I
used to always go to the starters and tell them
I don't want to play in the fourth quarter because
we had this thing where a C Green was start
and I wanted us to be up by so many points.
But I didn't have to play in the fourth quarter.
I'm not one of these guys. I'm not gonna try
to go get some stats. I care less about stat
I care about the dub and you know, preparing to rest,
(26:52):
uh what's saying this day day and age load management
on the bench. So I used to tell us that
I don't want to play in the fourth quarter. Well, honestly,
I'll be I understand that. And and this is something
that I probably should have mentioned at the start. You know,
you came into this series while yes, Shack had some
finals experience. You came into this series with hardware, you
had made runs already, So I can understand you you
(27:12):
bringing that mindset and kind of instilling it upon the team. Yeah,
that's the thing about you know, even though I was
still in my twenties at the time. Uh, you know,
everybody says, you know, it was twenty thousand. You was
about to be thirty, but who cared. I'd like to
think I was in my twenties, and we had We
had some championship predigrees on the team. Ron Harper had
won with the Bulls. We brought back A C. Green.
(27:32):
A C. Green had one championship with the Showtime Lakers.
B Shaw and Shaq had went to the finals when
they were in Orlando. So it was some championship experience
on our team. So I think that that was why
we were battle tested and we could perform during the playoffs.
Shout out to Spider, Sally, we we're gonna show him
some love too, right o, man, Spider was just over
to collect the check man. Fair enough, fair enough down.
(27:57):
We don't want to be down. TUESA episode, I think
the set emergency. All right, let's go in the game too,
because this is the game where Kobe goes down and
you know, Chack once again goes off. Indiana came out
firing in game two, you know, which definitely was expected
following the game one drubbing that you know that you
guys handed him. Reggie gets on the board first with
a mid range jumper, which absolutely had to feel good
(28:17):
coming off that one for sixteen Harris Miller. How long
they wait? It's not very very different result. And you
can feel the hush and the Staples Center here they
you know what this guy is capable up. He can
electrify his team with his shooting. That's what Rob. Have
you ever had a night like this and you know
where you simply just couldn't hit the broadside of a barn.
(28:38):
I'm asking it because sorry, I'm asking. I'm asking because
I want to know what you possibly, what Reggie's mindset
was coming into this. Well, you know, when you're the
top dog of the team, you're gonna get your shots.
You don't even think about it. You just said, Okay,
that was a bad night. You're gonna have one out
of a two games. And this is a playoff. I
know everybody's like, oh, the spotlights on you in the playoffs.
You you can't have those games. You're human. You're gonna
(29:00):
have those games. And I've had them throughout my life,
throughout my career, and you just brush it off, You
forget about it. As an athlete, you have to have
a really good short term memory. You almost have to
have amnesia. Sometimes when it comes to you gotta forget
about it because there's the next game, and next game
is always always the most important game. They came to win.
One game is the game tonight, backs at the wall
(29:22):
and they'll play a lot of energy. So build yourself
up to what this game is gonna demand. So they
the page was actually held a twelve seven leader to
start of this game, Killer Miller underneath play it up
and play. We've got a different ball game, right. And
I made this note because I don't remember really seeing
this very often. They had Phil calling an early time out.
(29:44):
Did he do that very often? No? He did not.
The thing about feeling is he was so into us
figuring it out for ourselves because he was like, if
you can go out and and and get yourself composed
and do what you need to get yourself back on track,
I can sell. But here relax and for us when
he hardly ever called time out, Um, you can go
(30:04):
back to previous series against Portland, he would sit down,
we might be the other team might be ona intend
to run. He was like, figure it out, because this
is gonna be who you are. This is going to
define who you are. Where in other games, because you've
got to think about this times when the team goes
on a twelve to run or something like that, you
might need that time out for later. So you've got
(30:25):
to figure it out for yourself, and veteran teams can
figure it out. That's exactly where I was gonna go
with it as a follow up. Is it was it
a matter of he simply knew that you guys had
already put it in the work prior to this, so
you you guys should have been able to figure it out.
