Because it's been a while since the NBA playoffs have been touched on here in real depth, this seems to be a good time to remind everyone why Kobe Bryant is the biggest phony in all of sports right now.

Raja Bell got himself suspended from tonight's Game 6 between his Suns, facing elimination, and the Lakers, after yoking Bryant down late in Game 5. Not that it wasn't completely unjustified considering what the Lakers had been doing to the Suns most of the series (neither Luke Walton nor Kwame Brown have missed any time after their "hard'' fouls) and what Kobe did to Bell specifically (plenty of replays of Bryant cracking him in the head and other body parts to free himself). David Stern called Bell's takedown "unmanly,'' although what he should have said was, "Remember that comment about our refs getting 5 percent of the calls wrong in these playoffs? I meant they get 5 percent right.''

Anyway ... here's a pretty succinct breakdown from today's L.A. Times of the jawing that went on during yesterday's off-day. The key phrase from Bell: "I have no respect for him. I think he's a pompous, arrogant individual." Sure, Raja, tell us something we don't know. Do you also think he wears No. 8?

Now, here's Kobe, from that L.A. Times story:

"Does he know me? Do I know this guy? I don't know this guy," Bryant said. "I might have said one word to this guy. I don't know this kid. I think he overreacts to stuff.

"We go out there, we play, and when we play during the season, we play each other. That's it. I don't know this kid. I don't need to know this kid. I don't want to. We go out there, we play the game and leave it at that. Maybe he wasn't hugged enough as a kid. I look at him a little bit, he gets a little insecure or something. I don't know."

So where do you want to start?

Well ... the man he referred to as a "kid'' three times, is a year older than Kobe.

The man he said no less than five times that he didn't know, guarded him when he played for the 76ers in the NBA Finals in 2001. Guarded him pretty well, too. They've also been in the same conference for the past four seasons. Bell guarded him pretty well all of those times.

Let's give Kobe credit for being facetious, sarcastic and humorous under the circumstances. Except there's this, from Sports Illustrated's big Kobe piece a few weeks ago: "After he dropped 51 points on Raja Bell in a loss to the Suns (April 7), he was asked about the physical battle Bell had given him. Bryant shot the questioner a look that said, Are you nuts? 'Raja Bell?' he said, enunciating the name as if it were a contagious disease. 'I don't even think about him. Man, I got bigger fish to fry than Raja Bell.'''

So it's all a matter of dismissing someone that probably is a little harder to dismiss than you thought. Problem is, Kobe's not even as good at doing that as Shaq is; Shaq answers questions about Kobe with either a blank stare, or with an economical "Who?'' Makes its point without making it look like you're trying too hard in the face of the mounting evidence to the contrary.

And do we even want to get into the whole "not enough hugs'' line? From the guy who went a year without talking to his father, Jelly Bean, a few years back, because they were in serious disagreement about his marriage?

The amazing thing is, Kobe could have merely let his play speak for itself. He is being such an unselfish player, such a facilitator, such a leader, he's making his seventh-seeded team a legit title threat, making Jackson look like a genius again, making Steve Nash look like a fraud, making the innocent bystanders wearing his uniform look like a supporting cast, making his critics look bad, and making himself look like the player everyone thought he could be if he wasn't so full of himself. Now, he's back to looking like he's full of himself. All because he couldn't just put a lid on it, couldn't let the suspension and the 3-2 series lead do all the talking.

Now, Bell's problem is this: he could have made a case for being the wronged party, and kept trying to make it yesterday, by describing in detail what Kobe was doing on the court and what Phil Jackson was saying from the bench. But by slinging Kobe down in that manner, in a game the Suns were running away with to stay alive and to steal some momentum and possibly the upper hand in the series, he proved that maybe no one should be listening to him after all.

Somehow, Bell missed the lesson about the retaliation always being punished instead of the instigation. Now his team is hurt by his absence, and Kobe and the Lakers have the psychological edge again. Worse, this game will probably be micro-officiated, and no one will get away with anything.

And, as a bonus, with all the talk about Kobe vs. Raja, there's less talk about Kwame, whose role in a sexual-assault investigation did wonders to bring the momentum he personally had gained to a complete stop, and which had to have sucked the wind right out of his team's sales just when they were ready to finish the Suns off. One must wonder: has there ever been a former No. 1 pick who not only has underachieved as much as him, but also disrupted the playoffs for two different teams in consecutive years while having as small a role on either team?

To make a long story short, I'm not missing a second of tonight's game. To make another long story short, I think my Kobe button is as easy to push as most people's Barry button. That might be a good debate: bigger lightning rod, Barry or Kobe?

As for the rest of the playoffs ... the less said about the Wizards' defense on LeBron James on the final possession of overtime last night, the better. OK, just this: See the big guy wearing No. 23? That's LeBron. See that big white strip of paint behind you? That's the baseline. Keep HIM away from THERE. Do all three of you defenders get that? Are you sure? Him, there, bad.

All right, one last word. Not that there's a lot of competition for this designation, but this is the best first round of the playoffs the NBA has ever had.