First Half Thoughts - Lakers/Rockets

Lakers will make more shots in the second half. Kobe seems to have trouble and be worried about shooting over Yao when he gets in the lane. The Kobe foul on Battier would have been a technical if Ron Artest made the same foul. Sasha Vujacic is an Eastern European war criminal. There is no doubt in my mind he is guilty of some atrocity in the Balkans. Yao gets tired and this causes the Rockets a lot of problems. They have to play different when he is not in. When he plays, they need to run the inside/outside game through him. It works. When he isn't in, Artest takes goofy shots and they relay on Aaron Brooks to penetrate and shoot or dish. This does not sound like the options of a team who can knock off the Western Conference favorites.

My initial impression - the Lakers will win the series because of their depth. The only way the Rockets can win is if they steal 1 and/or 2 at Staples and can keep Yao out of foul trouble and not too tired (clearly he starts to lag) and/or Artest can get in Kobe's head. Artest is one seriously weird dude.