Culver City Observer -

By Mitch Chortkoff Sports Editor What seemed very likely several weeks ago is now official. Jerry West is joining the Clippers. At 79, West still enjoys accurately evaluating players, a talent he's...

Mitch Kupchak learned the General Manager business from Jerry West, then took over. He had good years but not many in his final ones with lowly Laker teams and now he’s been replaced. What about t...

Would you believe? Would anyone believe? Awhile back a Georgia lawmaker, Gerald Greene (R-Cuthbert), was shot in the leg behind an adult entertainment store. Furthermore, Greene had several thousand...

I went to Staples Center Saturday and Sunday nights. That’s no surprise since my job requires keeping up with the Lakers and Clippers. But the weekend had a special significance. The Chicago Bulls w...

It’s good to be a fan of an LA team so far in the 2016-’17 National Basketball Association season. The Clippers are 10-1 at this writing, the best record in the NBA. And they’ve been routing oppon...

Gail Goodrich is the greatest lefthanded guard the Lakers have ever had. He played on two NCAA championship teams at UCLA, then teamed in the backcourt with Jerry West on two Laker NBA championship...

The Lakers held the annual media day on Monday and opened training camp in Santa Barbara Tuesday eager to please their new coach. Luke Walton has already pleased them. In the off season since Walton r...

The Lakers took awhile but they signed top draft choice Brandon Ingram this week. They also signed former top 10 draft choice Yi Jianlian, who played well for China in the just-concluded Olympics...

Kobe Bryant and Tim Duncan are future NBA Hall Of Fame players. Both have retired and both are properly being lauded for their accomplishments. But they are different kinds of people. Bryant embraced...

If you follow the history of basketball a few things are perfectly clear. If your team expects to win a championship you need at least two superstars to complete the journey to the top. The Lakers...

Until someone gets 12 championships on his resume I will continue to rank Bill Russell as the most valuable player in NBA history. He led the Boston Celtics to 11 championships While playing against...

When the Golden State Warriors won the NBA championship last season comparisons to the great teams of the past were heard. We hadn’t seen a shooter better than Steph Curry. The Warriors’ style of pla...

Luke Walton called Steve Kerr last Friday afternoon. “I have good news and bad news,” the Golden State Warriors’ assistant coach told the head coach. “Start with the good news,” Kerr said. “The Lake...

When I wrote Anatomy Of A Disaster four years ago I had no intention of repeating it the next season. But readers were so fed up with the Lakers’ demise they requested it. Then we had last season, 2...

By Mitch Chortkoff Sports Editor Basketball fans admired Jerry West when he was in his 20s and 30s. First, he and Elgin Baylor were superstars who introduced the NBA to Los Angeles. Then in 1972 he...

By Mitch Chortkoff Sports Editor It was 1996 and I was in Honolulu covering the Lakers' training camp. It was an especially important one because General Manager Jerry West had made a spectacular...

By Mitch Chortkoff Sports Editor Kobe Bryant and Luke Walton were teammates on the Lakers for nine years. Bryant says he's not surprised that Walton has done so well this season filling in for Steve...

By Mitch Chortkoff Sports Editor This is Los Angeles. The Lakers have won 16 NBA championships. The Dodgers haven’t won a World Series since 1988 but they’ve won their division the last three yea...

By Mitch Chortkoff Sports Editor The Lakers’ annual goal used to be winning the NBA championship. They succeed 16 times to become one of the elite franchises in league history. That was then and this...

By Mitch Chortkoff Sports Editor At the start of another Laker season General Manager Mitch Kupchak told the media last week this would be a season of laying a foundation. “Every season the Lakers h...

By Mitch Chortkoff Sports Editor In a few months Kobe Bryant will begin the 20th season of his remarkable Laker career. Next season he won’t have a contract. So what does he do? There are four ways h...