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No games can be won or lost in the offseason, but in the five months since being swept out of the playoffs by the San Antonio Spurs, the Lakers have seemingly lost what has largely defined the franchise in its five decades in Los Angeles: the power of perception.

Among the NBA’s elite, the Lakers have the bluest blood. They are one of the few teams in all of sports expected to compete for a championship every season, and with their alluring location, deep pockets and rich legacy, they have the means to live up to such lofty standards: Since the 1976-77 season, the Lakers have missed the playoffs just twice and have more titles than first-round exits. In the summer of 2012, the team turned a very good center (Andrew Bynum) into the best one in the league (Dwight Howard), and pried away Steve Nash, the best player from a division rival, for draft picks. Long before the ensuing disastrous results, building a superteam out of almost nothing only reaffirmed its supposed infallibility. The rich got richer, and so on and so on.

But with Howard's rejection of their richer contract offer in free agency this summer in favor of a deal from the Houston Rockets, the Lakers not only lost their bridge to the future -- the player expected to take the handoff from Kobe Bryant and lead the franchise into the next generation -- they also conceded some of that cherished status. Cap-strapped and lacking any other alternatives, the Lakers very publicly courted Howard, going as far as to roll out "Stay" billboards with his likeness, which long-term fans largely found unbecoming. To see their efforts rebuffed, to the cruel delight of many, stripped away some of the shine that surrounds the club, and that new, confounding image was only further established when the team trotted out new additions like Chris Kaman, Nick Young and Jordan Farmar (on his second tour of duty) to a media throng that had thinned out considerably from last year’s much-anticipated preseason meet-and-greet. Old money bet on the wrong stock and took a big lost, and now it’s forced to try and make ends meet any way it can like every other team.

Even with oodles of cap room awaiting it next summer and the usual inherent advantages it has in attracting free agents, the prospects of a quick return to glory are far more muddled than usual. The last time the Lakers missed the postseason, in 2004-05, the player expected to bring them into the future was already in-house. But now that same player could be what stunts their ability to transition into a new era. Almost a decade later, Bryant is still the best player on the Lakers, but because of his demanding personality, affinity for taking shots and millstone salary, he is also the best reason for other superstars not to play for the Lakers, at least in the immediate.

For the first time in a long time, there are no easy answers in L.A. But that uncertainty is precisely what makes the Lakers so compelling this season.

Perhaps more than any other sport, the NBA can be rather predictable. Certainly, there are surprises -- first and foremost, last season’s Lakers debacle -- but elite players dictate so much of the league’s results that it’s fairly easy to pick out successes and failures: If you have a superstar, you often win big; if you do not have a superstar, you often do not win big. And unlike the NCAA tournament or the NFL playoffs, 82-game regular seasons and seven-game playoff series have a way of straining out any truly shocking circumstances; last year’s ESPN.com Summer Forecast, comprised of 100 voters, correctly predicted 13 of the eventual 16 participants in the playoffs. Barring injuries, we pretty much know what we’re getting into once the dust settles on free agency. The ballet of a LeBron James dunk is indeed beautiful, but the known is at the core of this league, and that is what makes it so ripe for the advanced analytics that have become so popular, particularly in the daily discussion mill.

For so long, the Lakers found comfort in this predictably. There will always be outside noise generated by their palace’s intrigue, but the only question of much consequence remained a constant: Will they win a title this season? This year’s Summer Forecast panel predicts a meager 36 wins and a 12th-place finish for the Lakers. And while Bryant, among others, may still expect championships, the conversations surrounding the team are much dourer. What kind of player will a 35-year-old Bryant be once he has recovered from a torn Achilles? Can a move back to center rejuvenate a 33-year-old Pau Gasol? What does a 39-year-old Steve Nash have left? Can they even make the playoff field? The baseline for success has indeed been lowered.

Even though the spare parts the Lakers picked up on the open market to plug their many holes probably won’t lead to a significantly better on-court product than last season’s 45-win team, there’s a certain freedom to playing when up is the only place to go in the expectation game. Particularly for a team coming off a season in which each game felt as if it meant everything.

With injuries, reported in-fighting, malaise and poor results, last season’s Lakers were quite the poisonous cocktail. But the tumult only exacerbates when you factor in the context they played under. It’s easy to write off preseason prognostications as silly, and perhaps there is some truth to that, but in those summer months we recalibrate our whole interpretation of the league. While the time to reflect helps us better understand the eight months of game action that just happened, it also resets our expectations for what is about to happen: that the Heat are a budding dynasty, that the Rockets are budding contenders in the West, that the Lakers are a budding crisis. None of this has happened, but if it doesn’t, it will seem incongruous based on the perceptions we spend crafting in the summer months. Without the context of the Summer of LeBron, the Heat’s 2011 NBA Finals loss doesn’t seem so devastating. Nor does the Lakers’ 2012-13 season feel like such a letdown without the immense anticipation that preceded it.

Asked on Saturday if last season was the most difficult of his career, Nash concurred: "It was, yeah. There were other difficult years in there, but it was difficult because it was the freshest [in my memory] and there were the most expectations."

The Lakers were unable to replace Howard in free agency, but their consolation prize is a good one: the benefit of doubt. Bryant and others can express championship aspirations, but if they do not achieve that goal, it will only reaffirm what we already perceived. Anything more, though, will surely feel that much sweeter, and that joy of overcoming expectations (see: every athlete Twitter account) is one this franchise has not had the privilege of in some time. The mood around the team has noticeably been lifted from last season, those around the team say, chief among them head coach Mike D'Antoni, who now gets a full training camp and the chance to run his preferred system with players that seem a better fit for it. Any type of success, particularly in the early stages of the 2013-14 season, will surely only build upon that.

That may not be enough to fulfill any championship expectations left over from years gone by, but anything can happen. And given the circumstances this franchise now finds itself in, the excitement brought about by the unknown is indeed something to look forward to.

For a player defined by an insatiable appetite for superiority, Kobe Bryant was dealt a major blow by the departure of Dwight Howard. Not because of who left his Los Angeles Lakers, but what Howard took with him: Bryant’s last best chance at another NBA championship.

