Yeah, I just finished the finale, and that was definitely the most weirdly paced season of television I've ever seen. Even if it would have debuted in the spring, during the height of basketball season, with no strike and a perfect marketing campaign, I don't know that anyone but the diehards would have stuck with it. Compressing that many Lakers seasons into just seven episodes made absolutely no sense to me, and despite a number of highlights, it just felt haphazard and slapped together to me, especially in comparison to the first season.

As much as I love the idea of the show, and loved so much of the execution at times, after finishing this season I honestly don't think they could have sustained it beyond a third season, if that. I love basketball, and love watching basketball, but I find the actual basketball scenes to be the least dramatic/most predictable of the entire show, and considering the finale was mostly that, it was probably my least favorite episode of the series. That, and IMO, a lot of the character drama/dynamics felt like they had just about run their course, so all we would have been left with is more stage plays of basketball games we all know the outcomes to, which I have zero interest in personally.

Overall, it was a worthy experiment, one I'm still shocked was even made - never mind that they managed to cast it as well as they did, which I thought was impossible going in - and I actually really enjoyed the final montage as well. But I've had my fill, and am honestly kind of glad it's over now.

Watched the finale last night. We had no idea the show was cancelled but it was pretty easy to determine during the closing montage.

Nothing that hasn't been said earlier other than I really liked the Bird scenes where they showed how much of a hardass he was on the court.

I guess this officially makes this show a "failure".

In hindsight, I assume the problem is that this show was based on a real team. That only NBA fans would naturally gravitate to this show, yet most NBA fans hate the Lakers. So you have already limited your fan base to a small group of people. Where successful true life sports shows/movies focus either on universally loved teams (like Miracle) or where the team was unimportant to the story (Remember the Titans, Blind Side, Rudy, etc.)

I have always been a fan of Larry Bird and so I watched this show because of that. I think the scenes he's been in has been the most compelling of the show. But the scenes/episodes about the internal strife of the Lakers were boring to me.

I am a huge Spurs fan and absolutely hate the Lakers. That never really factored into it for me.

Granted, if the show was about the Kobe/Shaq era, it might be a different story..

I hate the Lakers but I thought the first season was very well done. There was an emotional connection for me watching the relationship between Buss and his mother.

The emergence of Riley vs. Westhead was also good TV.

This season just wandered.

Kareem was emphasized more, but the guy who played him was not a good actor, so that was a problem.

I too am a Larry Bird fan, but the guy who played him is so much smaller than Bird that it was distracting. (I know it must be very difficult to cast someone for that role.) About all he did this season was glare at people.

One season well done, a second season disappointing. I'm not sorry to see it end.

Brian Earl Spilner said:

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I am a huge Spurs fan and absolutely hate the Lakers. That never really factored into it for me.

Granted, if the show was about the Kobe/Shaq era, it might be a different story..

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It was a factor to me. I didn't even watch during the first season. The only reason I watched this season was because I was cutting the cord and I wanted to watch everything on Max I could before it was turned off.

One thing:

After losing Game 2 in Boston, Magic pulls Cookie aside and clearly wants to talk to her about something Big, but they are interrupted by the press.

I guess we'll never know, but I wonder what it was?

Ugh, yeah, that's annoying. Clearly setting something up for S3.

Curse you, HBO!

I'll never forgive you for doing Rome and this show dirty like that.

(However, I will continue to watch your other quality programming).

I feel like a third season could've been awesome. It could've covered all that in a 10 episode season.

Sucks.

Third season could have been good rolling in the bad boy Pistons but also Jordan & the Bulls