Preseason NBA: Los Angeles Lakers Look as Scary as Imagined

The Los Angeles Lakers may have lost their first preseason game of the 2012-2013 NBA season, but as you can imagine, many people aren't too concerned about the fact that they lost this game.  All eyes were locked in on one of the newest acquisitions of the Lakers in point guard Steve Nash.  Dwight Howard wasn't dressed for this game and he probably won't be playing much, if at all, in the preseason, but just seeing how much Nash helped the Lakers offense explains why they are the betting favorites to win the 2012-2013 NBA Championship.

Steve Nash played a total of only 14 minutes, but put together 5 points, 3 assists, and 1 rebound.  Just his presence on the court though made a huge difference for the Lakers, and as soon as he got into the point the defense automatically collapsed on him leaving players like Kobe Bryant, Pau Gasol, and Ron Artest open and willing to shoot the ball.  If this is how things are going to go throughout the season (which I can bet that they are), then the Lakers are going to be in for a huge year, and we may see Kobe Bryant put up a massive number of points.

Interestingly, I'd say that the players who are going to benefit even more from this are going to be the big men.  Dwight Howard, Pau Gasol, and even Jordan Hill and Antawn Jamison off the bench could be in for huge years because of the lanes that Steve Nash are going to open up for them.  Don't expect Kobe Bryant to force the action too much this season, as it's well-known that this is his team, but also that he has a whole lot of talented players around him who can light up the stat sheet.

A great sight would be to see Nash get back to the All-Star game for another season, and with the players around him it wouldn't surprise me one bit for him to put up quite a few assists per game this season, and also have his fair share of scoring.

The 2012-2013 NBA season is just around the corner, and the fans are all excited.  For the Lakers fans though, the entire goal this year is NBA Championship or bust, and potentially to knock off those Miami Heat who won their first NBA Championship with the big three last season, and we'll have our eyes glued on both of these teams all year.

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