Rider’s Stay Could Be Near End

J.R. Rider’s latest opportunity, the one where he’d score in place of Shaquille O’Neal and Kobe Bryant and help the Lakers win another NBA championship, could be over.

The talented and oft-tardy Rider is expected to be placed on the injured list today, the gracious alternative to being waived, which was intended when Laker officials called him into an office in their El Segundo headquarters on Monday afternoon.

Beset by similar behavioral issues that cut short his stays in Minnesota, Portland and Atlanta, most recently on a tumultuous four-game road trip, Rider was told by Laker General Manager Mitch Kupchak and Coach Phil Jackson that he would be released.

Apparently distraught at being released by a second organization in barely more than a year--Atlanta waived him last March 17--Rider begged to stay. In a compromise that speaks to Jackson’s continued patience with Rider, the club agreed to keep him, leaving a slight possibility that he would play again, though not before the playoffs.

With Ron Harper on the injured list and Bryant only now returning from injury, Rider would insure the club against further injuries to its backcourt, assuming he conforms to Jackson’s wishes.

In the road trip that ended Sunday, Rider was benched for two of the four games and played a total of 18 minutes in the others. He was 45 minutes late to Tuesday’s game in Utah and did not play. Miffed over playing time and being treated like a “scrub”, he left the bench for nearly the entire third quarter Friday in Boston, and therefore did not play Sunday in Minnesota.

Rider was suspended for five games in early March for violating the league’s anti-drug policy, sat out a December game in Oakland, his home town, for being late, and missed a midseason flight to New York, eventually paying his own way on a commercial flight. Meanwhile, Rider struggled to find his way in the offense, averaging 7.6 points and shooting 42.6 % from the floor.

Monday’s events came as Bryant is expected to return to action tonight, giving the Lakers one last shot to get it right.

With four games left in a season gone chaotic with colliding philosophies and damaged psyches, Jackson again will attempt to blend the breathtaking skills and bull-headed personalities of Bryant and O’Neal into his triangle offense.

At stake, the Lakers’ season and their hopes to repeat last year’s NBA title.

Bryant is healthy, pretty much, for the first time in seven weeks. The league’s third-leading scorer at 28.7 points a game, Bryant has played in 12 of 26 games since Feb. 20. In a second half fractured by injury and illness, he missed three games because of a sprained right ankle, two because of a viral infection and nine of the last 10 because of tendinitis in his left ankle.

He practiced Monday afternoon at the gym on Nash Street in El Segundo, three-on-three, slashing and defending and acting as if it were the final dress rehearsal. He will be evaluated again today and his return will be a game-time decision. The playoffs begin in 11 days, whether the Lakers are healthy or harmonious. The Lakers have four games to decide, beginning with tonight’s at Staples Center against the Phoenix Suns.

Bryant didn’t have time to talk, what with the physical therapy and all. He smiled as he passed a pocket of reporters, told them he’d see them today.

His return comes at an intriguing time. The Lakers have won four in a row, bringing questions about the delicateness of integrating Bryant and his creative style into their recent, grind-it-through-O’Neal success. Had Bryant returned four games ago, it might have been suggested he was back to save the Lakers, then losers of three of four games and in danger of losing all home-court advantage.

In the meantime, O’Neal is playing his best ball of the season, averaging 32.9 points and 12.9 rebounds in his past 13 games, reminding many of last season, when he was the NBA’s most valuable player.

“I’m getting the ball, guys are looking for me, and I just do what I do,” O’Neal said Monday. “For me to do what I do, I have to be involved. When I’m not involved, then I’m not the player you’re used to seeing. I’m somebody else. And I can’t be somebody else. When I’m somebody else, I get upset. Then I say what I feel like saying. But, the guys are looking for me, feeding me the ball, getting me the ball in the third and fourth quarter. I’m stepping up to the [free-throw] line, hitting them when I need to hit them. Like I said, when I get these dog cookies, then the dog will walk, sit, bite, run, fetch, do whatever you want.”

That said, he welcomed Bryant back, but with an unsubtle reminder of what has driven their offense for a week.

“Kobe’s an energetic player, a scorer,” he said. “We just have to keep doing the same thing we have been doing. Adding him should make our team that much better. For us, it’s all about moving the ball and getting everybody involved. If everybody’s involved, we’ll be a hard team to beat.”

Jackson will monitor Bryant’s early minutes. A game behind the Sacramento Kings, the Lakers could still win the Pacific Division, but not at the cost of driving Bryant too hard.

“That depends on the game, the circumstances,” Jackson said. “There’s no doubt about the fact we’re a better team with Kobe on the floor. We’re a better team defensively, a better team running. But, yet, the team chemistry’s been very good and we’ve played at a pace that has maintained the best attitude this team can have, defensively. So, we appreciate what he brings us and we hope that he can bring us the wins we have to have here.”

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O’Neal averaged 35.8 points, 11.8 rebounds and 3.0 blocked shots in four road victories.

For those efforts, O’Neal was the NBA’s player of the week and earned, among other things, a gentle reminder from Jackson to work harder on defense. Told that Jackson praised his play and then impugned his defense, O’Neal looked up quizzically.

O’Neal has a different relationship with Jackson than, say, Bryant does.

“He talks and I listen,” O’Neal said. “I don’t talk back, I don’t make faces, I’m out there busting my . . . doing what I can do. Whatever he says I just listen. I don’t make faces, I don’t complain, I just go out and do it. But, no center has ever backed me down and scored 30 on me. I try to guard two or three guys, I do the best I can.”