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Here's more than you ever possibly wanted to know about the status of Stephen Curry's left ankle, which he sprained late in Game 3, from his meeting with the media before this morning's shootaround in San Antonio before Game 5:

"I feel good," Curry said. "I’m ready to go tonight. It feels a whole lot better than it did before Game 4, so that’s all I could ask for.

"When I woke up yesterday, it wasn’t worse than it was before the game [Sunday], which is a huge success.

"Mission accomplished: to be able to play Game 4 and not have any setbacks or delay the healing process for tonight."

Sometimes the altitude and pressurized cabin of an airplane flight can cause joints to swell. Curry said that didn't happen on the trip to San Antonio.

"We prepared for it," Curry said. "Had it wrapped up, almost four times the size of my regular ankle with tape and wraps and compression and all that, just trying to make sure it doesn’t balloon up. And we got through it."

Curry didn't get any practice shots before Game 4, but he planned to participate in the Warriors' shootaround Tuesday and be on the court early before Game 5.

"I think it’s in good enough shape to do that, to be able to put a little of pounding on it, to warm up, to get my legs back and keep my normal routine before games," Curry said.

It's worth noting that he made five of his 10 3-point shots in Game 4 without practicing beforehand.

"He was born a shooter," Mark Jackson said.

For every Stephen Curry action, there is a reaction. I don’t know about equal and opposite, but there’s a clear correlation between the sweetest jump shot in the league and the joyous celebrations they provoke from the Golden State Warriors reserves.

Both Curry’s shooting prowess and the Warriors’ party moves were on display in Game 1 of the Western Conference semifinals, as evident in these highlights

My favorite moment from Game 1 was when four players stood up and simultaneously put their hands on their heads in disbelief, a move I like to call the Thomas Hill.

David Lee’s torn hip flexor has kept him out of most of the Warriors’ playoff games, but it doesn’t keep him from jumping up in astonishment after another Curry jumper splashes home.

“I’ve seen pretty much everything there is to see,” Lee said, “From being on the other end of Kobe dropping 60 in the Garden to you name it. There’s just something special about when Steph gets it going like that. Being the tight-knit group that we are, just encouraging one another, I know when we get hyped over there it just encourages him to keep going.”

When Curry’s on one of his scoring sprees, “It’s kind of a blur,” he said.

“I see them standing up,” Curry said. “There was big talk [Tuesday] at practice about the videos of all the reactions. It seems like they were all in unison last game. They’re out there having fun, we’re all out there having fun playing the game. That’s what it’s all about.”

Kent Bazemore is considered the ringleader. In his rookie season he already has a YouTube reel of his sideline celebrations.

"My situation, being undrafted and just being thankful to be here,
it’s my ode to the game," Bazemore said. "Just showing my passion.

"I’ve got my one signature thing. They call it 'Bazemore.' It’s actually like a crescent lunge, from yoga.

Lee doesn’t put as much thought into it.

"I’ll have reactions," he said, "and later look back and say, 'What was I doing?'”

SAN ANTONIO -- The San Antonio Spurs are unprepared for the Golden State Warriors. It’s not that Gregg Popovich forgot how to coach and has been negligent in his duties leading up to their second-round series opener. It’s just that their first-round sweep of the Los Angeles Lakers -- which feels like it ended around the time “The Sopranos” went off the air -- did nothing to simulate the challenges the Warriors present.

“It’s a totally different matchup than the Lakers series,” Danny Green said. “It’s kind of a 180. The Lakers were more of a big–man dominant, inside-presence type of team. These guys are more perimeter-oriented.”

The good news for the Spurs is that they’re in better shape in their backcourt than the frontline. Tony Parker, who was slowed by a sprained ankle in March, looked fully functional by the end of the Lakers series. He’ll join Danny Green and possibly Kawhi Leonard on the Steph Curry detail. That’s a variety of looks the Spurs can throw at Curry, from Parker’s quickness to Leonard’s length and athleticism. The question will be how much attention do they pay to Curry -- and do they send a double-team out on the perimeter?

Up front, Tiago Splitter is a game-time decision with a sprained ankle of his own, while Boris Diaw might make his return from surgery to remove a cyst on his spine that’s kept him out since early April.

Believe it or not, the Spurs made more three-pointers than the Warriors this season. That doesn’t mean they’re going to engage in a shooting contest with Golden State.

“I think it would be a bad idea to do that,” Parker said. “I’m improving shooting-wise, but I think Steph Curry is better than me.”

The Spurs will try to get some transition baskets and try to make the Warriors defend deep into the shot clock in half-court sets. They’ll also rely on their huge experience advantage. The Spurs have logged 490 playoff games between Parker, Tim Duncan and Manu Ginobili alone. The Warriors use five players whose postseason experience consists of ... that Nuggets series that ended last week.

It’s about valuing possessions, making proper defensive rotations or maintaining calm when the pressure mounts.

Oh, and as loud as Golden State’s Oracle Arena has been lately, it pales in comparison to the home-court advantage enjoyed by the Spurs against the Warriors. The Spurs haven’t lost to the Warriors at home since Feb. 14, 1997. In other words, since before Duncan came into the NBA.

