Rambis Doesn’t Expect Loss of Rodman to Go by the Boards

Shaquille O’Neal maintained his silence about Thursday’s firing of erratic rebounder Dennis Rodman, saying: “You know how I feel? Write what you think.”

When pressed to express his feelings, he said: “I don’t have an opinion.”

Meanwhile, Laker Coach Kurt Rambis said he understood if some players still wished Rodman was on the team.

“It’s a real give and take--because when Dennis was good, he was really good,” Rambis said.

“[But] it’s not like he was a 26-year-old guy. We weren’t building our franchise around Dennis. Somebody else is going to have to step up.

“There might be two other people where you combine their stats versus the combination of Dennis and [his backups] . . . their combined numbers will be just as good as Dennis and the other power forwards, I’m sure.”

On Saturday, J.R. Reid was in early foul trouble, scoring only one point and grabbing only three rebounds in 27 minutes.

Travis Knight, however, came back from the injured list with a decent outing: 17 minutes, three rebounds, three steals and two assists, but no points.

Robert Horry, who will swing back and forth between the two forward spots as Rambis implements more of a trapping defensive style, played some of his 12 minutes at power forward matched up against Karl Malone.

Horry did not score or have a rebound.

“If [Rodman] was on the same page as everybody and at practice on time and willing to go into games and doing all those things that a team needs a teammate to be doing all the time, there wouldn’t have been an issue,” Rambis said.

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Point guard Derek Harper, nursing a sore right foot, was a late scratch. But Rambis has cut his minutes dramatically recently and said he will continue to do so until Harper is ready to go full-bore again.

“I know at some point in time Harp’s going to feel like he’s crawling out of his skin because his body’s telling him to go play and be ready,” Rambis said. “Then it might be time to get him back with some good minutes.”

Meanwhile, Glenn Rice, recovering from tonsillitis, returned to action. He played 31 minutes and scored 11 points.