Jeff Lamp Fitting In Well This Season With Bucks

A year ago, Jeff Lamp was preparing for his first holiday season away from basketball since his grade school days; just another former college star who never quite got over the hump in the National Basketball Assn.

“I was just hanging out in Minnesota, getting ready for Christmas,” Lamp said.

Lamp is getting ready for Christmas, but instead of battling shoppers he is once again battling players like Julius Erving and Larry Bird.

After a year’s absence from the NBA, Lamp signed as a free-agent with the Milwaukee Bucks and has emerged as one of the team’s most pleasant surprises.

Lamp was a first-round draft choice of the Portland Trail Blazers in 1981 after an outstanding collegiate career at the University of Virginia. In three nondescript seasons with the Trail Blazers, he averaged 4.7 points in a little more than 11 minutes per game.

On a team loaded with players like Clyde Drexler, Jim Paxson and Mychal Thompson, Portland management decided Lamp’s numbers did not warrant a fourth season on the team.

Lamp said there were a lot of reasons for his release by Portland.

“There were really good players ahead of me and the salary cap was part of it,” he said. “And I never really played well consistently.”

After being waived by the Trail Blazers, Lamp tried out with the Indiana Pacers, the team with the worst record in the NBA in 1983-84. Bad record or not, Indiana did not have any use for someone too small to be a true forward and not quick enough to be a guard.

After being cut by Indiana, Lamp thought his NBA career was probably over.

“I stayed in shape for about a month to see if anybody was interested and nobody was,” Lamp said. “I figured that was it.”

After failing to sell his talents to the NBA, Lamp decided maybe he’d have better luck selling real estate and took courses to prepare himself for a life away from basketball.

But the competitive fires still burned.

“I felt I still had some ball left to play, even if it meant going to Europe,” Lamp said. “I had two offers in Europe and a tryout with the Bucks.”

Lamp chose the tryout with Milwaukee and neither has regretted the move.

Through 24 games with the Central Division leaders, Lamp is averaging 8.5 points and almost 19 minutes per game.

Despite playing mostly small forward with the Bucks, Lamp admits he’s still not the prototype of an NBA forward.

“I’m kind of a ‘tweener,” Lamp said. “I’m better when I can fill a spot. I’m not quick enough for guard and I’m not the guy who can handle the ball for you the entire game. I’m also not really big enough for forward.”

Some might say that’s exactly what got Lamp off the court and into the real estate business the last time, but he said there’s not much he can do about it.

“Sometimes it’s a matter of taking advantage of the things you are good at,” Lamp said.

And the Milwaukee Bucks think he’s doing just that.