If you’re wondering how tough Stephen Curry can be in the face of physical challenges from the Denver Nuggets, you’re asking the wrong question. The matter at hand for Curry, both in this first-round playoff series and for the duration of his time with the Golden State Warriors, is how Oakland can he be.

He plays in a city that’s known for producing tough NBA point guards. The list begins with Gary Payton. Raised by a dad nicknamed “Mr. Mean”, Payton would jaw at anyone and back down from no one.

Those who played against Jason Kidd could tell you he’s deceptively strong. Brian Shaw might be the toughest of all: he has persevered with dignity after his parents and sister were killed in a car accident when he was 27.

Damian Lillard, the unanimous rookie of the year, is the most recent addition to the lineage. He led all rookies in points and assists, and even though he played more minutes than anyone in the league his scoring and shooting went up after the All-Star break, when the rookie wall should have kicked in.

“What makes us so tough is we learned on the playgrounds and fought all the time and grew up with that toughness,” Payton said in a text message. “Curry has the heart to do that. I don’t know how he grew up, but in this era he can be really good.”

Curry grew up in Charlotte. But he can be of Oakland. He can represent what it stands for. And just as Payton, Kidd, Shaw and Lillard each offer different takes on toughness, we’re starting to see Curry’s version.

The Nuggets decided that if they can’t block his shot, if his passing will penalize them for double-teams (he’s the leading assists man in the playoffs, with 9.6 per game), then the best way to slow him down is to get rough. They shoved and tripped him in Game 5, causing Mark Jackson to complain about the tactics, leading Curry to spend a couple of days defending himself against the notion that he’s soft.

He’d grown a little weary of the topic by the time I asked him his definition of basketball toughness, before the Warriors’ shootaround Thursday. He sighed and said: “I don’t know, man. I mean it’s….grit. Being able to deal with contact. Stepping up in big situations. Kind of living up to the moment, I guess. But there’s a lot of different definitions that people can throw out there. A lot of different ways that you can assess people’s toughness.”

Curry’s slender frame will never intimidate anybody when he walks on the court. That doesn’t mean he can’t demoralize opponents by dropping a barrage of three-pointers on them all night. He won’t deck people with forearms…but he can exact his revenge after a big shot…or even during a big shot.

Curry’s signature moment in this series came midway through the third quarter of Game 4, when he launched a three-pointer from the sideline near the Denver bench, turned and stared down the Nuggets while the ball was in flight, then ran downcourt just as the ball splashed through the net.

“That was like the best-feeling shot I’d had all year,” Curry said a couple of days later. “They were all up and they were all chirping. So it was fun.”

Normally, Curry says it takes until the midway point of a ball’s arc to the hoop -- when he’s had a chance to assess the rotation and see if the trajectory looks as good as his setup, balance and lift suggested it might -- that he knows a shot’s going in.

“That was a little special one,” Curry said. “I had 120 percent confidence in that one.”

The Warriors have confidence in Curry. They see him out there balling with blood pooled in his right eyeball and bruises on his orbital socket from an accidental poke by Corey Brewer in Game 4. He’s been playing on a left ankle that he sprained in Game 2.

And he’s looking more Oakland by the minute.

“I’m not from here, but I’d like to set up roots here for a long time, hopefully,” Curry said. “It’d be cool. I’m not going to try to infiltrate their [fraternity]. This is where they grew up; It’s their neighborhood.

“But, like, Tim Hardaway, a guy that played here for a while -- Run-TMC and all that stuff -- you remember him as a Warrior. That would be something pretty cool to have. Especially if you win in the playoffs and the teams are doing well.”

A franchise long defined by Dr. Jerry Buss, Phil Jackson and Kobe Bryant is coping with a dizzying array of injuries and changes. We examine with J.A. Adande:

 

The best argument for underclass players staying in college for more preparation is the fact that you can mention Damian Lillard and LeBron James in the same sentence. No, not that you can compare Lillard's game to LeBron's, but you can write this perfectly acceptable sentence: LeBron James for MVP and Damian Lillard for rookie of the year are the two easiest choices for this year's NBA awards.

Lillard lapped the field, averaging 19 points and 6.5 assists per game, because his game is so polished. It's so polished because he stayed at Weber State for four years. The Big Sky Conference might not be stocked with NBA-level talent, but the likes of Shaka Smart at Virginia Commonwealth and Brad Stevens at Butler have shown there are good coaches throughout college basketball. And going against well-coached teams with evolving defensive schemes forced Lillard to improve.

"Over time, playing in the same league and playing against kind of the same bunch of schools and teams starting to prepare for me every year, knowing me a little bit better each year, I had to adjust, because they knew me well," Lillard said late Tuesday night, after the Portland Trail Blazers lost to the Los Angeles Clippers. "Off the floor, my coaches, they held me accountable for every little thing: being in class on time, showing up early to practice, holding other guys accountable. So I think my role in that program and at that school, it was so huge and I had so much responsibility for four years that it prepared me for being able to play at this level.

"As [opponents] kind of got on to me, that’s when I learned to watch film. I saw that they were kind of forcing me to weaknesses at that time. Over the summers, my coaches, they were making me think the game: write down 10 things that you need to get better at and over the summer you need to really get better at it. I got to the point where I was staying over the summer, working with them with those things that I wrote down and the things that they wrote down. And when I came back the next season, teams were forcing me to do something that I had developed over the summer: pull-up jumpers going right. Quick finishes -- we called them Steve Nash finishes, little quick layups. Step-back jumpers. Just small stuff."

