Los Angeles Lakers Basketball Team

NBA Hall of Famer Kareem Abdul-Jabbar has a rare form of leukemia, but the Lakers legend says his long-term prognosis is very good. Abdul-Jabbar, 62, revealed during an interview Monday that he has Philadelphia chromosome-positive chronic myeloid leukemia, a cancer of the blood and bone marrow that produces cancerous blood cells. The disease was diagnosed in December. But Abdul-Jabbar said his condition can be managed by taking oral medication daily, seeing his specialist every other month and getting his blood analyzed regularly.

Old A.C. Green. Sitting like a dean. Watching the Lakers go far. Along came a bear, and sat on his hair. And everyone said, Dude, that's bizarre. * This is the story about the little green bear that sometimes sits atop the head of the Lakers' big power forward. Don't laugh. This is serious. He is an important figure. He represents an important ethic. He is about strength, endurance, respect. We're talking, of course, about the bear.

The Lakers are more than a basketball team, they are a social glue, connecting a diverse city with brightly splashed layers of entertainment and excellence. The Lakers are not about individual statistics, they are about team championships, the annual push by parts that are never greater than the whole, the quiet owner who never closes his wallet, the humble late announcer who never missed a game. The Lakers have become Southern California's strongest and most enduring sports fabric not only because they win, but because of how they continually sacrifice their egos and agenda in the attainment of that victory.

Adam Morrison has made his peace with the player he is and the one he believes he still can become. Others have heaped criticism on Morrison, 24, for not living up to the immense expectations placed on him when Charlotte Bobcats co-owner Michael Jordan selected him as the third overall pick in the 2006 NBA draft. Not long ago, Morrison was one of the biggest stars in college, leading the nation in scoring with 28.1 points a game for Gonzaga.

The Lakers continue to wait for Sasha Vujacic and Ronny Turiaf, but they have fall-back plans in case their restricted free agents don't re-sign with them. The Lakers have talked with representatives of Boston small forward James Posey and veteran San Antonio sharpshooter Brent Barry to gauge the free agents' interest.

Lakers Coach Phil Jackson keeps saying he's not concerned about Pau Gasol 's hamstring injury. But someone on the Lakers is worried. "I'm concerned about it, definitely," Gasol said. "There's no set time to return, no set date. I just don't want it to turn into something long-term." It's almost at that point. Gasol was sidelined Friday against Dallas, the second regular-season game he missed after sitting out the last six exhibition games. The Lakers continue to call him day to day because of a strained right hamstring, but it has practically become week to week.

Carmelo Anthony was limping, dehydrated and ineffective, but the Lakers were somehow in worse shape. Fatigue didn't stop the Lakers, but the Denver Nuggets definitely did, tying up the Western Conference finals with a 120-101 pounding in Game 4 Monday night at the Pepsi Center. Anthony's pregame stomach illness, coupled with a sprained right ankle suffered in the second quarter, gave the Lakers hope of taking an overwhelming series lead.

Pau Gasol was shifting uncomfortably in the waiting room outside his boss' office, forced to wait half an hour for reasons unknown. He was told to go directly from the practice court to the front office, where he had never been summoned. He wasn't even allowed to shower. So he sat. And squirmed. And wondered what was happening. Then Chris Wallace opened the door, invited Gasol into his office and said five words that changed the NBA landscape: "We just made a trade."

Magic Johnson still tracks the Lakers, despite a second career as a real-estate tycoon and motivational speaker that often forces him to jet across the country, city after city, day after day. He found time, however, to make it to Washington, where he offered words of wisdom to some of the Lakers during their White House visit. His theme: Time to step it up. The Lakers found a pretty easy opponent to step on, beating the Washington Wizards, 115-103, Tuesday at Verizon Center.

Where are those puppets when we need them? The Montagues and Capulets, who feuded in "Romeo and Juliet," didn't have little stocking surrogates talking trash, although anything could happen in the next movie version. The Lakers and Boston Celtics did their own taunting, up close and personally. Even as friends, Magic Johnson and Larry Bird lived to grind the other in the dirt, as after one Celtics win in the Forum when Bird, sitting on the team bus, saw a disconsolate Johnson slink by. As Bird said later, "I thought, 'Suffer, you unprintable.

Pau Gasol was up against the wall, literally. He backed away slowly, maybe subconsciously, from reporters and smacked into a fire extinguisher and defibrillator bolted to the wall at the Lakers' training facility Tuesday. Gasol's frustration was evident Monday night after the Lakers' 95-93 loss to the Memphis Grizzlies, and the media wanted to know more about it after the team returned from its 5-3 trip. Gasol had seven shots against Memphis, Andrew Bynum only three, and Gasol publicly reminded everybody after the game the Lakers were "not making a conscious effort" to pound the ball inside.

