Grant Looks to Get More Involved

Horace Grant said, yes, his back is a little sore. Then he pointed to his right calf. That, too, was sore.

“Man,” he said, sighing dramatically, “I’ve turned into Bill Cartwright.”

Grant laughed. Even at 35, he was the critical acquisition of the summer, the power forward that would keep the Kemps and Duncans and Wallaces off Shaquille O’Neal’s back.

Through four exhibition games, including Thursday night’s 91-84 loss to the Cleveland Cavaliers at Staples Center, Grant was still finding his way around the triangle again, around a lineup with a true center again, and around a familiar coach again. The early result was 10 shots in 77 minutes.

“It’s going to take a little time,” he said. “I’m thinking about how I should react, where I should be when Kobe and Shaq get the basketball. I think I have to get back in the mind-set of playing with Michael [Jordan] and Scottie [Pippen] again, in terms of them taking the shots and me being in the rebound position. I’m not worried. I know Phil [Jackson] and the guys are not worried about it.”

Grant said he retained his feel for the triangle, if not necessarily the personnel.

“It’s still a little weird playing with a big guy again because I haven’t played with a big guy since Shaq left Orlando,” he said. “Each day we get more and more comfortable with each other.”

In the first quarter against the Cavaliers, Grant rebounded and put back a Laker miss. He was more involved in an offense that briefly perked up for the first time in the preseason.

“Well, he’s not getting involved in the offense, but that’s not all his fault,” Jackson said. “It’s partially some of his teammates’ faults. He gets one shot in 22 minutes [Oct. 11 against Charlotte]. Horace is a better ballplayer than that, first of all. He should be involved. Everybody should find him shots. Secondly, he’s got to run the floor and get some offensive rebounds. He gets hustle points. That’s always been one of his features.”

Like everything in mid-October, the Lakers will wait.

“Horace has played 35,000, 40,000 minutes of an NBA career,” Jackson said. “He knows how to play. It’s just a matter of getting himself well physically and playing all out.”

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The Lakers scored 27 points in the first quarter Thursday with their first unit, and 15 in the third, when Isaiah Rider replaced Ron Harper at point guard.

The difference in the offensive output, Jackson said, boiled down to the two players’ philosophies, and went so far as to call the third-quarter’s starting unit “pathetic.”

“[Harper] is a guard that wants to move the ball and keeps the team in an offensive rhythm, simple as that,” Jackson said. “You have to--have an idea that you’re going to move the ball to the first open man in this offense to develop a rhythm. If guards are looking to score and put the ball on the floor, they are going to break the rhythm of the team and that’s going to create a situation that’s not good. J.R. brought that with him and that’s a habit guards have to break. There’s a time and a place in the offense to do it. But, that choice has got to be made at the right moment. Ron knows that timing.”

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Rider said that Jackson was right, he should have treated his ankle, and that he will weather the criticism of that decision.

“We’re fine, we’re cool,” Rider said. “That’s just P.J. You have to earn your keep, period.”

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Kobe Bryant called premature reports out of Italy that he had “dropped out” as half-owner of Milan, Italy-based Olimpia Milano.

While he expects to sell his stake in the franchise in part because of disagreements with co-owner Pasquale Caputo, Bryant said negotiations are ongoing.

The report said the team’s board of directors had cleared the way for Milan businessmen to buy out Bryant and Caputo.