Though already 34 years and 316 days old, and only three months into his recovery from a torn left Achilles, Bryant told the Lakers’ team Web site last week that he intends to play, at a high level, for at least three more years in the hopes of pushing "the rings count out a little further." That prospect obviously takes a hit in the wake of Howard’s decision to sign a free-agent contract with the Houston Rockets. Which is why, despite the notorious mismatch in personality and outlook with his now-former superstar running mate, Bryant plunked himself down in Beverly Hills last week with the rest of the Lakers strike force to try to coax Howard into staying put. Even amidst all the tumult of last season, a zened-out Bryant would preach patience and staying the course, because doing so represented the only route to winning and aiding his legacy-defining ring quest.

But while the literal wins are sure to decline without Howard, at least in the immediate, Bryant once again comes away from a Lakers free-agency scare a winner. Because like in 2004, when he was the one threatening to walk, the outcome leaves the Lakers constructed very much in his image.

When Bryant re-upped in Los Angeles nine years ago, after the departures of Shaq and Phil Jackson, the Lakers effectively traded in a team built for contention for one that prioritized Bryant. With Lamar Odom and Caron Butler next to him, Bryant’s usage rate and scoring average rose slightly from the previous season, and then, when Jackson returned to the fold the following year, soared to what still stand as career highs. The Lakers accumulated just four playoff wins in the three seasons after he signed his new contract, which then led to roundabout trade demands spurred by his own impatience with the franchise. But Bryant got what he wanted: most notably, out from under the "sidekick" label.

An older, wiser and less-guarded Bryant appears more in tune with the big picture these days. Despite how sharp and tone deaf his message to Dwight was in their sitdown last week, the words that surfaced read more as an attempt to inspire than scare away. Lately, Bryant has sentimentalized his position in Lakers lore, particularly after the death of owner Jerry Buss, who twice talked him off the ledge when he was thinking hard about leaving the franchise, and his pitch appears driven as much by "Been there, bro" wisdom as it does personal gain.

Howard, of course, chose a better chance at future titles over being a part of a history filled with past titles, and as a result, Bryant’s fast-closing window for that coveted sixth ring only grows smaller. But what he got from Howard, who was quickly denounced as a villain by Lakers sympathizers (if he wasn't there already), is the kind of consolation Bryant, in particular, should appreciate: the chance to wear the white hat and save the day.

The Bryant preparing to enter his 18th season is a monolith, ingratiating himself to the fan at large more and more with every curse-word-laced quote and odds-defying pull-up jumper. In this age of quantifiable fact, he is our antihero, and he has already won over a large chunk of the public by swinging his big tween stick at Howard on the interwebs, unfollowing him on Twitter and Instagramming a photo of him soldiering on with best bud Pau Gasol soon after word of Howard's choice was announced.

Now picture what awaits Bryant this season: He's coming off a career-threatening injury, one he’ll probably come back from way earlier than expected; playing for a crestfallen, prestigious franchise that’s already being counted out; alongside sympathetic, good-guy sidekicks in the twilight of their careers; for a coach who encourages a fast pace and heaps of possessions.

Bryant has spent his entire career finding motivation from anyone and anything he could find; he was already ticked off at potential doubters the night he tore his Achilles. Next season offers up a typhoon of adversaries for him to overcome.

Age, one of the important factors in Howard’s decision, is already at the top of Bryant's list.

"I think the [Achilles] injury has something to do with it. It really increased the drive. And probably San Antonio getting so close to winning No. 5, probably hurt me a little bit, too," Bryant explained to Lakers.com’s Mike Trudell about his three-more-years declaration. "I want to make sure I push the ring count out a little further. It was really, really close there. They played phenomenally well. But it's a testament to what skill can do. To what us old guys can do if you play together, if you play with one mind and one purpose you can accomplish great things. It was inspirational for me and hopefully inspirational for the city of Los Angeles and this organization of what we can do, how this tide can change fairly quickly, and we'll be looking at a parade."

The Spurs’ success in the face of annual questions over how long they can win is deservedly hailed around the league, particularly with the rise of so-called super teams. As Bryant indicates, it has even become a bellwether for aging giants like himself.

With Howard gone and the Lakers looking more like the Spurs than the super team they feigned to be last season, there is an opportunity for Bryant to reach similar unexpected heights, to push the Lakers into the playoffs and prove himself against the one force larger than anything he can conjure up.

It may not result in a championship, but for Bryant, the opportunity presented by the loss of Howard is indeed a victory.

Of the players in the post-Jordan era of the NBA, it’s a fair argument that Tim Duncan and Kobe Bryant are two of the most accomplished individuals. While LeBron James will no doubt be a part of this discussion once his career is near its end, he has not yet built up a statistical resume quite as hefty as Duncan or Bryant.

Duncan (16 seasons) and Bryant (17) have about the same NBA service time, especially when you consider that Kobe was not much of an impact rookie in 1996-97 (7.6 PPG, 6 starts) while Duncan was the 1997-98 NBA Rookie of the Year, starting all 82 games and averaging 21.1 PPG and 11.9 RPG (keep in mind there were no 20-10 players in the entire NBA this season).

Individual/Regular-Season Success

Bryant is without question the more prolific scorer, averaging five more points for his career than Duncan. However, Duncan won two regular season MVPs (2001-02, 02-03), while Bryant has just one (2007-08). They were in direct competition for Duncan’s MVP awards also, as Bryant finished fifth and third respectively in the MVP voting for Duncan’s two MVP seasons.

While Duncan has a better percentage from the field for his career, Bryant has bested him by one in All-Star Games, All Defensive 1st team selections, and All-NBA 1st teams. In fact, Bryant tied Karl Malone for most 1st team All-NBA selections this season when he picked up his 11th such honor.

Team/Postseason Success

Team success has been plentiful for both players, as both have made the playoffs 16 times. Duncan has never missed the playoffs in his entire career. Bryant, on the other hand, missed the playoffs in the 2004-05 season, ending the season under .500 at 34-48. Since Duncan joined the Spurs in 1997-98, they have never had a winning percentage lower than .610.

Additionally, Duncan’s teams have won at least 50 games in every season of his career except the lockout-shortened 1998-99 season (50 regular season games total), which was the season he won his first NBA title and NBA Finals MVP.

