Why are they asking for their touches?

Times staff writer Mike Bresnahan ties up some loose ends before Lakers playoff games.

Q&A; of the day

Question: Why are a majority of NBA players so eager to high-five or low-five their teammates after they miss a free throw? Their faces don’t show any remorse on missing a FREE shot but yet they are eager to reach out and touch their teammates?

They will take a step toward the two rebounders and walk an extra step toward the three-point line to get two more high-fives from the rest of their teammates. I think they should get a slap on the face or a mean look from their teammates when they miss their free throws. I would just like to see one of their teammates leave them hanging once.

--Jeanie Kim, Beverly Hills

Answer: Jeanie 1, NBA players 0.

And they think they have problems

The Lakers were wringing their hands after Game 1, but Salt Lake Tribune columnist Gordon Monson wondered what recently deceased Jazz owner Larry Miller would have thought of his team’s “current state as a life-sized Fred Flintstone punching bag.”

“His vocabulary would be exploding like leaky kegs of nitroglycerin, and he’d be publicly naming names and openly busting guys for everyone to hear,” Monson wrote.

Best-case

Lakers scenario

A 16-point halftime lead turns into a 28-point victory. Kobe Bryant and Derek Fisher are so bored in the fourth quarter that they pretend to sleep at the end of the bench. Phil Jackson isn’t amused and scribbles more ominous notes on the locker-room whiteboard.

Worst-case

Lakers scenario

The referees call 68 fouls. The Lakers and the Jazz shoot free throw after free throw after free throw. The game is a drag. Fans are too bored to even cheer for their free tacos. The writers miss deadlines. Their editors get mad. Meetings are held Wednesday morning at The Times to determine what went wrong with the game coverage. (Sorry, that was my own worst-case scenario.)

Final thought

The Lakers will be able to beat Utah tonight at Staples Center because they’re big enough, fast enough, good enough, and gosh darn it, people like them.

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mike.bresnahan@latimes.com