Struggling Bryant won’t be benched, insists Lakers coach Scott

While Kobe Bryant retirement is something many critics point to as the solution to the Lakers problem, coach Byron Scott insists he hasn’t lost faith to his player.

The only thing that hasn’t changed is that Bryant still leads the team in shots per game (16.4), playing over 30 minutes per game. He is the Lakers’ Kryptonite and nobody is going to save them from him, especially not Byron Scott. It’s going to get worse before it gets better, and the two usual suspects are to blame. Maybe it could happen Saturday against the Trail Blazers; he’s averaged 33.1 points in his last seven games in Portland. If, say, Nick Young was shooting 31 percent from the field and under 20 percent from the three-point line right now but he kept on shooting, wouldn’t he be benched?

“I know his mentality is that he still feels that he can still play in this league, and we feel the same way”, Scott said.

“I would never, never, never do that”, Scott said after practice at the Lakers’ facility. “I said because I was pump-faking”. That’s what the pump-faking is. I get it, it’s Kobe, but there’s a tipping point to every scale. A lot of people focus on your hands with your jump shot but it starts with your feet being squared to the basket and having good balance.

“He’s struggling now to make a shot”. Balancing Bryant’s needs with that of the team’s many prospects is not an easy task, but one Scott is trusting Bryant to help figure out on the floor during games. “In all honesty, it’s tough when the shots that I take, the pull-up shots, jumpers and contested jumpers, were tough shots to hit at 27”.

The Los Angeles Lakers have now lost four games in a row after an unsurprising blowout loss to the Golden State Warriors on Tuesday night to drop their record to 2-12.

“I want to give these guys an opportunity to play with each other, so they can continue to learn and grow with each other”, he said. If that wasn’t bad enough, it was also a game in which Bryant said beforehand that he didn’t think a Los Angeles upset of Golden State was out of the question. He’s got nothing left. “I don’t mean at the end of the season, I mean right now”, Bengtson wrote.