All the small stuff adds up to a complete game.

I'm in favor of players having the option to go to the NBA straight from high school; there's no need to deny the rare players who are physically ready to make the leap, and there's no point in wasting scholarships on players who have no interest in going to school. I'm also in favor of the NCAA doing away with its arcane amateur rules, which would make staying in college more financially feasible for these athletes who want that choice. Damian Lillard shows the benefits of waiting to go pro.

The NBA sure has taken a philosophical turn lately. It started with Isiah Thomas quoting Immanuel Kant and has spread to the point where we can’t even enjoy someone getting dunked on without the Protectors Of The Game wondering if we’ve lost our collective way by ascribing Great Meaning to such inconsequential plays.

Bob Ryan and I have had a mutually respectful relationship for more than two decades, but that didn’t keep us from a heated debate about the significance of LeBron James’ dunk on Jason Terry Monday night. I believe it was the standout moment of a fantastic game. Bob, uh, thinks otherwise.

That’s why I was so encouraged to hear LeBron’s comments to reporters in Cleveland on Wednesday, when he confirmed that dunk did matter. A lot.

"The fact that it happened to J.T. made it even that much sweeter," LeBron said, twisting the knife by using Terry’s initials rather than the moniker "JET." "Because I think we all know what J.T., and he talks too much sometimes, and I'm glad it happened to him."

Boom.

So yes, with a history dating back to the 2011 NBA Finals, there was an added meaning to the play. As if you couldn’t tell when LeBron stood over the fallen Terry and glared at him, drawing a technical foul.

Dunking is the best form of legalized aggression the game has. The NHL allows its players to settle their differences with fisticuffs. In the NBA you have to be more creative, find ways to assert your manhood within the context of the game, or risk suspension. No better way to do that than to dunk. (I still believe this Kobe Bryant dunk over Steve Nash was a belated statement of Kobe’s feelings about the 2006 Most Valuable Player voting.

No, I don’t deduct points for the height difference between James and Terry, just as the discrepancy between DeAndre Jordan and Brandon Knight doesn’t diminish the impact of that dunk. We chastise big men for bringing the ball down low where smaller players can swipe it; it’s fair game to go after guards when they step in where they don’t belong.

I understand that dunks don’t provide the answer to the essential question that frames any decision, transaction or development in the NBA, which is, "Can it help a team win playoff games?" I still enjoy them. I like home runs in baseball and kickoff return touchdowns in football; that doesn’t mean I think they’re more important than pitching and defense.

There are moments that resonate with us, when athletes show off their talent and skills and remind us why we pay to see them play the same sports we can watch in the park for free. What was Bo Jackson’s professional career if not a collection of those highlights? His demolition of Brian Bosworth was his version of an in-your-face jam. Bo hit .250 with 141 home runs in baseball and rushed for 2,782 yards and 16 touchdowns in football. Yet he’s still the subject of reverential documentaries.

The entire premise of sports is absurd, to borrow an existentialist phrase. Making a big deal out of dunk is no different than building massive stadiums where athletes play for millions of dollars. In that context, no amount of hyperbole can be considered excessive.

I’ll close with this rhetorical -- perhaps philosophical -- question: If a LeBron dunk in a game that counts doesn’t matter, then why do so many people clamor for him to compete in a dunk contest exhibition?

Even though he won’t be playing, the thought of returning to his old home at the Rose Garden in Portland is stirring the emotions in Brandon Roy.

Knee injuries have put his attempted comeback with the Minnesota Timberwolves on ice after just five games this season, just as his bad knees ended his time with the Portland Trail Blazers after five years. But at least he is traveling with the Timberwolves on this trip, something he didn’t do when the team visited Portland for the first time on Nov. 23.

“I’m excited to go back,” Roy said after the Timberwolves lost to the Lakers in Los Angeles Thursday night. “I don’t quite know how I’ll feel. I’m excited to go back and be in that building again. It was special. I had a lot of special moments there.”

None was more special than Game 4 of the 2011 first-round playoff series against the Dallas Mavericks, when Roy scored 18 points in the fourth quarter to lead the Trail Blazers all the way back from a 23-point deficit for the win ... his last one in a Portland uniform.

That was my favorite performance by one of my favorite players, and this was the first time I had a chance to talk to him since I was glued to the television that day.
It didn’t take much to get Roy’s memories flowing and his eyes in that glassy “I reminisce, I reminisce” mode.

Prior to that fourth quarter, Roy’s biggest impact on the series came when he expressed his disappointment about playing only eight minutes in Game 2. The Mavericks won two of the first three games, sliding the Trail Blazers toward the offseason, prompting Roy to finally relax and let go.

“I just went into that game like, ‘Who cares?’” Roy said. “I was loose. I just played.”

Roy checked in for the final time with 4:46 remaining in the third quarter, and a short time later Peja Stojakovic made two 3-pointers in a minute and a half to put the Mavs ahead 67-44.

“A fan was like, ‘Roy, you ain’t doing nothing,’” Roy said. “I’m like ‘Man, I just got in the game, we’re down 23 points and it’s my fault? Whatever.’”

