Baller-in-Chief

(From the Associated Press via the Washington Post Online)

WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama welcomed the NBA champion Los Angeles Lakers to the White House Monday, praising the team for their accomplishments on the basketball court and their service in the community.

An avid basketball fan himself, Obama said he gets enormous pleasure from watching excellence on the court – and nobody exemplified excellence more than the Lakers last year, as they won their 15th league title, defeating the Orlando Magic.

Obama said he was especially excited to meet Lakers’ coach Phil Jackson, who has won 10 championships, though he didn’t hesitate to point out that six of those victories were with Obama’s hometown Chicago Bulls.

President Barack Obama holds a personalized Los Angeles Lakers team jersey presented to him by Lakers guard Kobe Bryant, left, as he honored the 2009 NBA basketball champions Lakers, Monday, Jan. 25, 2010, in the East Room of the White House in Washington. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak) (Charles Dharapak – AP)

“You remember that,” Obama joked with former Lakers all-star Magic Johnson, who was on the losing end of the Bulls 1991 victory.

Obama commended the Lakers players not only for their athletic achievements, but also their work off the court. The players held a fitness clinic for Washington-area school children Monday, and several players are donating money to relief efforts in Haiti.

President Barack Obama stands with Los Angeles Lakers guard Kobe Bryant, in the East Room of the White House in Washington, Monday, Jan. 25, 2010, during a ceremony honoring the 2009 NBA basketball champions Los Angeles Lakers. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak) (Charles Dharapak – AP)

The Lakers added to Obama’s collection of sports jerseys, presenting him with a bright yellow jersey with the president’s name stitched on the back.

(From Kurt Helin for NBC Los Angeles Online)

The Lakers meet the president, a nice way to forget about the ugly loss in Toronto.

Getty Images

The Lakers weren’t expecting to get a walkthrough — a pregame practice going over positions — on their off-day in Washington D.C. on Monday.

But when you’re going to meet the President, you practice.

On Monday, the Lakers got to meet Baller-in-Chief Barack Obama, and before the President walked in and official press conference started, the Lakers had a walk-though with White House staff on where to walk in, where to stand on the risers and the like.

They got it right when the lights went on — just like they did last year in the NBA Finals, which is the reason they got to meet the President. And while the President does more of these meet-and-greet photo ops than anyone on the planet, he seemed to seriously enjoy this one. Because who doesn’t want to take a break from writing and rehearsing a long speech given to a room where half the people want you to lose your job, so instead you can talk hoops with Phil Jackson and Kobe Bryant?

Obama has made no secret before he is a fan of Jackson, not surprising since he grew up in Chicago as a Bulls fan. Obama also made a joke about Jackson’s ritual of handing out books to players before their longest road trip of the year, saying he would like Jackson to send the Democrats and Republicans some books about playing as a team.

This was not the first time meeting the president for all of the players. Jordan Farmar introduced Obama at a campaign rally in Newport Beach back in 2008.

“President Obama was really cool,” Farmar said. “We talked basketball right away.”

Magic Johnson was there for the Lakers and said Obama was the first person he let talk some trash to him without talking back. Jeanie Buss offered Obama some courtside seats (although more people would still want to see Jack Nicholson).

If the weather in Washington were not the typical January cold and dreary, Obama would have wanted to have done this ceremony outside, on the full-sized basketball court he had put in at the White House. Maybe shot around a little on the court, and with the way the Lakers have played defense of late Obama probably could put up 20 points on them. The scouting report on Obama is that he is a pretty good and smart player, but likes to talk a little trash and shoot a little too much.

Maybe Kobe and Obama would have gotten along just fine.

(From the New York Post Online)

Obama’s pick and roll

SEN. Bob Casey (D-Pa.) says President Obama has a secret weapon — on the basketball court. “I love to play with him, but I’m never on the winning team,” Casey told the crowd at Rosie O’Grady’s on West 46th the other night at his re-election fund-raiser thrown by one-time Hugh Carey chief of staff Jim Cunningham. Casey said Obama always says, “I’ll pick first. I pick Reggie,” meaning Reggie Love, the president’s “body man” who played basketball for Duke. “Reggie protects and feeds the president on the court, and together they cream the rest of us. But it’s great fun.” Also on hand were Jim Gill, Jerry Crotty, Alfred E. Smith IV, Tonio Burgos and Bill Cunningham.

(From Eamonn Brennan for Yahoo Sports)

If you’re a hoops fan, you have at least one reason to enjoy our current president: Basketball is Obama’s favorite sport, and he approaches it with the reverence of someone who both plays and spectates, someone who appreciates the game from all angles. But you knew all this before Barack Obama became president.

What you also probably knew, or maybe you haven’t noticed, is that for whatever reason, former Duke guard and Obama personal staffer Reggie Love can’t convince Barack to wear a pair of shorts on the court. I don’t get it. Here’s yet more photographic evidence of Obama’s absolute allergy to shorts:

That’s Obama and Love, and as you’ll see, Love looks ready for some pickup. He’s got his swag right. Even if those Nike runners look like they’d be really bad for ankle on the basketball court, still, he’s ready to go.

Obama at least appears athletic, but he also looks like he’s getting ready to go for a brisk morning walk with his dog. If he walked on to the basketball court looking like that, the people I play with would laugh. (This scenario assumes it’s not Barack Obama we’re laughing at; I don’t think the DePaul student center crowd would really go for ridicule, given the hypothetical. But you know what I mean.)

Maybe dude’s legs are just really skinny. Who knows?

(From The Huffington Post)

On Monday, President Obama and personal aide Reggie Love (who is also HuffPost readers’ pick for White House Hottest) left their Manhattan hotel to play basketball at St. Bartholomew’s Church. During the campaign, the two men played b-ball on primary days for good luck.

The president spoke at the Hudson Valley Community College in upstate New York on Monday morning. He then traveled to NYC for three days of UN meetings in the lead-up to the G-20 Summit in Pittsburgh.

See photos of the athletes below.

Leaving their hotel:

Returning to their hotel, water bottles in hand (Fiji for Love, Aquafina for Obama), after the game:

A gratuitous Reggie Love photo. Here the personal aide walks across the South Lawn of the White House to Marine One on September 12 en route to Minneapolis with the president. His reading material? The New Republic.