As far as playoff success goes, Bryant has won one more title than Duncan. However, Duncan is currently undefeated in the NBA Finals (4-0) and has one more Finals MVP trophy to his credit.

Advanced Metrics in Historical Context

Advanced metrics also slightly favor Duncan. Duncan has 184.2 career win shares (an estimate of the number of wins a player contributes to his team based on his offense and defense), over 10 more win shares than Bryant does for his career. The Spurs stalwart ranks ninth in win shares all time whereas Bryant is ranked 17th.

Defensive win shares show that Duncan really changes the game on that side of the ball. Duncan’s defensive win shares are 93.5 for his career, fifth-best all time behind Russell, Kareem, Olajuwon and Wilt.

Bryant’s 49.5 defensive win shares rank 46th all time for the sake of context. Again, Bryant is a far superior offensive talent, posting 30 more offensive win shares than Duncan for his career, but in terms of all-time ranks, Bryant is ninth and Duncan is 28th, a much closer disparity than on the defensive end.

How bad was it for the Los Angeles Lakers in their first-round series sweep?

Let us count the ways, with significant help from the Elias Sports Bureau.

• The San Antonio Spurs outscored the Lakers by 18.8 points per game in their four-game sweep. Elias tells us that is tied for the fourth-largest points per game differential in a best-of-seven series in NBA history and the worst by the Lakers in franchise history.

The biggest in any series was 25.3 points in a four-game sweep by the Orlando Magic over the Atlanta Hawks in the 2010 Eastern Conference semis.

• The Lakers have now lost six straight playoff games dating back to last season. That matches the longest playoff losing streak in franchise history. They previously lost six in a row from 1973 to 1974 and 1991 to 1992.

• Dating back to his stints with the Suns and Knicks, Mike D’Antoni is 1-14 in his last 15 playoff games as head coach. Elias says the only other coach in league history to lose 14 of 15 in the postseason is current NBA broadcaster Mike Fratello. His worst span was losing 16 of 17 from 1995 to 2006 while with the Cavaliers and Grizzlies.

• The Lakers lost the final two games of their series against the Spurs by 31 and 21 points, respectively. In doing so, they became just the second team in NBA history to lose consecutive home playoff games by at least 20 points, joining the Miami Heat who did so against the Hornets in the 2001 first round.

• Since the playoffs expanded to eight teams per conference in 1983-84, the Lakers are now 0-5 in playoff series as the 7 or 8 seed. It should come as little surprise that they struggled against the 2-seed Spurs as the Lakers went 4-14 during the regular season against the top five seeds in the Western Conference including a 1-2 mark against San Antonio.

• The Lakers’ stars struggled with injuries for much of the season and it all came to a head on April 12 when Kobe Bryant was lost for the season with a torn Achilles. When they did have Bryant, Steve Nash, Pau Gasol, and Dwight Howard in the lineup together, they went 8-14 in 22 games.

• Additionally, the Lakers’ expected starting five of Nash, Bryant, Gasol, Howard and Metta World Peace played only 189 minutes and 11 seconds together - just 4.8 percent of the team's total minutes played during the regular season.

Any offense dominated by Kobe Bryant becomes a blank slate when he’s not present. A few very general principles might remain, but the Los Angeles Lakers’ half-court offense was essentially starting from scratch. Over the weekend, Dwight Howard prescribed a slower, more inside-oriented offense as the best bet to mitigate Bryant's absence. Did the Lakers accept Howard's proposal? A few quick notes from the Lakers' 91-86 win over the San Antonio Spurs on Sunday night at Staples Center:

• What kinds of shots does an offense look for and how does it try to find them? The answers to those questions provide a general sketch of a team's core identity. The Lakers on Sunday night were a team looking to work the ball into their big men on the block, and achieving that in fairly conventional ways. Early on, the vast majority of possessions were simple posts up with an entry pass from the wing in a mostly static half court. The Lakers posted up 32 times, the Spurs eight. When the Lakers wanted buckets to ice the game late, they punched the ball into Howard on the left block one-on-one against Tim Duncan. Howard generated 15 true shot attempts out of post-up sets, scored 26 points on 9-for-15 shooting from the field and 8-for-17 from the free throw line.
• The starting unit produced fairly efficient offense during its stint to open the game. It wasn't gangbusters and the ball got sticky, but the Lakers found a number of looks at close range and their presence on the floor without dynamic wing scorers had the Spurs leaning low all night. Pau Gasol couldn't find the net, but he still demanded attention down low from the defense, and leveraged that attention to find shooters (for instance, a big 3-pointer by Steve Blake to give the Lakers a two-point lead with less than five minutes to go in the first half).
• With Bryant out, Blake stepped in as the Lakers' primary perimeter creator, and it's no surprise he saw a huge uptick in usage. Blake finished with 23 points, including 4-for-8 from beyond the arc. A lot of the Lakers' stuff originated with Howard and Gasol at the elbows to serve as traffic cones for Blake. The basic strategy for Blake was to penetrate into the teeth of the defense and hope something materializes -- either a close-range and/or makable shot, or a passing lane to an open shooter or rolling big man. His eight 3-point attempts materialized in a hodgepodge of ways: off a high angle pick-and-roll from Gasol, flaring to the wing for a catch in rhythm and a couple of the pull-up variety.
• The Lakers tried to create shot attempts early (e.g. Dwight Howard rim runs off Spurs misses) but they could never quite establish a pace. You have to think that’s something Lakers coach Mike D’Antoni will drill home prior to Wednesday night’s game. If the Lakers are going to look for shots on the box, then they should do it quickly. One of D’Antoni’s most steadfast beliefs is that the offense has the advantage for the first few seconds of a possession, but after the defense gets set -- especially one as well-tuned as the Spurs' -- it has the edge. When the clock ticked down and the Lakers needed to create something out of thin air, they went into Howard and Gasol at the end of the possessions. Where an offense goes when it's desperate tells us a lot about where an offense believes it's strongest.
• The Lakers' half-court offense started to decongest a little when they started running some corner sets on one side of the floor, while Howard set up on the opposite block. Once the Lakers swung the ball to the second side and the entry pass to Howard was made, he was in much better position to attack the rim. We can forget that Howard is an absolutely unguardable beast when he catches in close proximity to the basket. The Spurs doubled Howard on a couple of occasions in the first quarter -- defensive reads in at least one case -- but by the third quarter, the Spurs threw hard double teams at Howard on the catch as a matter of policy.
• It's not an enormous problem, but Metta World Peace has some sort of issue with delivering entry passes. Funny thing is, he doesn't make a lot of poor passes. Yet if there's any sort of front on the post player, World Peace gets anxious. He'll bail out and put the ball on the floor. Twice in the first quarter, World Peace looked off post players -- Gasol and Howard once each. The two possessions yield was a couple of free throw attempts.
• With Gasol and Howard on the floor together, the Lakers were outscored 50-47. When the two big men share the floor without both Bryant and Steve Nash, the Lakers are a minus-8 for the season in a smallish sample size of 83 minutes.