At the end of the quarter, Roy took a 3-pointer that rolled around the rim and bounced in with a second remaining, setting the stage for the epic comeback.

“Coming into the fourth quarter, I’m like, ‘I’m going to be aggressive,’” Roy said. “Shots just started falling. Then I got even more aggressive, started making plays. I got loose.”

Roy made catch-and-shoot jumpers, pullup shots, driving layups. He was unstoppable. The crowd roared, thrilled by the scoring exhibition, enticed by the possibility that their Blazers could actually pull this off.

“I got chills myself,” Roy said. “Going into the timeout, I kind of got goosebumps.

“The closer we got, I just said, ‘Man, there’s no way we’re going to lose this game.’”

Roy made a short jumper to put the Trail Blazers ahead, 84-82, with 39 seconds remaining, then watched as a Jason Terry 3-pointer missed at the buzzer.

It turned out to be Roy’s last great moment of the many he compacted into his five seasons there, beginning with his rookie of the year season in 2006-07. The Mavericks won the next two games to finish off the series and launch their improbable championship run. The damaged knees that had reduced Roy to a bench player forced him to retire after the lockout ended in 2011. The Trail Blazers used the amnesty provision to take the remaining $64 million on his contract off their books, and he sat out the season.

He dropped by the Rose Garden once, on March 20, 2012, to watch former Blazers teammate and fellow Seattleite Jamal Crawford play on Crawford's birthday, but he mostly stayed away from the NBA. And while he was out, Roy watched replays of the fourth quarter of Game 4 on his iPad ... well, let’s just say more than once.

“It wasn’t the same, because nothing will ever be like that moment,” Roy said. “I mean, fans were cheering, my teammates ... and I really thought I could make every shot.

“Then you hear how the announcers are calling it. That made it a little bit better. When you’re going through it, you don’t quite know what they’re saying about it.”

Looking back, he acknowledges some points even came on bad shots, ones he can’t believe he attempted.

“When you’re in that zone, you take those kind of shots,” Roy said.

Roy won’t be in the game, let alone in that zone, on Saturday. At least he will be in the building. He’s hopeful that he can play again this season, but with his future not guaranteed, 27 games remaining on the schedule and the injury-riddled Timberwolves about to miss the playoffs for the ninth consecutive season, this could be Roy’s last time in Portland as a player, even an inactive one.

“This,” he said, “will be a little different.”

The Jerry Buss memorial service Thursday afternoon in Los Angeles was so, so ... Lakers. That’s the only way to describe it.
There were NBA legends, some random guy, fascinating stories, slight verbal jabs ... all playing out in front of a backdrop that featured 10 championship trophies.

NBA Commissioner David Stern called Buss, the Lakers owner who died at age 80 on Monday, “nothing less than a transformational force in the history of sports.”

Jerry West said Buss “has left a shadow over the entire sports world.”

Coming from the mouths of the league’s biggest names, it didn’t sound like hyperbole. And yet, mixed among the Hall of Famers such as West, Phil Jackson, Pat Riley, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Magic Johnson, plus future Hall of Famers Shaquille O’Neal and Kobe Bryant, was an ordinary, previously unknown man named Greg Tomlinson. His name wasn’t even in the program; he was a late-minute addition requested by Buss heir Jim Buss.

Tomlinson spoke -- extensively -- for the common fan, unable to provide much insight into Buss other than the fact that Buss remembered him and his kids the second time they met. Guess any service that lasts more than 90 minutes will find room for all sides.

Memorial tributes can reveal as much about the speaker as the person being remembered. You heard the poignancy of Kareem, the intensity of Riley, the competitiveness of Kobe, the inclusiveness of Magic (who asked every current and former Laker to stand up and receive a round of applause). You even heard echoes of the rivalry between West and Jackson.

After West’s emotional speech, Jackson recalled the time West drove him from his introductory news conference in L.A. to Buss’ house for his first meeting with the owner, noting that on that day West “didn’t talk as long as he just did now.”

Jackson also brought up the time Bryant wanted to be traded, recalling the analogy Buss used to explain why he resisted: “If I had a diamond of great value, four or five carats, would I give up that diamond for four diamonds of one carat? No. There’s no equal value that we could get for you. A trade would not bring equal value to this team.”

It was telling that four people with whom Buss had parted ways during his ownership tenure – Riley, West, Jackson and O’Neal -- felt compelled to come back and pay homage to him. O’Neal’s presence was the most fascinating, since his breakup was the most acrimonious, with some derisive comments made by O’Neal in the media.

“There was never a problem between me and Buss,” O’Neal said before entering the Nokia Theatre for the service. “As you know, I do whatever it takes to get ratings up for the game. He’s a businessman, I’m a businessman. The day after I got traded, Dr. Buss was the first to call me to say, ‘I miss you. If you ever need me, talk to me.’ Everything I did was for marketing purposes.”

O’Neal made a positive step back into the fold when he showed up for the Jerry West statue unveiling during the 2011 All-Star weekend in Los Angeles. Buss was there, and he and O’Neal had a positive exchange that likely paved the way toward the upcoming retirement of O’Neal’s Laker jersey. Thursday, in a sign of the absence of hard feelings, O’Neal drew the biggest laugh of the day at his own expense.

