Talk:Los Angeles Lakers

BAA, NBL, NBA Confusion

I'm working on a history of the Lakers right now and I'm a bit confused by something. According to the National Basketball League (United States) page, the Minneapolis Lakers win the 1947-48 NBL championship. Then, according to the Basketball Association of America page, they win the 1948-49 BAA championship. Then the two leagues merge in 1949, if I'm not mistaken. I'm guessing that the Lakers were in the NBL until 1948, then switched to the BAA for '48-49, then the NBA from '49 onwards but the article doesn't really clarify this. Confirmation, anyone?

Lakers' Rivalries

There is a page on the Kings-Lakers Rivalry. Wouldn't it make sense, if we're counting that as a rivalry, to count Lakers-Spurs as a rivalry. Considering that they played each other, 5 times (I think it was five) in the playoffs this century. And that until last year, the Western Conference Champion was either the Lakers or the Spurs since 1999. Also, it was a much more even rivalry than Lakers-Kings.--Seventy-one 20:54, 11 April 2007 (UTC)

I agree, Lakers/Kings was hardly a rivalry. The games were competitive but the Lakers won every series, at least the spurs were able to beat them. Also, no mention of Wilt in team history? 76.168.129.68 03:43, 10 May 2007 (UTC) KO

There's an article about it: Spurs-Lakers rivalry. And Wilt is in the team history summary provided here. For more details, see the much longer History of the Los Angeles Lakers article. howcheng {chat} 06:38, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

If we are going to add rivalries, we should make mention of te time periods which they were rivals. Right this moment, its the SUns (Eliminated them 2 straight years) and the Clippers (Finally performing to the level of the lakers) however we definetly need to add rivalries for the Celtics and the Spurs who are old classic rivalries. Ptotheerry2 20:14, 26 May 2007 (UTC)

I've got to say, the contention that the Lakers and Kings have a rivalry worthy of mention in this article is a bit of a joke. Even back when it was at its peak, which only lasted 2 or 3 years, the teams played one competitive series (the 2002 WCF). In terms of what constitutes a "rival," the Kings would not even be in the Top 10 from the Lakers' perspective. Just off the top of my head, I would list the Celtics, the Sixers, the Pistons, the Spurs, the Suns, the Jazz, the Rockets, the Nuggets, the Trailblazers, and the Sonics as more intense rivalries, historically, than what the Lakers have going with the Kings.CFBSolon (talk) 02:41, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

I agree with the above.. if you look at it historically, Lakers-Milwaukee Bucks or Lakers-Pistons were better rivalries. Lakers-Kings should be removed. Nada (talk) 05:45, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

Single game point leader

I reverted a change back to Kobe's 81 points as single game leader. Wilt wasn't playing for the Lakers at the time of his 100 point game.Vgranucci 22:42, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

Roster?

Why are the rookies listed on the roster? They haven't even signed a contract yet. Although the Lakers retain the rights to sign them (that is, no other team can sign them), by definition they shouldn't be included on the roster until they actually sign for the Lakers. For all we know, the Lakers may choose to leave Gasol and Sun with their current teams and not decide to pick them up until next season. Furthermore, the Lakers aren't even obligated to offer a contract to any of the players drafted in the second round; they definitely shouldn't be on there. 75.183.24.180 23:28, 1 July 2007 (UTC)

the only reason why they're there is becaus ethe Lakers still have possesion of them even though they're not signed. Annoyomous24 07:59, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Origin of team

I don't believe it is accurate to state that the team began in Detroit and moved to Minneapolis. There were several professional basketball leagues back then. It certainly is possible there was a team in Detroit that had Jim Pollard and when Detroit folded, Pollard came to Minneapolis where a new franchise was begun. It is my understanding that the franchise name had its origin in the City of Lakes, Minneapolis. The origin of the name comes from the nickname for the city and not the description of the state, the Land of 10,000 Lakes. Team names were not regionalized back then. If the team nicknames referred to something about the area, it was about the city and not the state. Perhaps I can find hard facts on the origin of the franchise. I am quite positive about the origin of the team name. Oldsopplaya 23:32, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

Ooops, the team had its origin in Detroit. Oldsopplaya 23:36, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

Notable Players

can you guys stop adding people who aren't really notable like for example, Aaron McKie. I'm going to delete all the ones I KNOW thats not really notable. ~~Annoyomous24~~ 10:33, 1 December 2007 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:Lakers 1966-1991.png

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BetacommandBot (talk) 20:46, 5 December 2007 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:KareemAandEarvinJ.jpg

Image:KareemAandEarvinJ.jpg is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

Please go to the image description page and edit it to include a fair use rationale. Using one of the templates at Wikipedia:Fair use rationale guideline is an easy way to insure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy, but remember that you must complete the template. Do not simply insert a blank template on an image page.