For a couple of hot seasons, LeBron James was the most polarizing athlete in sports. We've documented the causes ad nauseam, so no need to do so again. The most violent tides have receded, and when we look back at James' career at some point in the future, the rancor surrounding him between 2010 and 2012 likely will be regarded as a relatively brief dalliance with rage over the course of a monumental career. "The Decision" and the 2010-11 season certainly will be a prominent display in the official LeBron James retrospective, but I suspect it will be more incidental than we imagine now.

The generation's true enduring polarizer among hard-core NBA fans has been Kobe Bryant. However broad his appeal has been globally (if you want an illustration of this, visit China, where the five most popular NBA players are Kobe, Kobe, Kobe, Kobe and Yao), Bryant's persona among NBA fans in North America has always been wildly disparate. The legion of Kobe defenders is as rabid an individual fan base as there is in professional sports over the long term. Tim Tebow has held the No. 1 spot on the charts, but that's calmed.

The factions in the fan universe that love and loathe Kobe have been waging an endless war, one that has navigated his clash with Shaquille O'Neal, an event that first prompted many fans to choose a side. The Colorado rape case made him a crossover public figure, and now people who had seen few, if any, of his on-court exploits could offer commentary on Bryant, the human being. The mysterious Game 7 performance against Phoenix in the 2006 postseason, in which Bryant refused to shoot the ball down the stretch, added to the intrigue. Many regarded his behavior as repugnant, a confirmation that Bryant, despite his unyielding commitment to his craft and his catalog of wonders, was fundamentally selfish, a solipsist with little self-awareness in a team game, a guy out for himself.

There was the "ship his ass out" Bynum business, trading barbs in the media with marginal former teammates and other fodder for those with no love for Bryant. The past few years, analytics have gained traction in popular NBA debates. Empirical-minded critics produced hard evidence that Kobe's reputation as a clutch assassin was overblown. In this same recent period, Bryant fashioned a blunt candor, expressing on a regular -- even daily -- basis the kind of sentiments usually conveyed by older, crankier folks. The message has been clear: I really don't have much more to prove in this game, so why harness myself with a filter? What possible harm can the truth exact?

So for every count-the-rings loyalist, there are those who can't stand what they see as narcissism and a self-regard so shameless that it practically invites an emotional investment in the guy's failure. Not every Kobe skeptic's feelings are that strong, but it's safe to say there are a ton of people sitting in front of their screens and monitors, hoping the guy goes 0-for-5 down the stretch of a tight game.

When Bryant fell to the Staples Center floor Friday night in the fourth quarter, and it soon became evident that he ruptured an Achilles tendon, a profound sadness set in -- even among most of those who root against Bryant. A severe injury is not the kind of failure fair partisans want to witness an opponent suffer.

Bryant might offend, but he never withholds. The theater of NBA Basketball can't achieve its full potential without intensity, and Bryant has generated more of it than anyone in the game over the past 15 years. Championships, awards and recognition have rightly followed. While Bryant is in rehab -- and ultimately when he's gone -- we'll be deprived of all that, no matter where we stand on the Kobe continuum. Because even if you reside at the revulsion end, the origin of those judgments lies with him. Kobe makes you feel, as any exceptional performer or artist should. And that warrants our empathy.

Basketball is better when its most ambitious talents are on the floor to test the game's limits. Bryant has never stopped trying to stretch the boundaries of possibility. The Hero Ball, legitimacy of the myth-busting and self-absorption don't negate that. Bryant's body of work can still be the subject of examination and debate, but appreciation for mastery should always exceed any personal failings. This instinct allows us to fulfill one of basketball's cooler missions -- the collective celebration of the sport.

The gritted teeth. The peaked eyebrows. The scrunched face.

The look has been the logo for Kobe Bryant at his best over the past few years.

But here was Bryant, sitting near the east foul line at Staples Center, his knees near his chest and both of his arms attempting to stabilize his limp left leg, and the look conveyed only horror.

Two nights earlier, Bryant turned in a heroic performance -- a 47-point, 8-rebound, 5-assist, 4-block, 3-steal gem in a much-needed win at the Rose Garden, a place that had so tormented him in years past. It was the type of game that made you believe that nothing could stop him from lifting the tired and tattered Los Angeles Lakers into the postseason.

But here he was, one of the game’s last few giants, crumpled into a heap.

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After decades of living through newspaper box scores and first-hand accounts, the Information Age has created new ways for understanding and interpreting the game. Advanced statistics have become not only part of the conversation in recent years but an integral piece in any argument. “Efficiency” is a buzz word that permeates through locker rooms and press rooms and at home. It’s not unlikely to hear about “usage rate” or “effective field goal percentage” during a local or national broadcast.

All of it has conspired to create a more educated fan, and, in turn, a new ideal for a superstar basketball player. It’s not so much about heroic feats as much as it as about cold, hard reality.

The guy who jacks up all types of shots, from every angle, against every defense has given way to the guy who can do a little bit of everything and do it efficiently.

The last-second dagger may have gone in, but should it have been taken in the first place? The discussion of Hero Ball has effectively killed our basketball heroes.

Except for a select few, most notably Bryant.

This emphasis on process over raw production regardless of the means most undercuts a stone-cold gunner like Bryant, who, despite a 17-year career that has been nothing short of prolific, has a tendency to take the reins and refuse to give them up, regardless of the obstacles thrown in his path.