“[Buss] gave me everything I wanted,” O’Neal said. “I wanted one [contract] extension. He gave it to me. I wanted a second extension. He gave it to me. I wanted a third extension. He traded me.”

Bryant felt compelled to remind Jackson of the time he was asked for input on bringing him back, as if to say it would not have happened without him signing off. Bryant imitated his initial reaction by grimacing and swaying back and forth like Stevie Wonder at the piano.

Bryant said Buss looked at him and said, “Trust me.”

“And I did,” Bryant said. “And that has taken us to a whole another level and winning another two championships.”

Bryant stepped down from the stage as Magic Johnson made his way up. They stopped and embraced. As one observer noted, all 10 of the championships won by Buss were represented in that hug.

Johnson brought the service to a rousing crescendo, urging everyone to stand and cheer.

“This is a celebration of life,” Johnson said. “This is a celebration of success. We shouldn’t be sad.”

“Please, Buss family, do not ever sell the Lakers,” he implored. “And win more championships.”

The character of this memorial was uniquely Jerry Buss, from the star power to the subtle machinations playing out beneath the surface. It spoke to his ability to draw people together, even in the afterlife.

Kobe Bryant cares about the All-Star Game more than each and every one of the fans who cast 1,591,437 votes for him to start in it a record 15th time cares about the All-Star Game. That’s strange, because the All-Star Game is supposed to be for the fans, while for the players it’s usually a weekend of camaraderie, sponsor tie-ins and maybe a little chance to showcase their skills. Not for Bryant. For him, it’s another opportunity to win.

He doesn’t just show up to All-Star Games, he competes in them.

“When have I not competed?” he says.

You could scratch your head until you’re bald trying to come up with the answer to that one. I’ve even seen him compete when he’s injured, challenging ballboys or media members in shooting competitions before games he couldn’t play in. (Watch him revel in making a reporter do 200 pushups after Bryant sank a left-handed shot from halfcourt).

It explains why Bryant ranks among the NBA’s all-time greats, and how he has whittled the choice of greatest All-Star performer down to two: Bryant and Magic Johnson.

Bryant has the most points in All-Star game history, and he shares the record for All-Star Most Valuable Player awards. Today will be his 14th start, the most of anyone (he also was voted into the starting lineup in 2010 but couldn’t play because of an injury).

Magic has the most All-Star assists and has won the MVP twice, half as many as Kobe. Magic could have had more for himself, if he hadn’t been dedicated to setting up Ralph Sampson in 1985 or enabling Tom Chambers of the SuperSonics, the local favorite, to win it in Seattle in 1987. David Stern said Saturday that his favorite All-Star memory is Magic winning the MVP in Orlando in 1992, three months after Magic announced he was HIV-positive.

Both Kobe and Magic brought the right combination of playoff intensity and charity game showmanship to the All-Star Game. Magic pushed the ball upcourt, forcing his teammates to fill the lanes, daring the opposition to keep pace. Kobe plays lock-down defense and goes at opponents with ferocity when he has the ball.

“In those situations you don’t have to worry about zone coverages or double-teams,” Bryant says. “You just get a chance to go at a guy. It’s fun for me to be a part of.”

He might be the only one who thinks the game is the most fun part of All-Star Weekend. By the time tipoff finally arrives on Sunday evening, most folks are ready to head out of town. There have even been some snide remarks about Bryant’s effort from his fellow All-Stars, who in the past have adopted the attitude, “If Kobe wants that MVP so badly, he can have it.”

He’s never thought that way. If you’re going to be the one holding that trophy at the end of the day, you’ll have to beat him out for it. Last year that mentality resulted in a concussion and a broken nose when Dwyane Wade fouled him on a drive to the basket, and it led to a national referendum on LeBron James’ heart when LeBron passed off while Kobe was daring him to shoot at the end of the game.

Bryant shares the MVP record with Bob Pettit, who won his four awards in a seven-year stretch between 1956 and 1962. Bryant’s four are spread over 10 years, from 2002 and 2011. He emerged as the best on a court filled with the best for a full decade. The last one seemed to be a message to the likes of James, Kevin Durant and Blake Griffin -- who will be All-Star fixtures for years after Bryant is gone – that he hasn’t left the stage yet.

“It may have a little bit to do with it,” Bryant says. “But for me I’ve been that competitive about the game since I was 18. I don’t know, it’s just the way I’ve been.”

There’s a basketball game on the schedule today. That’s all Kobe Bryant needs to hear.

This week revealed the true fault with the Lakers. I mean fault in the fissure sense, like the cracks in the earth’s crust running underneath California that occasionally cause the ground to shake. It’s not so much the differences in personality between Kobe Bryant and Dwight Howard, it’s the difference in the stages of their careers.

Kobe is in win-now-at-all-costs-even-if-it-means-a-shortened-lifespan mode. Howard has to weigh all the pros and cons of his upcoming free agency, when he’ll have to make the most important decision of his career. A championship isn’t Howard’s only concern. Nor should it be.

Howard, 27, is about to determine where he’ll spend his prime years ... and whether he’d be willing to forsake millions of dollars to spend them with someone other than the Lakers. The irony is the injuries he’s going through now could help the Lakers’ chances of keeping him for the long term. If he’s worried that his body is breaking down, that the back surgery last year and the shoulder problems he’s encountered this season won’t allow him to regain his prior dominance, he would be advised to take the extra contract year and the more than 30 million additional dollars he would receive by re-signing with the Lakers.

