Written by: Bryan Jolly
The Renegades. The Bench Mob. Kobe’s Angels. The Wild Bench. Whatever you want to call it, the Laker’s second unit is, without question, the best in the NBA. They’re getting quality minutes and putting up quality numbers. How the bench on a two-time defending championship team emerges as the strongest and deepest in the league may be the biggest surprise since Sasha Vujacic’s engagement to Maria Sharapova.
Not only is this Lakers bench productive, it’s productive in all the right places. 14 seasons under his belt, Kobe can’t be expected to carry the scoring load every night. Last year, Kobe had no help beyond Gasol and Odom. This year, the Shannon Brown show has been rolling since the rings were handed out. He’s playing like the sixth man of the year, averaging 11.8 PPG and shooting a blistering 51% from beyond the arc. Tired of being typecast as a dunker, Brown spent the offseason developing the perfect complement to his open court explosiveness: a jump shot.
If re-signing Shannon Brown was the most sagacious offseason move by the LA front office, the late-July phone call that Kobe made to Matt Barnes isn’t far behind. Barnes is the epitome of a love/hate guy: you hate him until he’s wearing your colors. I used to love his antics at UCLA, then quickly turned against him as he started battling the Lakers in Sacramento and Golden State. Now that he’s back in LA, nothing but love. No one outside of Kobe and Barnes knows how the conversation went for sure but I’d like to think it went something like this:
Kobe: Matt, it’s Kobe.
Barnes: Kobe? (Dramatic pause) … Kobe Bryant?
Kobe: Yeah, Kobe Bryant. Listen, Kupchak is about to offer you a contract. I know we’ve had our battles over the years but I want you to know, I respect you as a competitor and I want you on my team.
Barnes: Uh… Can I apologize for those comments I made about your wife in the ’09 Finals?
Kobe: Doesn’t matter. I just wanna win. I think you can help.
Next: The Importance of Matt Barnes and Ron Artest
Kobe’s a smart dude. He understands the importance of having someone like Barnes on your team. Someone to provide constant activity. Someone who gets under the skin of the best player on the other team. Artest is a great player but he’s not a real offensive threat. Barnes can provide the same type of tenacious defense while being more efficient on the offensive end– especially in the open court. (I can’t help but cringe every time Artest gets the ball on the break with one or two defenders back. Chances are he’s picking up his dribble just inside the three point line, barreling to the left and chucking up an out-of-control layup that bounces off the glass and misses the rim entirely).
Adding Barnes also adds another fierce competitor into the mix, the type of guy you need in May and June. I can picture Barnes and Artest battling in practice, constantly escalating the intensity and sucking the rest of the team into the competitive vortex.
I’m hesitant to ask this question and risk further jinxing the terracotta knees of Andruw Bynum, but I think it needs to be addressed: What happens when Drew comes back, which is reportedly tonight in Washington? Odom is possibly playing the best ball of his career, coming off a summer as the emotional Leader of Team USA, instead of his usual summer routine of lying around bingeing on Sour Patch Kids. He looks great. He’s attacking the basket, dropping Pau off for easy buckets and getting good elevation on his jump shot. When Bynum comes back and Odom settles back into his sixth man role, the Lakers will be able to roll out a second unit of Blake, Brown, Barnes, Odom and Caracter. Three of those guys would start on 90% of NBA teams right now. Dyan Cannon isn’t the only scary person sitting on the sidelines in Staples anymore.
Next: Accepting Your Role
You hear people talk all the time about the importance of role players; players who are willing accept a secondary role, focus solely on winning and forgo their own box score ink for the greater good of the team. Sacrifices have to be made. Matt Barnes had to turn down more lucrative offers to come off the bench in LA. Artest had to accept Brown’s offensive emergence. After Bynum’s inevitable return, Odom will have to accept his relegation back to the bench. Robert Horry, the quintessential role player, knew exactly what his teams needed and provided it. He left his ego at the valet stand with his Bentley keys. Seven rings later, he’s a lock for the Hall of Fame—as a role player. The importance of role players in the NBA cannot be overstated.
Take the Miami Heat. Two of the top five individual scorers in the league, but no quality role players to provide the glue. Nobody to come off the bench and provide a spark. Actually, there’s no one to come off the bench and do anything. LeBron is logging more minutes this season than Ron-Ron’s shrink. You can’t compete with three players when the other team is parading out 11 quality guys.
Bench players are an oft-overlooked breed. This year, the Lakers bench is impossible to ignore. In recent years, it has been uncomfortable to watch the bench come in and buy time while Kobe got a few minutes of rest. Now (as I bust out my best Thanksgiving metaphor), the bench is like the delicious gravy poured on top of the turkey and potatoes and stuffing– it only makes the meal that much better.