But the more the game of basketball becomes grounded in statistical truth, the greater the myth of Kobe Bryant seems to grow. Because while his historic scoring ability has fueled his rise, it’s the defiance of a TV anti-hero that has defined his 17-year career.

I can’t skip college? Watch me.

I can’t succeed without Shaq? Watch me.

I can’t play with a gnarled finger? Watch me.

I can’t win as many rings as Jordan? Watch me.

Even as his age has crept past 30, his brashness, that impenetrability of a teenager, never waned.

So it was no surprise that after a 2011-12 season that saw his attempts rise and his shooting percentage dip, Bryant again defied the odds this year, turning in some of his best performances as the unbridled hope of a Lakers NBA Finals run quickly disintegrated into a daily fight to save face. The means had indeed changed. A healthier Bryant was taking three fewer shots per game, and more and better shots at the rim while scaling back the midrange jumper a bit. He also vacillated roles at times to Stucco over the Lakers’ injury woes, sometimes even eschewing his tunnel vision for the rim to become more of a facilitator, at one point racking up double-digit assists and near-triple-doubles in clumps.

But it wasn’t enough just to do it. In the midst of his facilitating binge, Bryant made sure to underline the ease with which he could do it. He would go into games with the clear mission to get others involved, drop 10 assists or so, and afterward act like it was no big thing, at one point even evoking Neo from “The Matrix.”

By any means necessary, Kobe would often say.

At some point during this season, as the injuries began to mount and the losses dragged the Lakers’ playoff chances deeper and deeper into a hole, Bryant became more myth than man, and the charming cockiness he displayed in postgame scrums -- cracking jokes despite dire situations and swearing openly into live mics, always with a sly grin -- only added to the persona. Slap a 10-gallon hat on him and you’d think the stubble-faced Bryant was a character conjured up by Elmore Leonard.

LeBron James has been superhuman this season. But while his physique is Herculean, The Decision and the emotional toll it clearly took on James has made him seem so mortal, even as he defies gravity. He is also very much a star of now, the model of all-around brilliance and efficiency the game now craves. Bryant, too, has endured his share of personal and professional obstacles, but his foibles only further emphasis the old ideal of a superstar athlete -- the cocky, manly gunner with the ice in his veins and a fear of no one.

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Which is why it was more confusing than heartbreaking to watch Bryant limp on his tattered left leg to the locker room Friday night, even making a portion of the walk from one end of the court to the other without any help. Leg injuries have felled several of the league’s brightest stars in the past year. But Bryant was supposed to be impervious to such things. In nearly two decades with the Lakers, Bryant has missed no more than 17 regular-season games in a single season, playing with face masks and cartoon-sized gauze wraps along the way.

But there he was, as always, after the game: in front of his locker being peppered with questions from the media. Only this time it came with crutches underneath his arms and a glossy coating around his eyes as he dammed his emotions.

As ESPN's Chris Palmer noted: "Kobe with tears in his eyes. Never seen him so...human."

Bryant will likely rehab and make a comeback. After the game, a Lakers win over the playoff-bound Golden State Warriors, he told reporters that the thought of pundits questioning his ability to do so already pissed him off.

And, surely, such a recovery will be hailed as heroic.

But already 34 and 232 days and facing perhaps a year-long comeback, it’s possible that, at least in spirit, the NBA lost its last hero of Hero Ball on this Friday night.

Kobe Bryant suffered what the team called a probable torn Achilles tendon Friday night in the Los Angeles Lakers' 118-116 win over the Golden State Warriors.

Perhaps the wear and tear of 17 NBA seasons is catching up with the 34-year-old Bryant, who has played 3,013 minutes this season. He's the first player age 34 or older to play 3,000-plus minutes in an NBA season since both Michael Jordan and Gary Payton did so in 2002-03.

Bryant's average of 38.6 minutes per game this season is only the eighth-highest of his career, but his minutes have escalated in April. He's averaging 45.2 minutes in six games this month; that's his most in any month of his career, minimum two games.

In his past seven games, Bryant has played 95 percent of the minutes, and he has played 47 minutes four times. Compare that to the first 71 games of the season, during which he never played 47 minutes and was on the court for only 80 percent of the possible minutes.

On top of his 17 NBA regular seasons, Bryant has played 8,638 minutes in 220 playoff games. Plus he played another 747 minutes in winning gold medals at the 2008 and 2012 Olympics.

The playoff and Olympic minutes add up to more than three seasons worth of time, which means he has played the equivalent of more than 20 NBA regular seasons.

If Bryant did tear his Achilles, he can look across sports to other 30-something stars who returned to action. Dan Marino ruptured his right Achilles in 1993 at age 32, then made the Pro Bowl in both 1994 and 1995.

David Beckham, then 34, tore his left Achilles in March 2010 with AC Milan, and while he missed the World Cup, he came back to win two MLS Cups with the Los Angeles Galaxy and now plays for French club Paris Saint-Germain.

On the other hand, as this Basketball Prospectus article from last year details, several NBA players, including 32-year-old Isiah Thomas, never played again in the NBA following an Achilles tear.

Whether or not this is the end of Bryant's career, he has made his case to be included among the greatest basketball players ever. Earlier this season, he passed Wilt Chamberlain for fourth place on the NBA's career scoring list, and he's 675 points behind Jordan for third.

Kobe has won five NBA titles, two Finals MVPs, one regular-season MVP and two scoring titles. His 15 All-Star selections are tied for the second-most ever, and he has been named first-team All-NBA 10 times, one shy of Karl Malone's record of 11.

LOS ANGELES -- As rivalry games between the Los Angeles Lakers and Los Angeles Clippers go, Sunday’s tilt at Staples Center on the Clippers’ home court felt less charged. Chris Paul didn’t growl at Pau Gasol for patting his head. Metta World Peace wasn’t in uniform to torment any opponents. And Blake Griffin didn’t posterize any unwitting victims at the rim.

The teams were far more concerned with their respective agendas. For the Lakers, a win was necessary to maintain their hold on the No. 8 seed, while the Clippers are acutely aware they’re in danger of opening the postseason on the road. Those shadows eclipsed any animosity that might have previously existed over head-patting, post-dunk mugging, or bragging rights.