But wouldn’t you want your body to heal properly before you had to choose, so you wouldn’t be making a decision based on fear? If you were Howard, wouldn’t that take precedence over a regular-season game in February? People like to believe they’d be all about team and championships. Those people haven’t been in a position of turning down $30 million.

What about loyalty? Yeah, what about it? Loyalty to a place he just got to? The same team that tried to trade Pau Gasol, then asked him to come off the bench even after he brought two more banners to Lakerland? What about that whole saga sends a signal to Dwight that he’ll receive eternal gratitude if he sucks it up now and plays through the pain?

The little media back-and-forth between Kobe and Dwight that played out over the past couple of days won’t preclude them from coexisting on the court when they have to. But it does reveal their different approaches, and it’s hard to win when people stand in different philosophical corners.

Kobe and Shaq didn’t get along, but at the start of the last decade they both were consumed with the same thing: winning championships. Shaq had his humongous contract, Kobe had already been given a fat, six-year extension. They squabbled over the means, but their end goals were the same. That’s why they got three rings together.

The Lakers traded for Howard even though he wasn’t clamoring to come to L.A. They knew he was in a contract season. They shouldn’t be surprised if his agenda doesn’t completely mesh with everyone else’s. They shouldn’t be angry if he does what’s in his own best interests.

It was the first question you asked when you saw Kobe Bryant finished with 14 assists against the Utah Jazz Friday night. You repeated it when he had another 14 assists against the Oklahoma City Thunder on Friday. Will he keep passing this much?

It feels like a stretch, like when we were asked to buy the quirky character actor Steve Buschemi as the leading man/gangster on “Boardwalk Empire.” Passing isn't Kobe's thing. Scoring is. You know how LeBron James scored his 20,000th point a year younger than Kobe did? Well, LeBron was four years younger than Bryant when he reached his 5,000th assist. If we can borrow the promotional hashtag Bryant uses on Twitter, you can #countonkobe to shoot.

But I believe Kobe will stay in this pass-oriented mode the rest of the way because traditionally he has pushed the scoring envelope in the regular season, then played more team-oriented ball in the playoffs…and with the Lakers margin for error eliminated by losing 25 of their first 42 games, every game is like a playoff game from here on out. That’s why he’ll stick with what’s working.

Over the course of Bryant’s career, the statistical differences between Kobe in the regular season and the playoffs are negligible. There’s a 0.1 difference in the scoring average. Assists are the same. Usage rate drops a percent in the postseason. It’s the anecdotal evidence that changes dramatically. In the playoffs, Bryant’s shot selection improves. You don’t hear those passive-aggressive complaints about the ball not moving from his teammates. The ultimate confirmation comes from the Larry O’Brien trophy. No one can win five championships by playing selfishly in the postseason.

Howard Beck, the New York Times writer who used to cover the Lakers for the Los Angeles Daily News, first came up with the notion of the different mode for Kobe in the playoffs, and on the last day of the regular season in 2004 Beck elicited this description from Phil Jackson:

"Sometimes [Bryant] needs to overwhelm the rest of the ballclub's necessity. ... As we get into the playoffs, that'll dissipate, because he knows that he's got to put his ego aside and conform to what we have to do if we're going to go anywhere in the playoffs. Any player that takes it on himself to do that [play for himself] knows that he's going against the basic principles of basketball. That's a selfish approach to the game. You know when you're breaking down the team or you're breaking down and doing things individualistic, you're going to have, you know, some unhappy teammates ... and he knows these things ... intuitively, I have to trust the fact that he's going to come back to that spot and know that the timing's right. The season's over, things have been accomplished, records have been stuck in the books, statistics are all jelled in, now let's go ahead and play basketball as we're supposed to play it."

It’s why Bryant, who has gone for 50 points in one out of every 50 games on average in the regular season, has done so only once in 220 playoff games. And it’s why he has had more assists than field goal attempts in the past two games.

From the first day of training camp, Bryant theorized that this sudden collection of superstars with Steve Nash and Dwight Howard could work together because each player did different things, so they wouldn’t step on each other’s toes. It turns out the key wasn’t doing different things, it’s about doing things differently, stepping out of comfort zones, adapting to suit this team’s needs.

"It’s trying to evolve and figure out what we need as a ballclub and taking a lot of pressure off Steve to have to be the playmaker all the time," Bryant said. "Instead of me being a finisher, just really facilitating."

It’s fascinating to hear Bryant and Nash, who both came into the league in 1996, talking about altering their approach after all of these years and accomplishments. And yes, it does speak to the desperate place the Lakers have reached.

"It is a big difference for me and it is a big change," Nash said. "It’s something that I have to adjust to. Very rarely did I get the ball and catch and shoot in my career."

A bit later, he said, "It’s not going to be the same that it was in Phoenix for me. It’s going to be different. And I have to accept and embrace that and try to help any way that I can."

Steve Nash as a spot-up shooter and Kobe Bryant as a passer. We didn’t envision this when this team came together. We also didn’t envision a 19-25 record with the All-Star break around the corner. If you want to know how this will play out over the next three months, look back at Bryant’s playoff games over the past 16 years.

