It Shouldn’t Be About R-Word

And now a quick word about respect: Nope.

On some levels, this Western Conference final between the Kings and the Lakers is being touted as a quest for respect. It’s a great word, respect.

You can throw it out there without actually saying what you mean, and people will take it for whatever they will.

Respect on the court? From the officials? In the mirror? From Randy Newman?

It’s unclear. Still, the Kings want some respect from the Lakers, and Sacramento seems to want some collective respect from Los Angeles, and there is no question that all of that will come to pass.

At precisely the same moment Pamela Anderson moves to Elk Grove.

Not to burst any implants here, but there can’t be a worse thing to play for against L.A. than respect. If the Lakers had any respect for the Kings, then a guy like Samaki Walker wouldn’t be saying things like, “This team has been known to fold.”

Who is Samaki Walker, you ask?

Exactly.

And we’re just getting warmed up. The Kings over the past couple of years have either been disrespected by the Lakers or pretty much ignored altogether, and it’s hard to decide which is the deeper cut.

Sacramento, the place? It almost never gets insulted by anyone from L.A. It is hard, after all, to insult a place that never crosses your mind.

From some people you will hear that this series could change all that, that this is the year the Kings earn their due from the Lakers and, by extension, Sacramento from L.A.

The only thing this series can change is the Kings’ destiny as a franchise, and for some strange reason we keep insisting that ought to be enough.

Forget respect from the Lakers; it ain’t gonna happen. A year ago, after his team swept Sacramento out of the second round, Shaquille O’Neal memorably opined that the Kings were headed “back to the expansionism,” a destination that, happily, turned out to contain 61 victories during the next regular season.

Part of what makes L.A. the franchise it is is an overwhelming self-involvement. If you’re the Lakers of Kobe and Shaq, it is all about you all of the time. People around the Kings may want to declare a rivalry, but to the Lakers, no disrespect, the Kings are mostly just the team standing in the way.

Sacramento was the gnat on the shoulder of the Lakers for the past two years, and there’s nothing wrong with that. The Kings were still building something that L.A., in large measure, already had finished.

That the sense of inequality was significantly removed this season, when the Kings got better and the Lakers didn’t, doesn’t mean L.A. is suddenly showering the love. All Narcissus ever saw, after all, was his own reflection.

It’s how winning franchises think.