Bryant Getting Antsy for Return

The new left-handed jump shot is coming along reasonably well, Kobe Bryant said with a smile, but all things considered, he cannot wait until the hard cast comes off his right hand sometime next week and his broken metacarpal bone is healed enough that he can get back to playing again.

Bryant, who will start the season on the injured list, estimates that he will be ready sometime after Nov. 15, sitting out 10 to 12 games.

The hardest part, Bryant says, has been harnessing his energy while watching his teammates play in practice and games since Bryant broke the bone Oct. 13 in the first exhibition game.

“I try to keep it under control,” Bryant said. “But I’m getting very anxious, yeah. I’m ready to burst out of the cage.”

Bryant, who never has had an injury that sidelined him this long, agrees with Coach Phil Jackson that the time off might serve some good--giving him some down time to step away from the action and learn the triangle offense as an observer.

During the team’s exhibition games, Bryant sat next to the coaching staff and frequently quizzed assistant Frank Hamblen.

“You get a chance to step outside of it,” Bryant said. “You see a lot of stuff, observing the spacing on the floor, various spots on the floor . . . how to play this game.

“You really learn a lot just by observing, just by watching . . . especially in my case. The physical stuff has never really been the problem for me.”

Before the injury, Bryant said he had no major troubles adapting to the triangle, and Bryant anticipates none when he returns to the lineup alongside Shaquille O’Neal and Glen Rice.

“It was fine,” Bryant said. “I didn’t have any problem with it. It’s fairly simple, really. . . . I wasn’t trying to think, I was just going with the flow.

“When you learn where your teammates are going to be, it just makes it so simple. . . . Hopefully, when I get back, by the work and studying I’m doing now, everything will just click. I can just flow into it.”

And if that means Bryant will see his shot total go down?

“Fine by me,” Bryant said. “If you’re a talented basketball player--and Shaq and I are the two powerhouses on the team, as well as Glen Rice--the opportunities are going to be there.

“But what this offense does, it makes everybody else a threat. Everybody can’t key in on myself or Shaq or Glen.”

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O’Neal kept to the waggish spirit of Jackson’s light-hearted presentation at Friday’s L.A. Chamber of Commerce luncheon in honor of the team, and continued to pay tribute to his friend, Benoit Benjamin, who was released by Jackson on Thursday.

“I had a pet named Big Ben and Mitch [Kupchak] and Jerry [West] killed him!” O’Neal said when Jackson brought the microphone to him. “Big Ben, come back! Big Ben, come back!”