Let's all do cartwheels and dance into the early morning hours while we toast to the Lakers. Yes, they've shown us that what we thought we learned from the Boston Celtics was just a mirage.

Boston's title was a result of players sacrificing individually statistics, sharing the Basketball, making defense the primary focus, playing with intensity and desire every night, and bringing a title to a team, a coaching staff, an organization and a fan base that had been waiting for years.

Then came the Lakers.

They tossed "ubuntu" aside in favor of Kooku (Kobe Owns this Organization, it's Kobe's Universe). Bryant came to the Lakers as an 18-year-old in 1996, and he got to be part of three championships, and been to the NBA Finals four times by the year 2004. He was -- to steal a phrase from Kevin Garnett -- on top of the Woooorld!

Like any reasonable person in that position, Bryant proceeded to blow it all up. He decided he wanted to be the man and lead his team to a championship. It didn't matter if that meant alienating fans, disrespecting teammates, and running away Hall of Fame coaches. Hey, that's just collateral damage.

If you think I'm overstating that, well go back and look at how the Lakers broke up and then re-read Phil Jackson's descriptions of Bryant behind the scenes with the Lakers in his book "The Final Season."

He didn't want to take advice from veterans. He wanted to lead even if nobody wanted to follow. When a teammate brought up concerns about his and Shaq's selfish play, Bryant criticized him for whining.

Remember the video of him ripping teammates. Recall his media tour when he announced that he wanted out of LA prior to last season and the eventual title run.

Yet, the Lakers were so desperate to keep Bryant happy that they catered everything to him so he'd sign a long-term contract to stay in LA.

Kobe, do you want us to trade Shaq? Kobe, who would you like to be the new coach? Kobe, who do you think we should draft? Kobe, which free agents should we sign? Kobe, do you need your car washed? Kobe, do you need us to pick up your dry cleaning? Etc...

What does Bryant get for a reward after forcing a championship franchise into a rebuilding mode? He gets a championship a few years later, and he gets to be the man.

Terrific. Like they say, good things happen to those who have to have it their way.

The rest of the Lakers aren't off the hook, either.

First of all, they enabled Bryant. Second, they got embarrassed in the NBA Finals by what almost all of the so-called experts thought to be an inferior team in Boston last year, and they somehow turned that around into a swagger.

When they didn't play well, the reaction was so nonchalant that they might as well shrugged their shoulders and mumbled, "We know we've got plenty of talent. We just weren't feeling it tonight. Oh, well."

They treated defense like it was a luxury, a bonus they just broke out when they were ready to get serious. But no need to overdo it when you've got Bryant to outscore people (LA had the 13th-ranked defense in the NBA).

They let a Houston Rockets team without stars Tracy McGrady and Yao Ming push them to a seventh game in the second round. For that matter, Orlando should've won two games which they let slip away on a missed lay-up by Courtney Lee (Game 2) and missed free throws by Dwight Howard (Game 4).

Instead, Bryant gets his trophy, the Lakers get their fourth title since the 1999-2000 season, and Bryant's enablers seem to feel the need to rub it in to a franchise that wasn't even their opponent.

Joey Buss, son of team owner Jerry Buss, gets on stage and gloats that the Lakers are closing in on the Celtics for most championships, and Luke Walton gets on the microphone during the parade/celebration in LA and proclaims he one-upped his father, Bill Walton, because he won his title with a better franchise than his father (the Celtics ).

Ah, yes. They are the champions. The trophy couldn't have gone to a better team or a better franchise.

Well, unless it happened to go to ANY other team or ANY other franchise.

Lynn Worthy's e-mail address is lworthy@lowellsun.com