Or was it also a combination of just understanding that
you know, he could he could respect the fact that
you guys have been there before, so you should be
able to uh, you know, he respected the process, he
(30:46):
respected the guys he that that were on the court,
and he says, Okay, you're smart enough. You've been in
the league long enough that you know that it's about
a game of runs. Um find a way to stop
a run, you know, pull it out. Because you can
see hart Ron Harper is our veteran leader on the
cod who had been in the triangle, had one championships
on the field. He would literally just hold the ball
(31:06):
and point and get everybody directs is almost like saying
to everybody, take a deep breath, calm down, les execute.
They clear it out on the hardwork. Still got it.
Now the dribble, now the faceline. The layout gone at
Miller explodes for six quick points Facer team and we surface.
(31:26):
So Kobe shows versatility just inside the six mark of
the first as he blocks Mark Jackson on one end
and then he sheds Reggie before jumping in the air
to draw Rick Smith so that he could dump it
down to a deeply rooted Shack for an end. Here's
Bryan six on Reggie defending shot Rob. Can you just
(31:48):
can you please just describe what it's like the face
Shack in the post, particularly when he had that post
defender on his hip. And I had face Schack previous
years and ninety five and the finals, and he was
dominant then, but he was a whole another beast at
this moment. He had got stronger, he had got faster.
So you've got guys on on the pacers that aren't
(32:09):
used to this. You know, you can try to immolate
Shack and practice, but there's nothing to it until you
really got them fill him. And Shack was the type
of guy once he got in that circle, that charge circle,
you might well get out of way, because unless you
grabbed him and held onto him tight, and that still
might not work. He was gonna go up and dunk
on you. And so Rick Smith's not the strongest guy.
(32:32):
We know how strong Dale Davis was, but it was
just a battle for them to try to stop Shack.
I'm not gonna lie. I actually felt for him and
in this series. So then Kobe rolls his ankle at
the three minute market, you know, as he comes down
on Jalen's foot after a jumper down his ankle hurt paint.
That's bad news for the Los Angeles Lakers as they
(32:54):
hold their collective breath. But the Stables not good folks.
That could be trouble in River City. First, what's going
through your heads? You know, as it's as it's clear
he can't continue, you know, it's it's we thought maybe
he just tweaked it and he failed because we continue
to play. You know, we went down and they actually
shot it. We went back. We went back down and
(33:15):
was like okay, because Kobe got up. You know, most
times when guys are hurting that bad, they're gonna stay
on the floor. They got up, he tried to run
back down, but then you know, he just he couldn't
do it. We had to file and get him out there.
I was like, oh, lor I saw I Hope it's
not bad. Hopefu's just smileth hope he can go in
and tape, retape and come back out. But the good
thing about that is we had started the season without
(33:37):
Kobe that year. Um he was hurt and so we
have been used to playing without him, so we had
to experience. And that's a good thing about having a
guy like a Glenn Rice. He was a former All
Star who could come out there and take over the outside,
the moving around. You know, he will go down and
pick up the story. That's the good thing about having
(34:00):
of veteran like a a Brian Shaw and a c
Green and Aron Harper, who all had that that pedigree
of being in the playoffs, so we wouldn't worry. We
kind of got together and say, hey, look, we all
want to keep players down, so we got to pick
it up. They're gonna sense that they're gonna have an
advantage because COBE's out, But we had to turn the
(34:22):
tables on that. Rob. Was there any part of you
guys that thought that Jayleen might have done that on purpose.
I know that he's he's kind of acknowledged that after
the fact, but I mean, in the moment, was there
any thought of that? In the moment, we didn't think
about it. And then you go back and look at
the tape because we watched film and we saw it,
it was like, did that look like he did that
on purpose? After this is when rule started changing because
(34:45):
Jalen just didn't do it to Kobe. You can see
a lot of guys the way he played, and I
played with a guy named Bruce Boyd. You know, that
was just the way he played. He I don't think
he did on purpose, but when he would contest, he
would do that. And he stepped under a lot of
people too. But it's just some guys. That's the way
they played defense. You know, I don't think they had
anything malicious intent behind it, but sometimes it happened. Man,
(35:06):
that's terrible. I mean it's terrible. Honestly, as a fan
of the game, you never necessarily expect to hear that.
