Jones Has Defensive Ambitions Too

The disappointment from the end of last season has fueled the determination at the start of this one, so Eddie Jones talks of making the all-defensive team more as a fact than a desire.

“I’m going to be there,” the Laker guard said. “I’m going to make sure I’m there. I’m going to come in and work my butt off defensively and make it pay over to the games.

“Once you make it, then people start looking at you to make it. This is definitely going to be my year to make it.”

He was hoping 1996-97 would be, but when the voting by coaches was announced during the first round of the playoffs, Jones learned that Michael Jordan and Gary Payton made the first team in the backcourt and Mookie Blaylock and John Stockton the second. Among other things.

“You got some guys who make the team only because of what they did the year before,” he said. “It’s already in coaches’ heads--those guys play defense. There’s going to come a time when I’m there.”

Jones--who has finished fourth, eighth and sixth in the league in his three seasons--got six votes, three behind Stockton.

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Nick Van Exel played 23 and 27 minutes the last two exhibition games as Coach Del Harris began the delicate--and probably ongoing--task of balancing the need to play his starting point guard with the need to protect the injured left knee.

“That’s kind of the way we’ve got to do it,” Harris said. “We’ve got to do enough so he stays in shape, but not overdo it. That shouldn’t be a big problem because he’s always been in good shape.”

Indeed, even after he missed five consecutive days earlier in camp for rest and follow-up examinations on the bruised bone, Van Exel appeared in good condition upon the return to practice, although his timing was off. When the knee began to bother him again, he sat out Thursday’s workout, before starting exhibition games the next two nights against the Clippers in St. Louis and the Cleveland Cavaliers in Kansas City, Mo.

The good news for the Lakers is that the schedule will allow for continued rest, even after the exhibition season that continues Tuesday at Denver. When the games start to count Oct. 31, they play only four times in the first 11 days. From there, though, it’s six in nine.