With the decade just hours away from being completed, I was trying to figure out what my favorite faces are from this past decade. Bill Simmons invented the Peyton Manning Face and the Derek Lowe Face but neither of those made my list.

There were only two faces that made my list for the All-Decade Faces List. And I’d like my good pals, Matt and Ben, to present the list to you right now.

Gentle sirs?

Lion Face: Kobe Bryant
You know when Kobe was least effective in trying to score his 44 points during Tuesday’s win over the Warriors? When he went to the basket. Think about that. Kobe Bryant scored 44 points and it wasn’t because he scored a bunch of easy buckets (2/6 around the hoop). Sure, he was 16/16 from the line and a lot of those came from being aggressive and drawing fouls. But he made 11 of his 21 jump shot attempts to account for 28 points. And 27 of his 44 points came in the second half when the Lakers evened up the score and eventually won the game. A perfect example of how deadly and crafty Kobe was a sequence towards the end of the third quarter.

Kobe attacked the basket by driving up the right side of the floor on a fast break. Anthony Morrow was completely resigned to letting Kobe fly in for the dunk. But Ronny Turiaf hustled back and blocked the dunk attempt. The Warriors took the ball the other way and got a transition dunk by Vlad Radmanovic. So what does Kobe do? He just calmly gets the ball on the ensuing possession and has Monta Ellis posted up around 14 feet from the basket. He completely turns Monta around defensively by pivoting towards the baseline but he never takes a dribble. Somehow he completely fakes Monta in leaving him open by never even taking a dribble. He beats him on great footwork, raises up and knocks down a jumper. This is how he scored 44 points all night (having Monta guarding you throughout the evening certainly made it easier). Oh and by the way, he also had 11 assists.

Lemon Face: LeBron James’ offense
Although he had a couple of highlight plays, LeBron James was completely taken out of the scoring aspect of Tuesday’s win by the Cavs in Atlanta. He was the opposite of Kobe last night. He did all of his damage inside and couldn’t make a single outside jumper. And when I say he couldn’t make a single outside jumper, I literally mean he couldn’t make a single outside jump shot. He was 0/11 from the perimeter. Some were good shots. Some were bad shots. Some shots were just right. But no matter what he threw towards orange roundie, it was met with a clang and a rebound for someone on the court. Luckily for the Cavs, he found other ways to contribute (9 assists, 8 boards, 5 steals). But for once, the Cleveland star needed his teammates to bail him out.

Lion Face: Derrick Rose
You know what’s a cure for a case of the ole struggles? Having T.J. Ford trying to guard you. Derrick Rose played a dominant game for the Bulls by obliterating Ford the way Jerome James attacks an appetizer sampler. Much like Kobe, he did a lot of his damage with the jumper. He only scored one basket around the hoop and stayed with a steady diet of pull-up and step-back jumpers. Ford couldn’t stay with him. Dahntay Jones couldn’t stay with him. Hell, his jersey even had a rough time staying with him. He was just too quick for his own good. Not something men usually want to be described with but against the Pacers it worked.

Lemon Face: Atlanta Hawks Fourth Quarter
It took eight minutes and 47 seconds for the Hawks to get on the board. This is the same Hawks team that is currently second in all of the NBA in offensive efficiency. At one point they had missed 11 straight shots, turned the ball over six times and missed three straight free throws during the fourth quarter. Amazingly, the Cavs took it easy on them during this stretch by only scoring 10 points themselves. This was a game in which momentum and home court advantage looked to be reasons the Hawks would pull out this win. Then the fourth quarter happened and the Hawks decided to go all Ruben Boumtje-Boumtje on themselves.

Lion Face: David Lee
I can’t figure out if David Lee is actually a good basketball player that matters on the court or if he’s just a good fantasy basketball player who puts up empty stats like Zach Randolph (pre-2009-10 season). But against the Pistons and their semi-big, mostly stunted frontcourt he was definitely a good basketball player. He scored 18 points inside and finished with 30 points overall. He also had 12 rebounds and five assists. He didn’t allow any of the Pistons’ big men to get a lot of easy buckets inside and kept them off the boards for most of the night. He was a dominating presence inside. It shoots my theory of “post-Jack Sikma curly-haired white guys not being able to positively affect a team” right in the foot.

Lemon Face: Michael Smith, Kane Fitzgerald, Tony Brothers
I really hate bitching about officials. I think it’s contrite. I think it’s a tired act of heaping responsibility away from the performance of the team. Even in the most egregious situations (Kobe vs. the Bucks a week or so ago and Game 6 of the 2002 WCF), I feel like ultimately you have to blame the players for not persevering through the bad calls. But Tuesday night in Houston was a joke. They completely took Emeka Okafor out of a game in which Emeka Okafor was defensively the reason the Hornets had stormed back into the game and taken the momentum. But questionable call after questionable call against Okafor on plays in which he didn’t commit a foul or was actually fouled but given a foul ended up unfairly fouling him out of the game. It was a shame too because it took away what was shaping up to be a fantastic finish.

Lion Face: David West
The offensive side of that run the Hornets made against Houston was thanks to this man. David West outscored the Rockets by himself in the fourth quarter when he exploded for half of his 44 points. He did it all. Score inside against guys like Carl Landry? Check. Face up jumpers? Check. Step-back jumpers? You betcha. Three-point shots from Chris Paul passes? Well of course, he did. David West was just in a freaking zone like a man who can hear Jimmy and stretches like Jane Fonda before he laces them up at Venice Beach. 30 second half points for West on 11 of 18 shooting. Congrats on the new career-high and I’m sorry about the loss.

Lemon Face: Clyde Drexler
Clyde Drexler you say? But he doesn’t even play in the NBA any more. You’re right; he definitely doesn’t play any more. However, he DOES do color commentating for Houston Rockets games and I couldn’t have been more disappointed. Here is a list of things that I wouldn’t say are his strong suit based on what I heard from him Tuesday night:

- English
- Verb Agreement
- Watch a basketball game and accurately explaining what’s going on in the game.
- Offering up an unbiased take on the situation.
- English
- Offering up a correct take on the situation.
- Questioning calls against the Rockets when it’s clear on the replay it was the correct call.
- Public speaking.
- English

It definitely reminded me of this scene from Bedazzled, which is something that only Austin Carr has done before:

And Now for an onslaught of Lion Faces…

Manu GINOOOOOOOOOOOBILIIIIIIII
Just do me a favor and watch the highlight package here from the Spurs win over the Wolves. Manu Ginobili’s passing was certifiably insane.

I mean, seriously… the behind the back pass is not something people just do. You can’t just go out there and be whipping the ball around like that. You have to at least pretend it was challenging to pull that off.

Go Go Gadget Tyrus
Tyrus Thomas struggled to score during the Bulls win over Indiana but he made up for it with rebounding. On this play, he was Inspector Gadget:

LeBron James Defies Physics and Time
I refuse to believe this play actually happened:

There is just no way you can catch the basketball 30 feet away from the hoop, dribble down the lane and dunk it with two hands in two seconds. I just don’t believe it. There had to be some time of clock malfunction or teleporting that wasn’t discovered.

Hot Sauce in My Bag!
Bugs Bunny may have been a G but he never bumped on Josh Smith’s head.