Kobe Bryant, Lakers lose opener, pressure builds on Mike Brown

• Dallas Mavericks beat Los Angeles Lakers 99-91 in season opener Tuesday
• Lakers coach Mike Brown faces great scrutiny because of Lakers' new stars
• Kobe Bryant played well despite being injured and scored 22 points

LOS ANGELES — The pressure was on Mike Brown yet again on Tuesday night, his new-look Los Angeles Lakers finally taking the floor in the regular season for all the basketball world to see.

There was 24-7 attention coming his way as it was, with non-stop hype surrounding his dream team of future Hall of Famers like Kobe Bryant and new additions Dwight Howard and Steve Nash. But right about the time Brown spoke with the media before tipoff, a bit of irony crept into the picture that only compounded the matter: his most prized former player from his Cleveland Cavaliers days, that reigning MVP known as LeBron James, was collecting the sort of hardware that he is expected to earn this season during a ring ceremony with the Miami Heat.

Brown and the Lakers know they'll all be deemed failures if they don't unseat the champs and earn the Lakers' 17th crown. And Brown, whose team did little to relieve any of the pressure with a helter-skelter 99-91 loss to the Dirk Nowitzki-less Dallas Mavericks in the opener, swears he's ready for this ride that has officially begun.

"I think (former baseball manager) Tony LaRussa said it best one time," Brown told USA TODAY Sports. "He said 'Pressure is lack of preparation.' So I feel like I'm prepared. I feel like we're prepared, so maybe that helps out.

"To me, I felt more pressure going into the season last year. It wasn't from the standpoint from the team or anything like that, but because of the (lockout) shortened season. I really didn't know these guys. I didn't know the media, or anybody in town, so there were a lot of things that I had to get used to while coaching the team for the first year. But I wanted that (Lakers pressure). I wanted that. I had other opportunities to go other places, but I wanted that."

If Brown is crazy enough to read the clips when he wakes up Wednesday morning, there's little doubt he'll see the sort of knee-jerk reaction from the media and fans that will be the norm all season long. This debut was nothing short of inauspicious, an underwhelming performance in which the Mavericks seized control in the third quarter and never looked back.

Kobe Bryant played through the pain of a right foot strain that kept him out of the final two preseason games to score 22 points (11-for-14 shooting), but the Lakers' offense that was humming along in the first half (a 48-46 Mavericks' lead) was disjointed in the second half and the defense was hardly as dominating as was expected. Howard started strong but was lost in the offense late, finishing with 19 points and 10 rebounds while hitting just three of 14 free throws and eventually fouling out with 2:02 left to play. The truth, though, is that it's what happens in late April and beyond that matters most.

"It's not an excuse, but it will all come with time," Howard said. "We haven't had an opportunity to really play together as much as we want, but we're going to get it. ... We're going to chip away, and we're going to get better."

The Lakers have been here before, and they're well aware what sorts of things happen if perception doesn't ultimate meet reality. The 2003-04 dream team that featured Karl Malone and Gary Payton is remembered as a failure because those Lakers didn't win it all, never mind that they reached the NBA Finals before falling to the Detroit Pistons. And as general manager Mitch Kupchak has been quick to remind the masses, change often comes in times like those. The fallout of 2004 was the Shaquille O'Neal trade to Miami and the departure of coach Phil Jackson, and similar changes could be in store if this mix of world class talent doesn't work.

Even with Bryant playing, the concern over his health only underscored the reality that the Lakers' medical chart will be even more important their stat sheet this season. All three players have been remarkably durable throughout their careers, but none can claim a clean bill of health in recent history.

Anyone outside the team's practice facility on Tuesday morning could see the state of affairs on that front: While Howard waited for his driver to pick him up after shoot-a-round, he unraveled the layers of ace bandages wrapped around his back that was surgically repaired in late April; not long after, Nash — a 38-year-old who had back problems of his own last season — showed his age by way of his car choice while driving off in a white, hatchback Porsche that surely comes in handy with his children who still live in Phoenix.

Bryant, who called this injury the "most frustrating" of the many he has endured, will likely re-assess his situation on a daily basis. His foot will be tested yet again on Wednesday night, as the Lakers play at Portland.

"Dealing with the tendons, there's nothing you can do therapy-wise," Bryant said on Tuesday morning. "If you treat it with manual therapy, the worse it gets. It's kind of just a waiting game, just...You kind of have to allow it to heal on its own. It's pretty frustrating.

"It's really just a matter of, 'Does it get worse?'...If it's not going to get worse, then it's one of those injuries that you can play through and you can heal as you play. But if gets worse, then you can't go."

It was fitting that Dallas was in town for the opener. The Mavericks were the ones doing the damage when the Lakers' dynasty seemed to be done, when Dallas' sweep in the 2011 Western Conference semifinals marked a new low for an organization that hasn't known many while leading to the Mavericks' title. Andrew Bynum and Lamar Odom were ejected for dirty hits in an ugly Game 4, with Magic Johnson and a number of other prominent Lakers voicing their displeasure and deeming it a disgrace in the days to come. Still, this was the same Mavericks team in name alone.

Beyond the fact that Nowitzki had arthroscopic surgery on his right knee on Oct. 19 and is expected to miss four to six weeks, only two of the 19 players who reported to Dallas training camp (Nowitzki and Shawn Marion) were part of the championship team. New Mavericks point guard Darren Collison led the Mavericks with 17 points, while fellow new addition O.J. Mayo had 12 points while shooting 4-for-13 from the field.

One thing was made clear at the start: nothing has changed about the Lakers' totem pole. Considering pregame introductions in the NBA are an unofficial indication of the local power structure, it came as no surprise that nothing changed on that front. Bryant, who has led the Lakers to five championships and so badly wants a sixth ring to match Michael Jordan, was the last name called just as he has been in so many years passed.

"It's not the way we wanted it to go," said forward Pau Gasol, who led the Lakers with 23 points and 13 rebounds. "We know it's not going to happen for us right away, but we've just got to stick with it."

As Bryant himself made clear at the start of training camp, Howard's time is coming soon but this is still his team for now. Howard was the third member of the starting five to be named by the Staples Center announcer after Metta World Peace and Gasol, followed by Nash and finally Bryant. The Staples Center crowd, it seemed, offered near-equal cheers for each member of their new Big Three.

Howard looked as agile and impactful as ever from the start, taking just 24 seconds to grab his first rebound and doing his best Kareem Abdul-Jabbar impression less than two minutes in when he buried a smooth right-hand hook while floating through the lane. Moments earlier, the Lakers' enormous safety net of talent was on display: Howard badly missed a dunk from the left side, but the gaffe was quickly forgotten when Nash buried a three-pointer off of the offensive rebound for his first points in purple and gold. The Lakers led 29-25 after the first quarter but trailed 48-46 at the half, with the second unit that played such a significant part in the team's 0-8 preseason struggling again.

After the Mavericks took a 54-49 lead midway through the third quarter, a fan could be heard yelling "fire Mike Brown!" Collison scored again to extend the lead and cause even more consternation from the locals, and a flagrant foul called on Howard soon thereafter made the mood all the more dour.

The unraveling continued from there. The Princeton offense that was installed during the preseason was nowhere to be seen on some possessions, with World Peace forcing isolation action at times on one end while the paint that Howard typically patrols with so much dominance too often invaded by the Mavericks during others. Carter sparked the Mavericks' surge almost by himself, repeatedly burying jumpers in the second half en route to his 11-point, 5-for-12 shooting night.

"It's growing pains, and it's a struggle," Nash said. "We're out of sync, and we're going to probably have some more moments in games like that."

Contributing: The Associated Press