If there is other fair use media, consider checking that you have specified the fair use rationale on the other images used on this page. Note that any fair use images lacking such an explanation can be deleted one week after being tagged, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you.

BetacommandBot (talk) 06:57, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

D-League Affiliate

Why is the D-league affiliate in the team info sidebar not showing properly..i tried editting it still showes {{{affiliate}}} Motafa (talk) 21:09, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

Phil Jackson 04-05 or 05-06?

Yes Phil did come back during the year 2005, but the page is about when he coached the team. He coached the team during the 06 season. Its not when the year stars, its what year the season ends. That's what the NBA calls their season, "by the year the season ends." For example, Frank Hamblen has been with the Lakers since Phil first joined the team during the 1999-2000 season. Yet, in that page he coached the team during the 04-05 season, but did he come during the 04-05 season? No. Its the same with Phil, he came during the year 2005, but he coached the team in during the 2005-06 season. Carlo_ms06 (talk) 05:45, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

NBA is not like MLB or NFL. There is no 2006 season in NBA, there's only a 2005-06 season. Phil Jackson signed his contract in 2005 and the first season he coached was the 2005-06 season. As for Frank Hamblen, he was an assistant during the 1999-2000 season. In 2004-05 season, he became the head coach.
Please, take a look at the Phil Jackson's NBA page and you'll read "Jackson guided the Lakers to three titles in his first stint as their head coach from 1999-2004." It doesn't say that his first stint was from 2000-2004, it clearly states the first year of his first season as a Lakers head coach, which is 1999.--Crzycheetah 06:08, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

So by making this edit, you're stating that the 2006-07 season was Phil Jackson's first season, which is clearly wrong.--Crzycheetah 06:18, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

Alright, how about we change its to 2005-06-present? That way the it shows the season when the coach started his term as the head coach of the team? What about it? Carlo_ms06 (talk)

As that NBA page shows, the first year of the first season should be mentioned first, so I changed it back to "2005-present" and linked "2005" to the 2005-06 NBA season to avoid confusion.--Crzycheetah 19:12, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

Kobe Bryant picture in Team History

Why is there a picture in the Team History? I really doesn't make sense putting a Kobe Bryant picture in the team history. If there's a Kobe bryant picture in there, why not put Magic Johnson in there or Kareem Abdul-Jabbar? **Annoyomous24** (talk) 21:45, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Trivia

Does anyone think that we should delete the section, Trivia? $$Annoyomous24$$ (talk) 19:07, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

Definitely, but first we should check the team history section and see whether those "trivial" info is there, then remove it.--Crzycheetah 20:18, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

Celebrity Fans

Who is Allen Yaghoubzadeh and why is he a famous fan? A Google search says he's an Orthodontist in Beverly Hills. Really? C'mon. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Bigobigo (talk • contribs) 19:35, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

My guess is that it was added by some joker, who wanted to laugh a little. I removed that name.--Crzycheetah 20:17, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

Shahram Shabpare ( Iranian hip hop artist, live in Los Angelses ) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.253.93.139 (talk) 16:00, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

Source of "Lakers" name

Where did the Lakers name come from? I've heard three origins. The article says because Minnesota is the "Land of 10,000 Lakes". I've heard it was because Minneapolis is the "City of Lakes". This site says because of a type of cargo ship.[1] I'm leaning towards the Minneapolis origin but I can't find any reliable source for the nickname. ~ Eóin (talk) 18:20, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

To answer my own question, this Sports Illustrated article backs up the Great Lakes cargo ship idea. So is the "Land of 10,000 Lakes" origin wrong? ~ Eóin (talk) 00:40, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

I think it may be a combination of the "Land of 10,000 Lakes" and "City of Lakes". I'm suspiscious of the claim that they were named after a ship.--RLent (talk) 18:20, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

The ship name seems dubious to me too. This Maxim article says 10,000 lakes as does this book. So I think we can eliminate the "City of Lakes". ~ Eóin (talk) 19:16, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

Some helpful people at the reference desk solved the problem. See Wikipedia:Reference desk/Entertainment#Source of Los Angeles Lakers nickname. ~ Eóin (talk) 20:12, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

GA Review

This review is transcluded from Talk:Los Angeles Lakers/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Immediately looking at the article, I don't think this is near enough to a pass to put it on hold and give it my level of full review, but I will do my best to try and help you improve it and push it towards a future re-nomination.