But then again, you guys are competitors. I I can
see you know, folks. Sometimes folks will go to extreme lens. Yeah,
we've not debt extreme absolutely absolutely. So it's tied at
sixty at the midway point of the third and it
stayed that way for pretty much, you know, most of
(35:26):
the quarter. But when the last minute it kind of
felt like Shaq flipped the switch once again. He swatched
big Sam Perkins on one end, then he makes a
twelve turnaround twelve foot or on the other end. Then
he starts the fourth with a drop step lay up
over Perkins once again, Perkins inside, but you shot. You
can see it coming from our about the point. Even
if Perkins can't, Shack was closing round about him. There
(35:47):
was no way that shot was going to see the ram.
Perkins comes down and banks in at three on the
other end, only to have Shaq come right back down,
back him up under the basket even before you receiving
the past from Brian Shaw, and he dunked it over
the top once again. Something you don't turn around down
but you want that's all the lay up and that's
(36:09):
not a dome. I mean, really not to beat the
dead horse. There really just wasn't a good answer for
Shack at this stage in his career. Uh, it was
as his m v P year. He was showing his dominance.
He was trying to get his first ring. There was
so many things that he had on his mind that
he wanted to do for this team. You know, he
wanted to carry him to the promise. Then. You know,
(36:30):
he was that type of guy that had been there before,
tasted it, but didn't get the full satisfaction of that.
And now he was able to. He could see it,
he could see it coming down the pipe, and he
went down and just dominate those guys in the paint.
The Pacers, to their credit, they did keep fighting. This
one passed the fox perch years, got it loose, Austin
Urger picks it up, thirst for the lay up. Yeah,
(36:51):
hustle players that the Paciers must have had answered every
challenge of Lakers, but ultimately it was too a little
bit too late because you call a pass from Shackle
on the baseline and basically just flipped, you know, casually
just flipped the ball over your head for the bucket,
and the foul in the paint Beauliber Shaquille O'Neal, putting
(37:15):
the Lakers back up six with a minute ago. Well,
can can you can you walk us through that play?
Why were you being so casual, so cool about that? Man?
This is a reverse lay. You know you. Shack was
excellent passing. Um. People don't give him enough credit. How
he didn't mind passing. He would look for you on
the cut because he knew if he hits you on
the cut, not once, not twice, but three times, that
(37:35):
was gonna open up for him because nobody was gonna
leave us. And and he found me on the baseline,
a little flip of the wrist and you know it
was in. You know, just the flip of the wrist
and the bucket goes in. But you know, think about
that is we always talk about Shock and his dumbads,
and he was the one that helped us each and
every day get better because it's we always think about
point guards making the people around them better with their passing.
(37:59):
You know, Shock, that's what he did because we fed
off him, he was able to cut off him, and
he was an excellent passer. Now the Pacers are Firefox?
What Fox? What's it in the icebox? Folks? The two
teams basically just traded buckets in the final minute, and
your Lakers wind up taking it one eleven, one oh four.
(38:22):
Ryan equidial plays the pride toward the face file. Time
for one more break before we get to Game three,
when the series shifts to Indiana and the Pacers face
a must win Game three. Al Right, we're back here
(38:46):
on NBA Finals. Fire Rob, Let's go ahead and jump
into game three because this is Reggie's revenge. So Kobe's out.
You know, you guys are facing the team you know
that's gonna be desperate. They're trying to avoid going down three,
you know, three oh or oh three in the finals.
I guess it depends on your effective what's the tone
in the locker room and what was Phil Jackson's messaging
heading into that game in Indiana. Um, it was no Kobe,
(39:08):
no problem for us. You know, we started the season
enough without Kobe. We said we're gonna miss him, but
we got capable guys that's gonna feel his brow. You know,
Brian Shaw started that started that game. He's a guy
that has a great rapport shock when it comes to
doing the Shockshaw redemption was what they called it. That
means that ali the shock. So we didn't we didn't
really worry Abody too much, but we knew Reggie was
(39:29):
going home, and our key was to try to, you know,
keep Reggie at bay, keep him up the three point line,
make him a driver, and and pretty much not let
Austin Crozer get off even more because those were our
two keys. We even figured everybody else can get there.
But those two guys were like our focused in game three.
So with Kobe out, it looked like the Pacers were
(39:51):
focused even more on pushing tempo whenever possible, I mean,
for obvious reasons, you know, And they got off to
a really good starting this one. Taylor sent it download
of Perkins half better at Miller's. He's got an anger
on Folk, He's finally found an enemy. Reggie was back
to his normal self. Jalen was good for the Pacers
at the start once again, and they were really dictating
(40:12):
Pacer off that first quarter, and they were playing like
their proverbial playoff. Life was on the line, Reggie for
three blazing start. They were up pretty big in the
second quarter, but attend to run punctuated by a dunk
on the break from you, of course, off a Fisher pass.
