Shaq Ready to Give ‘Bums’ the Rush

Shaquille O’Neal must be feeling better, because he wants the basketball again after five months of on-and-off interest when many nights he simply wasn’t himself.

His little outburst in Seattle -- “I need more than 13 ... shots” -- was as much for the benefit of reporters as teammates, who strolled through the locker room and so were quite accessible if O’Neal had wanted their attention then and there.

He had 35 points and 14 rebounds Thursday against Detroit, the first time he’d led the Lakers in points and rebounds since Jan. 24, and showed the wear of it Friday against the SuperSonics. But he’d always said that Kobe Bryant’s lead (27 shots in Seattle) was fine as long as the team was winning, and O’Neal turned surly the moment it didn’t.

Asked in the minutes after the game if they had forgotten about O’Neal, Jim Cleamons, subbing for Phil Jackson, said, “Well, I didn’t forget about him. The fact remains, in the heat of the battle, we just got caught up in thinking we had to score quick. We kept settling for jump shots. We didn’t need to settle.”

No, they needed O’Neal. Whether he was capable of repeating Thursday’s numbers is debatable, however. His early jumpers were way off and he was slow to defend Seattle’s cutters. But given his postgame commentary, if he asks for the ball, the Lakers probably will err on the side of getting it to him, which probably was his point.

“I want to be put into a position to do what I do,” O’Neal said during Bryant’s recent scoring streak. “I’m not a token big man. I’m not Bill Cartwright, who runs up and down the court for 15 minutes and doesn’t touch it. Bum foot or not.”

Told that sounded like a lot of things he said two years ago, when he fought Bryant for control of the offense, O’Neal said, “No, no, no. Right now he’s doing his thing. He’s doing it within the flow of the game. Look, every great team has a one-two punch. I’m just saying, when I’m down there and got a bum on my back, and all 28 teams’ centers are bums, when I got a bum on my back in scoring position I want the ball. That’s all.”

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O’Neal made it clear in September he would not play in the 2004 Olympics unless Jackson was the coach and he has not budged since, but that hasn’t kept people from trying to change his mind.

Sunday in New Jersey it was Karl Malone’s turn. The veteran power forward of the Utah Jazz suggested that O’Neal and those like him -- Kevin Garnett, for instance -- did not appreciate “what’s at stake here” and therefore, he said, “there’s something wrong with them, basically.”

In the years since he played for the 1996 Olympic team, O’Neal, who will be 31 Thursday, has become protective of his summers, even more so since the Lakers started playing into June.

“You look around, and without a doubt you’d hope that Shaq would play,” Malone said. “There’s not tons of centers out there, but there’s forwards that can play center by committee. You would hope a guy like Shaq would play. I don’t know why he wouldn’t, but that’s a decision he’s got to make.

“It’s not about taking up your summer. Basketball has been good to you, and to give up one of your summers for all you’ve gotten -- I don’t think that’s too much to ask.”

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Jackson, who last Monday underwent a procedure to break down a kidney stone, will have X-rays today that will measure his progress in passing the stone. He is expected at practice today.