Five thoughts about the Clippers’ steady 109-95 win over the Lakers:

• The Clippers shredded the Lakers’ defense. In a game that featured only 88 possessions (unofficially), the Clippers had an offensive efficiency rating of 123.9 points per 100 possessions. The Lakers are such an easy defense to scramble. Why is Steve Blake cheating eight feet off Paul to offer a meek double-team on Griffin, who’s more than capable of kicking the pass out or spinning baseline away from Blake? What kind of defense worth its salt doesn’t pick up either of the opponent’s two wing players in transition? Why on earth is Antawn Jamison finding himself on the high side of a Paul-Griffin slip screen, essentially creating a five-on-four situation for the Clippers in the half court? And these are just a few examples from the Clippers’ run late in the first quarter. Optimists can talk all they want about how the Lakers will make noise in a potential first-round matchup with San Antonio, but the Spurs run the kind of offensive system that brutally punishes defensive cluelessness.
• Kobe Bryant’s first and only breather came with 40 seconds remaining in the fourth quarter long after the Clippers tied a bow on their victory. Bryant is now averaging more than 46 minutes over the past four games, and he looks exhausted. He’s getting to the line at a fair rate, and averaging 11 assists per game over the stretch, but shooting just 37 percent from the floor. Following the game, Mike D’Antoni took a slew of questions about the load Bryant’s carrying, even as he maintained the management of Bryant’s minutes has been ceded to Bryant. “That’s a risk we’re running with Kobe,” D’Antoni said. “We’re playing with a little bit of fire, and we wouldn’t like to. But we’ve put ourselves in a position where we have to. … He wants to go. He wants to do it. He has to know his body and he will.” Is this denialism on the part of the D’Antoni and Bryant? The Lakers aren’t a deep team along the perimeter, but one look at Bryant down the stretch against Memphis on Friday -- when he looked as if he might just expire at the top of the floor while plotting the offense -- and again on Sunday, and it’s hard to fathom that the Lakers can’t find three or four minutes a half to spell the guy.
• After some throat-clearing to begin the game, the Clippers refocused their offense around their two horses, Paul and Griffin. For Paul, it was child’s play. All afternoon, he swung right of a high pick from his big men and found space to launch uncontested mid-range jumpers. And that’s when the Lakers were lucky. When Howard was on the bench, Paul maneuvered his way to the rim with little resistance. For Griffin, nothing inspires like a few possessions matched up one-on-one with Jamison. When he caught the ball at the elbow, he didn’t deliberate and drove without hesitation. Griffin is well-served when he thinks dribble-drive as his first option in that situation, especially if he has space to get into his move. For Griffin, just because the jumper is “there,” doesn’t mean a drive isn’t. “Whenever those two guys are aggressive, it opens up the floor,” Jamal Crawford said. Crawford, Caron Butler, Willie Green and Matt Barnes -- the Clippers’ wing crew -- saw a bevy of open looks from the perimeter, many of them by way of Paul (12 assists) and Griffin (five dimes of his own).
• The Clippers have had their own issues defensively of late, particularly against the pick-and-roll. They got somewhat of a pass on Sunday because Lakers don’t run a lot of ball-screens. The Lakers looked early into Dwight Howard, posting him up quickly if he found deep position. They also ran a bunch of stuff out of the horns formation, with dribble-handoffs and swing passes until Howard found a spot on the block, Gasol had a clean look in a good spot, or post-ups or freelance isolation for Bryant. The Clippers weren’t perfect. Howard bullied their big men, and defensive rotations were slow at times when they blitzed Bryant on the pick-and-roll. But things improved for the Clippers in the second half as the Lakers became more desperate and the Clippers used their speed to compound that desperation with chaos.
• Griffin couldn’t find the net during warmups from long distance. Asked a minute or so after that warmup session whether players are less likely to look for shots they missed badly before the game, Griffin said no -- though he conceded other players might approach things differently. Sure enough, despite the cold snap during warmups from beyond the arc, Griffin attempted three 3-pointers for the first time this season, hitting one of them -- a dagger in the fourth quarter that essentially iced the game and induced a laugh from Griffin. “The thing I was laughing about was that I’d missed every single shot before that,” Griffin said (he was 0-for-7 from outside the paint before the 3). “Guys on the bench were telling me to keep shooting. ‘We want you to take that shot. We see you every day before practice. Keep shooting.’ And I was just like, ‘Man, you guys are crazy.’ So for it to go in, I was laughing.”

The Lakers road to the playoffs hit an unexpected bump Wednesday in Atlanta when Kobe Bryant severely sprained his left ankle. It happened as Bryant was going up for the potential game-tying shot with time winding down in the fourth quarter.

Bryant is out indefinitely and if he misses Friday's game at Indiana, it would be the third time in the last four seasons that he has missed at least one game in a season.

According to the Elias Sports Bureau, the Lakers are 611-350 (.636) with Bryant and 41-32 (.562) without him since 2000.

Bryant has been remarkably durable over the course of his career, especially as he’s gotten older. He’s actually missed fewer games as he’s risen in age.

Prior to the 2007-08 season, Bryant missed a number of games with various injuries.

He missed the first 15 games of the 1999-2000 season after breaking his right hand during the Lakers preseason game against the Wizards. The Lakers didn't miss Bryant though going 11-4 without him during their run to their first NBA title under Phil Jackson.

Bryant missed six games in January 2004 after injuring his surgically-repaired shoulder against the Cavaliers. He came back for two games and then missed seven more with a cut in his index finger.

The next season, Bryant missed a month after spraining his ankle against Cleveland in January. The Lakers weren’t able to recover as they missed the playoffs for the first time since the 1993-94 season.

Bryant has more than tripled the scoring of the next closest Laker in crunch time this season and has taken half of the teams shots in those situations. Entering Wednesday, Bryant scored 122 points in the last five minutes of the fourth quarter with the score within five. Only Kevin Durant, Kyrie Irving and LeBron James had scored more in crunch time.

Bryant’s injury would only add to the number of games missed by the Lakers Big 4 this season. Pau Gasol, Steve Nash and Dwight Howard have missed a combined 60 games this season.

The impact
Accuscore runs computer simulations to determine team win-loss probabilities.

The Lakers chance of winning each of their next three games can be seen in the chart on the right.