(40:33):
It's a three on two break and already is there
to finish it. That's what I was talking about. Now
it's down to seven. As strongly as Indiana has played,
the Lakers are making a push. That's what great teams
do at the end of quarters and halves. It was fifteen.
The Lakers are on a tend to run. It got
you guys back to within striking distance. So they're up
(40:54):
eleven at the half. Now I'm wondering what figure like.
So you told me you no code, no problem going
in and what fills halftime conversation with you guys like now?
You know, Phil was always trying to keep light of
the situations. He was like, we have him right where
we want them, you know, and think about it. We
only scored fifteen points in that first quarter. It's not
that hasn't been us in the first two games. So
(41:15):
we wanted to come out and just focus on Reggie
because Reggie is that guy that know in his building
he's extraordinary, so we were really worried about him. Of course,
he was still worried about Jalen Rose because he was
that guy as they secondly, well was a leading scored
throughout the season, but at the time, you know, he
was like the batman to rob until Reggie Miller's batman
(41:37):
might set the Lakers have turnovers come close. We were
just saying, just focus sty out of foul trouble, just
keep pounding inside the shock and knocked down some shots,
(42:01):
lays out, shots out, and you guys definitely tried that.
But he was honestly more of the same in the
second half. It honestly, it just felt like they were
hitting you guys in waves. If they weren't knocking down
timely shots, they were really pushing pace and running whenever possible.
Unbelievable Lakers having unravel. You know, Reggie winds up putting
(42:23):
up thirty three. You know Jalen, you know, to your
to your credit, as you just mentioned, he chips in
with twenty one as well. But I actually want to
talk about this guy because Travis Best gave Indianas some
really good minute throughout this one. Travis Best plus the
Hulk to that. For Travis Best, we talked about his struggles.
He's got a lay up here in the game. Now.
The little someone might look at that box score and say, Okay,
(42:44):
he scored fourteen, But he scored fourteen off the bench,
and he hit some key shots at moments when you
guys were trying to get back in it alone. The
way can you speak to Travis Best in his game
and what it actually might you know, let's have some fun.
What would Travis Best look like in today's game as
well and this day? And as Travis would be a
beast um. He's a crafty player, he got great handles.
He can shoot it over the top with the best
(43:04):
of It's so many times I thought that Shock was
gonna block his shot, but he got up and over
Shock off the last into the into the buckets the gaga.
Don't get wrong. Fish is a heck of a defender,
and he was footstep for footstep with Best, but Best
(43:24):
was getting the best of him, sort of say, and
I think when you look at situations like that, you know,
sometimes better offense beats better defense. And he was Travis Best,
Austin Crows, Sam Perker's those two, those three guys off
the bench was to provide so much firepower for the
for the pacers, and then from the Laker side of things,
you know, Shock did still have thirty three and thirteen.
You know you've got some nice contributions, Harp. You know
(43:46):
through in fourteen you spread it around again. Ten seven
and six. Fish had a nice double double off the bench,
tin and ten. But he really just felt like you
were missing the second half of that one to punch. Yeah,
you know, when you end in finals, you have to
have a one to buch and which shock being there
and Kobe not being there. We missed that because if
you look at Reggie Miller and Jayalen Rose, they came
(44:08):
out with U fifty four points between the two and
them the way to it and Miller's got it on
the steel. He's gonna pull up out of the ark
and let it go fire a train. Yes, Miller work out.
He's dancing, he's trying sing up and down. And so
(44:29):
when you got your two top dogs scoring like that
half your points for the game, you gotta have another
guy who can get twenty plus points. And you know,
not no disrespect anybody on our team. We just didn't
have a guy who could create like Kobe Bryant could
and to get his own shot past the two games
to watch and these hoosherstat White for what said I
So the patients end up taking this one one and
(44:51):
ninety one in an effort to make a series of it,
and you know, of course we got a series now.
But on that note, let's go ahead and wrap up here,
but don't miss part two when Kobe Bryant becomes a
superstar and Howard Beck comes back for our end of
series awards. Mmmm.
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