NBA

It doesn’t take much to figure out that the Clippers’ starting five is all but set for the Oct. 30 opener against the San Antonio Spurs. Barring an injury, Lamar Odom, Elton Brand, Michael Olowokandi and Jeff McInnis probably can be written into four of the five spots.

The shooting-guard role is shaping up to be the only intriguing battle of training camp, with Corey Maggette, Eric Piatkowski and Quentin Richardson pushing each other for playing time.

Maggette is the best all-around player of the three; Piatkowski has the best outside shot; Richardson has perhaps the most potential. Piatkowski started the team’s final 40 games last season, but there’s no guarantee that he will retain the shooter’s role to begin 2001-02.

Maggette and Richardson will be difficult to keep on the bench. Maggette made his case for more playing time last week. It was Richardson’s turn to do so Friday, telling reporters, “I need to be out there.” However, Richardson acknowledged he must be patient.

“There’s definitely a lot of good players at that position,” he said. “There’s definitely competition. We’re all friends. We all want to play. We all have to do good things to get on the court.”

If Richardson wants his playing time to increase from the 18 minutes or so he averaged last season, he needs to make more shots. Richardson made only 44% of his shots last season and was good on only 33% of his three-point attempts, sub-par averages for a shooting guard.

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The Clippers made their first moves of training camp, cutting center Neil Edwards and forward Ansu Sesay to trim the roster to 15 players.