The Orange County Register (Janis Carr) reports — James Posey: “You can’t stop Kobe because he does so much. He scores, he shoots the 3-ball well, he has a nice in-between game, he knows how to get to the free-throw line, he attacks the basket. It’s tough. He’s one of the guys who has the ball a lot, and a lot of attention needs to be directed toward him. You can’t stop him, you just try to control him, just try to make him work for everything,” Posey said. “Sometimes even that isn’t enough.”
InsideHoops.com editor says: I could shut Kobe down. He knows it. He’s scared. Same with LeBron. None of these dues could score on me. But I like them and don’t want to hurt their feelings, so instead of signing with an NBA team and doing it, I’ll just continue to run InsideHoops.com.
The San Antonio Express-News (Mike Monroe) reports: For the first time since he arrived in San Antonio in 2001, Spurs forward Bruce Bowen did not start a game for which he suited up. Bowen’s response: His best game of the season. Bowen replaced starter Ime Udoka, who started in his spot, with 2:22 remaining in the first period. By the end of Tuesday’s 92-80 victory over the New York Knicks at the AT&T Center, he had scored a season-high 13 points, making all three 3-point attempts in almost 28 minutes on the floor. Bowen, who had started all 555 of his games as a Spur, accepted his removal from the starting unit with equanimity. “As a competitor, you may not want it to happen,” he said. “It’s a matter of just being as professional as you can, and not allowing those things to affect you from the standpoint of not withdrawing from the team.”