The two best assists of the sports weekend won’t show up in the box score. They didn’t help a team win a game. They did something much more important. They gave a little moment of happiness to a child who has been through the worst extremes of horror.

It started when Los Angeles Clippers guard Chris Paul took a break from warming up for his game against the Washington Wizards and dribbled over to the baseline, where 8-year-old Isaiah Marquez-Greene was standing with his father, Jimmy Greene.

Isaiah was a student at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., when a gunman went on a shooting spree that rattled the nation on Dec. 14. Isaiah heard the shots. His sister, Ana, was in a classroom three doors down the hall. She was one of the 20 children killed that day, along with six adults. Ana became one of the most identifiable victims because of a video in which she sang while Isaiah played the piano. For many outsiders it was the first time they could attach a name, face and voice to one of the victims. A memorial Facebook page, Remembering Ana Marquez-Greene, gained 93,000 followers.

Isaiah had been invited by the Los Angeles Kings to participate in their season-opening Stanley Cup celebration earlier in the day. He had stood in a similar spot in Staples Center, flanked by his parents and former Kings greats Marcel Dionne and Rogie Vachon, holding the championship banner that was about to raised to the upper reaches of Staples Center.

Some seven hours later, with the Kings’ ice covered by the Clippers’ court, Isaiah’s sports fantasy weekend continued. Kings players Anze Kopitar and Willie Mitchell had come by the hotel room and brought the Stanley Cup with them. He had a Kings t-shirt and an all-access Kings staff credential hanging from his neck. He had an autographed hockey stick from Anze Kopitar. He got an autographed Paul jersey and a set of red, NBA-logoed wristbands and headband from Clippers equipment manager Pete Serrano. And now Paul had a request.

“Do you know how to play defense?” Paul asked.

Isaiah shook his head. Paul tried again, but he couldn’t lure Isaiah on the court to guard him. So he came up with a different idea.

“Okay, give me a pass and I’ll make the basket, get you an assist,” Paul said.

He gave the ball to Isaiah, who heaved a pass back to him. Paul gathered himself on the “LAC” logo on the court, took an extra moment to concentrate, then elevated and took a jumper that dropped through the net.

Paul wasn’t finished.

“Do you know who Grant Hill is?” he asked Isaiah.

Another head shake.

“Grant Hill is one of the greatest players ever to play basketball,” Paul said. “I’m going to have you pass to him to see if he can make a basket.”

Isaiah fed Hill, who took his familiar, wide-legged jump shot and made it.

Hill ran over, looked down at Isaiah’s feet and noticed his Fila shoes, the same brand Hill wore during his glory days with the Detroit Pistons.

“It’s the Fila connection!” Hill said as he slapped five with Isaiah.

Three hours later, Isaiah was standing in front of Hill’s locker, holding the game ball that had been signed by the Clipper team. That he was still standing at all at the end of this long, emotional sports Saturday that began at 7 a.m. with a rehearsal for the Kings' pregame ceremony was an impressive feat on its own. His father kept waiting for that inevitable cranky crash kids go through and it didn’t happen, not even after 12 hours, an NHL and NBA game had passed. Greene's wife had long since returned to the hotel room. Their son kept going. At one point, energized by a 16-ounce soda he inhaled during the Clipper game, he proclaimed: “I feel like running back and forth across the court 15 times.”

In other words, he felt like doing kid things. I don’t know how that’s possible for a child who has been through an experience that would a war veteran would consider traumatic. But if there’s a word that I’d use to describe Isaiah it’s undaunted.
When he met Fox Sports West sideline reporter Jaime Maggio, she told him the hardest part of her job is holding the heavy microphone and then handed it to him.

“It’s not that heavy,” he said.

None of our burdens are that great, none of our challenges that difficult compared to what Isaiah and his family have been through.

“We’re still trying to wrap our minds around it,” Greene said. “What’s going on, how we’re doing. It’s a moment-to-moment thing. There really hasn’t been healing. There’s still very much grieving and confusion and loss. In the midst of that, our faith is very strong and always has been. We know that [Ana] is with our Lord. And that gives us comfort.”

For one day they also had relief, thanks to a couple of sporting events and the people behind them. It started with the governor of the Kings and chief executive officer of their parent company AEG, Tim Leiweke, who wanted to find Sandy Hook families with a hockey connection and invite them as a way of honoring the victims. AEG spokesman Michael Roth came up with two families with kids who played in youth hockey leagues. One family declined to participate; the Marquez-Greene family decided to accept the invitation and make their first trip since the tragedy.

“For my wife and I, it’s tough,” Greene said. “We’d love for our daughter to be here to experience this all too. We think about her all the time. But that being said, it’s nice to get away for a weekend and have a distraction.”

That’s supposed to be the purpose of sports, isn’t it? Except lately they hadn’t done a very good job of it. The tales of the nonexistent girlfriend of Manti Te’o and the long-awaited tell-all by Lance Armstrong even managed to overwhelm the buildup to the NFL’s conference championship Sunday -- which itself was headlined by an investigation into an alleged sexual assault that involved San Francisco 49ers wide receiver Michael Crabtree.

Saturday brought better news. The NHL made its lockout-delayed season debut. Chris Paul returned for the Clippers after missing the previous three games with a knee injury. And an 8-year-old boy was there to take it all in, smiling repeatedly.

