Wherever he’s played—from grade school on up—Lakers forward Lamar Odom’s always been a starter. But when word seeped out during the team’s media day that Phil Jackson was toying with the idea of putting him as his main bench guy, subbing in for Trevor Ariza to contend with small forwards, Odom couldn’t hide his disdain. Some of Kobe circa Summer ‘07 rubbed off on Odom, who said his coach was less than clear headed when the thought came to him.

“He must have woke up and bumped his head. He probably hit his head on something — boom,” Odom said about Jackson. “To start off like that, you’ve got to be out of your … mind.”

Note to kids out there—whenever your coach is threatening your playing time, it’s always good to go with the Samuel L. Jackson approach of speaking to make your point. And to be fair, Jackson also said he was going to cutting Kobe’s minutes down. We’ll see how far that goes if they start getting blown out by the Bobcats.

Lakers’ Lamar Odom unhappy with idea of being sixth man [LA Times]
Image [LA Times]