The Lakers are more than a basketball team, they are a social glue, connecting a diverse city with brightly splashed layers of entertainment and excellence. The Lakers are not about individual statistics, they are about team championships, the annual push by parts that are never greater than the whole, the quiet owner who never closes his wallet, the humble late announcer who never missed a game. The Lakers have become Southern California's strongest and most enduring sports fabric not only because they win, but because of how they continually sacrifice their egos and agenda in the attainment of that victory.

Never, Memphis center Marc Gasol maintained, has he thought he could have been on the Lakers' championship team. Gasol said the trade that sent him along with three other Lakers and two first-round draft picks to Memphis for his brother Pau was the driving force behind the Lakers' winning the title. "They probably wouldn't have won a championship without Pau," Marc said. "So the trade had to happen. The Lakers gave me a chance to play. I didn't know if I wanted to come to the NBA or not. It took me a year to decide that, and I ended up here in Memphis, a city that I love."

Kobe Bryant walked off the court quickly and quietly, his head tilted down, an emblem as good as any after the Lakers ended their longest trip of the season with a last-second loss. They faced a variety of conflicts against the Memphis Grizzlies -- Gasol vs. Gasol, Bryant vs. Jerry West, Phil Jackson vs. Pat Riley and themselves vs. the trip that wouldn't end -- but lost them all except Bryant's pursuit of West's franchise scoring record. That Bryant was in a somber mood after getting 44 points and becoming the Lakers' all-time leading scorer set the table for what Jackson would confirm after the team's 95-93 loss to the Grizzles on Monday night at FedExForum: This trip was only "so-so."

Pau Gasol was shifting uncomfortably in the waiting room outside his boss' office, forced to wait half an hour for reasons unknown. He was told to go directly from the practice court to the front office, where he had never been summoned. He wasn't even allowed to shower. So he sat. And squirmed. And wondered what was happening. Then Chris Wallace opened the door, invited Gasol into his office and said five words that changed the NBA landscape: "We just made a trade."

The Boston Celtics may be struggling, but the Lakers still know they will face a team today that will play physical basketball and play defense. The Lakers have won three consecutive games and have the second-best record in the NBA at 36-11. The Celtics have lost two in a row and have the third-best record in the Eastern Conference at 29-15. None of that matters when these two rivals play each other. "We have to meet the style of play that's going to be played against us, it's as simple as that," said Lakers Coach Phil Jackson , who can tie Pat Riley for the franchise's all-time wins record at 533 with a victory today.

Back when Ron Artest was still introducing himself to his new teammates several months ago, Andrew Bynum declared a personal goal. He wanted to make the All-Star team this season. It didn't happen, which disappointed the 22-year-old, but perhaps led to some resolve. "I'm going to go out there and keep balling the way I am," Bynum said Friday. "It's just given me the same goal to strive for next year and something else to push for this summer when I'm working on my game."

A listless game between the Lakers and 76ers on a cold Friday night became a showdown between Kobe Bryant and Allen Iverson. Bryant and Iverson raised the temperature of the game in the second half, the two of them taking the game over, giving the crowd inside Philadelphia's Wachovia Center something to get excited about. The Lakers pulled out the victory, 99-91, because Bryant had 22 of his 24 points in the second half and because he has a better supporting cast. Iverson had 21 of his season-high 23 points in the second half.

Western Conference coaches were able to overlook the 17 games Pau Gasol has missed this season. But they weren't able to ignore Andrew Bynu m's up-and-down season with the Lakers. Gasol will join Kobe Bryant at the All-Star game on Feb. 14, the second time in as many seasons the Lakers forward was selected to play as a reserve for the West team. Bynum, however, did not make the All-Star team after averaging 15.8 points and 8.4 rebounds a game. He started off strong, collecting double figures in points and rebounds in eight of his first nine games -- while Gasol was sidelined -- but endured a stretch of 23 consecutive games without a double-double.

Someone forgot to tell Andrew Bynum that the coaches already submitted their ballots. The 22-year-old center, hoping to be selected today as an All-Star reserve, put up eye-catching numbers in the Lakers' 118-96 victory over the Indiana Pacers on Wednesday at Conseco Fieldhouse. He scored a season-high 27 points and took 12 rebounds as the Lakers improved to 3-2 on their eight-game trip, this one coming against a team that's, uh, defensively challenged, to put it kindly. Whether Bynum's body of work this season is good enough to be put in play Feb. 14 at Cowboys Stadium will be determined by NBA coaches, who submitted their votes for reserves earlier this week.