“I’m glad to see him here enjoying the games,” Greene said. “What kid gets to be in bed with the Stanley Cup? It’s really cool, the experiences they’ve let him be a part of.”

Gradually, his family is reconnecting with the world at large. It's coming in steps. Greene said he hasn’t watched television in a month. This was the first time the family has traveled since the tragedy.

He and his wife, Nelba, had to wrestle with a particularly devastating soul-searching because they had only returned to Connecticut in August, after spending the previous three years in Canada. They had chosen that neighborhood in part because during a visit to Sandy Hook in May they saw a schoolwide art project that celebrated the peaceful nature of the town. They made their decision based on safety, and wound up feeling they had placed their children in harm’s way.

But Greene made a discovery in the wake of the tragedy. After seeing the response of the community, the way former strangers pulled together, he realized that Sandy Hook had not been the wrong choice. It was the right choice. The community formed a group called Sandy Hook Promise which is dedicated to continued conversation, not silence, to honoring, not forgetting.

“It’s much more important to be open and available,” Greene said. “To have all the conversations around the pertinent issues: gun violence, access to mental health services and safety in public places.

“We really feel like Ana was incredibly loving, incredibly talented, intelligent girl. Going forward, we want to go forward in love. Not in divisiveness, me on my side of the political aisle, you on yours. We’ve really got to come together. Because this isn’t a political issue. It’s a human issue.”

Humans. That’s what they all were distilled to on Saturday. Not hockey players, not basketball players, just people showing care and concern for an 8-year-old boy.

“I heard he hadn’t smiled since the incident occurred,” Chris Paul said. “Having a son of my own and having a daughter…I couldn’t imagine. I couldn’t imagine. I was just happy that he could be here and have a good time.”

To help the families of Sandy Hook Elementary School visit MySandyhookfamilyfund.com

LOS ANGELES -- Not many teams could make a rivalry more intriguing with a pair of blowout games. With the Los Angeles Clippers and Golden State Warriors, it gets more intriguing the wider the margin of victory.

Sure, the Clippers’ 115-89 beatdown of the Warriors on Saturday was about as suspenseful as a Bazooka Joe comic. But with a menacing glare from Mark Jackson, a hard foul from David Lee, and Chris Paul’s memory and eye for detail thrown in the mix, there was just enough to make you want to fast-forward to their fourth and final meeting Jan. 21 -- and hope they’ll collide again in the playoffs.

The Warriors were the only team that could claim two victories over the Clippers this season, and no other squad enjoyed the process as much as the Warriors did in their 115-94 victory Wednesday night in Oakland, during which the Golden State bench rejoiced at a Blake Griffin shot that hit the side of the backboard and Jackson joked about Griffin’s acting skills.

Saturday was the Clippers’ turn for repayment, with compounded interest. Despite having played a long, emotional game against the Lakers the previous night, they spurted to a 35-12 lead after the first quarter, expanded the lead to 28 points in the second, and were throwing alley-oops to DeAndre Jordan off the backboard and from half court while parading to a 39-point lead in the third.

It was enough to get Jackson to spend a good portion of a timeout glaring in the Clippers’ direction.

“What you’ve got to do as a coach, as a player, is just let it soak in and remember it,” Jackson said. “That’s all. Mark it down with permanent ink and ... we’ll see ya. We’ll see ya. Nothing upset me. They earned the right to celebrate the way they played. Just a good, old-fashioned, heavyweight championship stare-down, that’s all.”

The Clippers tried to avoid saying there was any extra motivation behind this performance. Not even from Matt Barnes, their emotional sergeant-at-arms.

“The most important thing was we wanted to get a win,” he said.

He and his teammates attributed this performance to simply wanting to play better against a divisional opponent that had already beaten them twice ... although Paul noted that: “The first time they beat us here, you would have thought they’d won the NBA Finals, you know what I mean?”

Yeah, we know.

The Clippers followed that game with a home loss to the Cleveland Cavaliers, causing them to reassess their approach. They credit those losses with giving them the mentality to win 17 consecutive games. They actually learned to prepare for games in the same manner in which Jackson is trying to get his squad to think.

“In order for us to get to where we want to get to, we have to treat every game like a big game,” Jackson said. “We can’t let our guards down. We can’t think, ‘OK, we’ll stumble into a victory.’ We’ve got to play with force.”

These two teams are learning what it’s like to be considered targets.

It used to be the only thing that could connect these teams was adjacent seats at the draft lottery. Nearly halfway through the 2012-13 season, they both can be regarded as upper-echelon teams in the Western Conference. Only three games separated them entering Friday night, and they fully expect to know each other down to their Social Security numbers by the time this is over.

“If we plan on getting where we plan on getting, we’ll see them down the road,” Jackson said.

The Warriors still have the 2-1 series lead. Griffin might still be a little sore from the two-handed shove Lee gave him as he attempted a fast-break alley-oop. For a series with such little history, there suddenly is a lot to keep in mind.

“We remember,” Griffin said. “Wednesday’s game was pretty fresh in our mind. They outplayed us and they deserved the win.”

As a result, “We knew they were going to come out and go after us,” Jackson said. “We did not respond tonight.”

I doubt that will be the case next time. What I do know is I can’t wait to see what’s next.