If Bryant only misses three games, it shouldn't have much of an impact on the Lakers' playoff chances. Accuscore gives them a 71 percent chance of making the playoffs if he plays in those games, a 69 percent chance of making it if he misses the next three.

Since a Sports Illustrated article was published on Thursday in which Kobe Bryant guaranteed that the Los Angeles Lakers will make the playoffs, Kobe has been playing some outstanding basketball.

For the first time in Bryant's career, he has scored at least 38 points while shooting better than 60 percent from the field in consecutive games.

After scoring 40 points on 15-of-23 shooting (65 percent) in a win against the Portland Trail Blazers on Friday, Kobe had 38 points on 13-of-21 shooting (62 percent) as the Lakers defeated the Mavericks on Sunday.

Kobe is the oldest player in NBA history to score at least 38 points while shooting at least 60 percent in consecutive games, according to the Elias Sports Bureau.

Sunday was just the third time in Bryant's career that he's had at least 38 points, 12 rebounds and seven assists in a game. It's the first time he's ever done so while shooting at least 50 percent.

Bryant is the second-oldest player in NBA history with at least 38 points, 12 rebounds and seven assists in a game while shooting 60 percent or better from the field. The only older player to do so was Elgin Baylor in 1970, according to Elias.

Kobe was especially dominant down the stretch on Sunday. He shot 9-for-11 in the second half, including a perfect 5-for-5 in the fourth quarter.

It's the fourth time in Kobe's career that he's attempted at least five shots without missing one in the fourth quarter. Not surprisingly, the Lakers are 4-0 in those games. It's the first time he's done so in nearly five years (April 2, 2008 vs Portland).

In his last two games, Kobe is 8-for-10 from the field and 8-for-9 on free throws in the fourth quarter.

Sunday was the first time Kobe made a 3-point attempt in the fourth quarter in over a month. His last fourth-quarter 3-pointer was January 20 at Toronto. It snapped his streak of 12 straight missed 3-pointers in the fourth quarter.

Is Kobe playing his best basketball of the season right now? Perhaps it goes even beyond that. It seems that he could be playing the most efficient basketball of his career, as he's done things in the last two games that he's never done before.

Kobe's "Game Score" on Sunday was 31.5, his third-highest of the season. His highest Game Score this season was 32.2 on Friday against Portland, so based on that metric his last two games are among his three best performances of the season.

The last time Kobe had consecutive Game Scores of more than 31 was March 2007, when he scored at least 50 points in four straight games.

Game Score, tracked by Basketball-Reference.com, was created by John Hollinger to give a rough measure of a player's productivity for a single game.

The Lakers have now won three straight and eight of their last 10 games. But the important streak: 2-0 since "the guarantee" was published.

How will LeBron James finish?
James is presently averaging 27.3 points, 8.2 rebounds, and 6.9 assists per game. If he finishes the season pushing the assist numbers up a smidge, he could be the first player to average a 27-8-7 line since Michael Jordan in 1988-89.

Only three other players besides Jordan have averaged those numbers for a full season- Oscar Robertson (five times), John Havlicek (twice) and Larry Bird (once).

Milestones
Kobe Bryant enters the post-All-Star Break portion with 30,933 points. That’s 486 points behind Wilt Chamberlain for fourth-most all-time.

At his current scoring rate of 26.8 points per game, he would pass Chamberlain on March 28 against the Milwaukee Bucks.

Bryant’s teammate, Steve Nash, should move into fourth place all-time on the NBA’s assist list pretty soon. His 10,137 assists are four shy of Magic Johnson.

The Lakers playoff push
We detailed the state of Los Angeles basketball last week, but just to offer a quick recap from a Lakers perspective:

The Lakers have made the playoffs 34 times since the NBA-ABA merger in 1976-77, the most of any team.

But with a 25-29 record and a .463 winning percentage, the Lakers are on pace for their third-worst season since the merger, trailing only the 33-49 team from 1993-94 and the 34-48 team from 2004-05.

The Mavericks playoff push
The Mavericks are in danger of having their playoff streak come to an end at 12 straight seasons.

The Mavericks got off to a 13-23 start and only five teams had given up more points per 100 possessions through January 9 than they did.

But since then they’ve won 10 of 16 and rank fourth in offensive efficiency and first in turnover percentage.

The Mavericks remaining opponents winning percentage (.511) ranks seventh-toughest in the NBA. The good news for them is that two of the teams they’re chasing down from the No. 11 spot- the Portland Trail Blazers and Utah Jazz- face the toughest and third-toughest remaining schedules respectively.

The bad news is that two of the other teams- the Houston Rockets and Lakers- face the fifth-easiest and 11th-easiest remaining schedules

The Bulls without Derrick Rose
The Chicago Bulls are 30-22, 1½ games behind the Indiana Pacers for the Central Division lead. Point guard Derrick Rose’s status remains uncertain.

The Bulls averaged 110.7 points per 100 possessions with Rose on the court last season. This season, that has dropped to 103.5 points per 100 possessions (10th-lowest in the NBA). The Bulls have gone from outscoring teams by better than eight points per game last season to outscoring them by just 1.6 per game this season.

One other oddity: the Bulls have a better road record (15-9) than home record (15-12).

The last .500+ team to finish the season with a better road record than home record was the 2009-10 Boston Celtics -- a team Tom Thibodeau knows something about since he was an assistant coach on their staff, his last year there before leaving for the Bulls. That team reached the NBA Finals before losing in the Finals to the Los Angeles Lakers.

We preview the NBA All-Star Game with 10 facts you need to know.

• Kevin Durant won his first All-Star Game MVP award last year after scoring 36 points. He’s scored 30 or more points in two straight All-Star Games, the only player in NBA history to accomplish that feat. His career scoring average (28.3 points) is an All-Star record (minimum 60 career points).

• LeBron James, making his ninth All-Star appearance, ranks second in career scoring average (25.9 points) in the game. According to the Elias Sports Bureau, James has scored at least 20 points in each of his past seven All-Star Games, the longest such streak for any player in NBA history.

• Kobe Bryant and Kevin Garnett were selected to the All-Star Game for the 15th time. Only Kareem Abdul-Jabbar has more career selections (19). Bryant’s 15 selections have come consecutively, the longest active streak. His 271 career points are the most in NBA history and his four MVPs are tied with Bob Pettit for most all time.