I would also suggest you look at Portland Trail Blazers, which is a basketball team GA, and any basketball team FAs, for a guide on improvements. A WP:PR might also be a good idea.

The main problem with it is the lack of text really for such a huge subject. The history section could be vastly expanded, but particularly it looks very weighted towards recent years. Each decade from the 50s to 90s, get only a paragraph each, yet the recent years, have different split off periods, with the last season getting a long paragraph all to itself.

Is the celebrity fans section really notable enough to be included? It's also very stubby.

I would suggest putting the home arenas section into prose rather than a basic list.

For such a team as famous as the Lakers, I would expect far, far more information and more sources available to you. There is only one book used in the reference section.

There are also several MOS issues.

• Scores should use endashes. See Wp:DASH. As should date ranges.
• Numbers under 10 should be written in full. See WP:MOSNUM.
• Numerals and units should be broken by a non-breaking space, e.g. 20 years.
• See WP:DATE for how to use dates. Also they should be consistent throughout.
• Don't use images directly under level 3 heading. Also don't force image sizes. Portrait pics should also use the "upright" tag in them. See WP:IMAGE for more details.

Best of luck expanding and improving this article towards a renomination. If you want any more advice or questions, just fire a message at me. Peanut4 (talk) 18:32, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

Shaquille O'Neal

Shaquille O'Neal won 3 consecutive NBA Finals Most Valuable Player Awards from 2000 to 2002.

Even though I don't really like Shaq, there should at least have a picture of him in the articl. Here's one right here -->. -- K. Annoyomous24 02:01, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

Vandalism/Edit wars

Is this article really appropriate for a GA nomination when it is obviously the target of such a large amount of vandalisms and edit wars? It is one of the more hated/loved NBA teams and that draws frequent vandalisms. Are there any more thoughts, I think the GA might have to be denied just because of that. --Banime (talk) 16:22, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

If you look at Michael Jackson, you'll see that there are also a lot of vandalism. The article Michael Jackson is currently an FL. So I think vandalism won't make GANs a speedy decline. -- K. Annoyomous24_[c] 19:00, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

Agree that vandalism/edit wars alone should not cause the GA nomination being denied. Though I think the current nomination should be denied since the nominator has not attempted to address issues raised by the reviewers.—Chris! _ct 21:06, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

GA Review

This review is transcluded from Talk:Los Angeles Lakers/GA2. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Hello. I will be doing the GA review for this article. Here are some issues I noticed, as well as some suggestions for improvement:

Completed tasks

• "The Lakers are notable for having" - You don't have to mention that something is notable...obviously it is or it wouldn't be included. Change to "The Lakers had"

Did i replace the word notable? BlueRed 19:28, 25 October 2008 (UTC)

• "The Lakers are generally regarded as one of the NBA's most successful franchises." - by who?
• Avoid contractions - I see at least a couple that need to be spelled out longhand

What contractions did you notice? BlueRed 08:00, 25 October 2008 (UTC)

Didn't (twice), weren't...that was just a scan though, there may be more. Nikki311 16:09, 25 October 2008 (UTC)

• "Abdul-Jabbar broke his hand and was out for two months, the Lakers ended up winning 45 games." - there is a word missing in here somewhere
• The one section is entitled "Showtime" without making it 100% clear to what it is referring. Maybe change "By the 1984–85 season, the Lakers' "Showtime" era was in full swing" to "By the 1984–85 season, the Lakers' "Showtime" era, the most successful era in the team's history, was in full swing" - I'm just using that as an example, because I don't know exactly what the era means, but my phrase could be substituted with the appropriate definition.
• Headers: only the first word and proper nouns should be capital

Which words shouldn't be capitalized? BlueRed 08:00, 25 October 2008 (UTC)

Dynasty (depending on if that's the proper name) and rivalry. Nikki311 16:09, 25 October 2008 (UTC)

• "Although Seattle won the first game, the Lakers responded with four straight wins, and taking the series." - two options to fix this sentence. "Although Seattle won the first game, the Lakers responded with four straight wins, taking the series." or "Although Seattle won the first game, the Lakers responded with four straight wins and took the series."
• Avoid POV terms like "Unfortunately"
• Avoid prepositions at the ends of sentences: "the team saw the emergence of their young center Andrew Bynum, whom the Lakers saw potential in." --> "the team saw the emergence of their young center Andrew Bynum, in whom the Lakers saw potential."
• Isn't a little too early to call the last section "Rebirth"? They could begin losing again at any moment, and although some great things happened (including getting to the finals), they didn't win them. I'd suggest merging the "2007–present" into the "Rebuilding section".