• Bryant and Dwight Howard are slated to start for the Western Conference, but the Los Angeles Lakers enter the All-Star break in 10th place in the West. According to Elias, the Lakers could be the fourth team since the merger (1976-77 season) to miss the playoffs in a season with two All-Star starters on the roster. The last team to do so was the 2005-06 Rockets (Tracy McGrady and Yao Ming).

The Lakers will also become the first team in All-Star Game history to start two different centers in back-to-back years (Andrew Bynum in 2012).

• The Miami Heat lead the way with three All-Star selections -- all three of whom will start -- becoming one of eight teams with multiple selections. According to Elias, they’ll be the sixth trio of teammates to start the All-Star Game following a championship season, and the first since Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Magic Johnson and James Worthy in 1986.

• Kyrie Irving is the sixth-youngest player ever selected to an All-Star team (he’ll be 20 years, 331 days old on Sunday).

• David Lee earned the Golden State Warriors' first All-Star selection since 1997 (Latrell Sprewell). That leaves the Milwaukee Bucks and the Sacramento Kings as the teams with the longest active streaks without an All-Star (nine seasons).

• Stephen Curry is averaging 21.0 points per game this season, the highest average for a player not selected to an All-Star team. Monta Ellis is fourth on that list (18.4), but he’s got the highest career points per game without ever being selected to the All-Star Game (minimum 400 games played).

• Jeremy Lin of the Houston Rockets was the only player among the top 10 vote-getters who was not selected to the All-Star Game. He finished ninth, between Howard and Blake Griffin. Bryant led the way with more than 1.5 million votes, just ahead of James.

• The Eastern Conference leads the series 36-25, but the West has won two straight and three of the past four games. A third straight victory by the West would be tied for its longest win streak (three straight from 2002 to '04).

The NBA is a superstar league, but it’s often governed by systems. “The system” can be a monument or a mess. It can bring out the best in some players while alienating others. If executed to perfection, it can win a team a title. A system can delight purists, annoy the casual fan and drive a wedge between a coach and management. A system is philosophy, physics, architecture and chaos theory all rolled up into one.

For the Los Angeles Lakers, 2012-13 has been the Season of the System. Mike Brown was fired for a failure to effectively implement his Princeton offense, then succeeded by Mike D’Antoni, the architect of a high-octane spread pick-and-roll system that’s been appropriated by coaches all over the league. Had many Lakers fans had their druthers, Phil Jackson would’ve returned to re-institute the triangle, the gold standard of modern-day systems.

Back in November, when Los Angeles was engulfed in system overload the week Brown was dismissed and D’Antoni hired, Los Angeles Clippers coach Vinny Del Negro was asked which system he deployed.

“Chris Paul,” Del Negro said.

Del Negro wasn’t being flip or coy. The question was straightforward, and he offered the best approximation of his team’s blueprint when it had the ball -- the Chris Paul System.

“All those names and all that stuff,” Del Negro said of the Princeton, the spread, seven seconds or less, etc. “You just put the ball in the best player's hands.”

To Del Negro and Paul, the NBA is a superstar league, and the offense they run is dictated by Paul. In the Clippers’ world, his instincts take precedent over any dogma. That intuition is rooted in strong principles. Paul will probe, but he’s meticulous and patient, and in the half court he’ll rarely act until the defense is leveraged.

“On offense, you just try to make the right play,” Paul said. “Every time I come down the court, I want to make sure that two people have to guard me, no matter what. If I’m in a ball screen, I want to make two people have to guard me and then somebody is going to be open.”

Draw the defense, make the play. Apart from that, there’s no defined program etched into the Clippers’ playbook. A system has principles, but not every principle belongs to a system.

Down the hallway at Staples Center, D’Antoni subscribes to a different basketball value system, but his doctrine has been a tough sell in Los Angeles, particularly to his big men. In the confines of D’Antoni’s system, size and length aren’t virtues unto themselves. Big men have the same imperatives within the offense as the little guys -- they must stay in motion, move the ball and keep the paint vacant so that there’s space for drives and cuts. Want to make yourself useful? Set a drag screen, make a quick pass from the high post, do anything that keeps the offense moving.

For Pau Gasol prior to his injury and Dwight Howard, who’s nursing one of his own, D’Antoni’s system has been vexing. Gasol won championships in a triple post offense, while Howard feels he can bully anyone on the left block if you just feed him the ball. All the while, Steve Nash, who flourished under D’Antoni’s system in Phoenix, has remained quiet on strategic matters, and Kobe Bryant has largely turned the conversation away from a debate over tactics and toward a discussion about urgency.

For all the comparisons drawn between the Lakers and the Clippers -- their disparate histories, the organizational credo, even Clipper Darrell versus the Lakers Bros -- the most prominent contrast this season among basketball junkies in Los Angeles has been the strategic visions of each team. The Clippers have found harmony in simplicity, while the Lakers have butted heads over academic differences. The Clippers make plays, as Paul says, while the Lakers lock horns.

The great irony in all this? The two teams rank seventh and eighth in offensive efficiency. The Clippers score 106.1 points per 100 possessions, while the Lakers score 104.8. Over the course of your average NBA game, that amounts to approximately one Dwight Howard missed free throw.

The daylight between the two teams, who square off Thursday night in their third meeting this season, is on the defensive end, something that often gets lost amid the contentiousness surrounding the Lakers and whatever competing agendas exist in their camp.

Neither team features a hard-and-fast system on that end of the floor, but the Clippers rely on the same brand of simplicity that drives their offense -- maximize strengths like speed and athleticism, and communicate when a situation calls for clarity. Howard was supposed to be the Lakers’ defensive strength -- the Chris Paul of rim protection, the guy who when a defensive possession went awry could quickly erase the mistakes. Only it hasn’t played out that way -- there is no “Dwight Howard System” in Los Angeles yet.

Do NBA teams need systems to fall back on, as D’Antoni maintains? Can common sense trump organization on the court when the stakes are raised, as Paul and Del Negro believe? There’s probably a happy medium -- but right now, the Clippers are more happy, while the Lakers are more medium.