I merged it. BlueRed 19:30, 25 October 2008 (UTC)

• "The Lakers have a long and historic rivalry with the Boston Celtics, who met in the NBA Finals 11 times, the Lakers only won two of them (1985, 1987)." - this sentence is missing a word somewhere
• "One of the most memorable moments in the rivalry" - POV - Just say "During the rivalry"
• There is a lot of vernacular or informal phrases. For example, saying a team "fell" instead of lost or were defeated, as well as saying "ended up winning" instead of just "won" - a good copyedit may help eliminate some of the wordiness and informality

I removed all "ended up" phrasing.—Chris! _ct 06:34, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

• Some of the references are missing publishers, accessdates, etc.

Which ones? BlueRed 19:30, 25 October 2008 (UTC)

Fixed—Chris! _ct 06:34, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

• I'm worried about the reliability of some of the sources, including LakersWeb.net, hoops4thesoul, greatsportsrivalries, and lakersuniverse. What makes these sites reliable?

• There is also some cases of improper comma usage throughout. Commas should be used to separate clauses that can stand independently of one another without the conjunction. So... "During the 1993–94 season the team ended up only winning 33 games, and missing the playoffs for the fourth time in franchise history." should be "During the 1993–94 season the team ended up only winning 33 games and missing the playoffs for the fourth time in franchise history."

Did i fix it, or are there still more? BlueRed 19:30, 25 October 2008 (UTC)

• The lead doesn't comply with WP:LEAD. The lead should be about three or four paragraphs summarizing all the main points of the article.

I'll give the authors of this article seven days to make improvements. Nikki311 16:37, 17 October 2008 (UTC)

Some work has been done, but I still see quite a few problems that have not been addressed from my list above. I'll give the article a few more days in the hopes that some fresh eyes will have a go at my suggestions. Nikki311 17:07, 22 October 2008 (UTC)

I put strikes through the ones I thought were completely taken care of. The ones without strikes still need some work. Nikki311 01:38, 25 October 2008 (UTC)

I've expand the lead and fix some comma issues.—Chris! _ct 23:53, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, I've been busy with some other projects. I'll check through the article again in the next couple of days. Nikki311 00:03, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Ok. I finally had a chance to look back through the article. I eliminated quite a bit of wordiness and peacock phrases. Keep an eye on new contributions to make sure wording is neutral. For example, saying a season was good is biased...just state the facts. I've decided to pass the article because I believe it now meets all the GA criteria. Great work! Nikki311 22:41, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Thanks—Chris! _ct 22:48, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Lakers Rivalry

Why is there a section for the Sacramento Kings? As Kobe stated, the Kings and the Trailblazers are not our rivals and won't be considered our rivals until they beat us in the playoffs. It's why the Suns aren't our rivals, because we haven't had the chance to knock them out (D'antoni went running, it loses some of it's luster now). —Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.148.112.200 (talk) 21:47, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

They may not be true rivals now, but we do have an entire article about the Lakers-Kings rivalry. howcheng {chat} 16:01, 17 March 2009 (UTC)

Length of the team history section

Why is the team history section so long and detailed, when there's a separate article specifically for the history of the team? Isn't that the whole point of having a separate history article: so that this article isn't forced to be mostly a long recitation of the team history, but instead can provide a very brief summary (maybe three or four paragraphs) of that history and then move on to other things about the team? If the editors of this page really want the history to be so long and detailed on this page (and I can't imagine why that's desirable), then what is the point of having a separate "History of ..." article at all? 12.155.58.181 (talk) 22:11, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

Three or four paragraphs for the entire history is too brief and short. Though I kind of agree that the history can be a bit more concise.—Chris! _ct 00:04, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

Non-playoff seasons

The sentence with "the fewest non-playoff seasons with five (tied with San Antonio Spurs)" should be deleted. The Lakers missed 1958, 1975, 1976, 1994, 2005 between 1949-2008. The Spurs only missed 1984, 1987, 1989, 1997 between 1977-2008. 208.127.31.79 (talk) 03:57, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

You are totally right. I think the person who inserted that sentence was also counting the ABA seasons, which I don't think it should. -- [[SRE.K.A.L.|L.A.K.ERS]]_{call me Keith} 04:15, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

Fred Schaus

Fred Schaus led the Lakers to 4 NBA Finals in 5 seasons. He was coach from 1960 to 1966 and later on became the team's General Manager. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Family guy85 (talk • contribs) 07:00, 12 April 2009 (UTC)