Aldridge, Leonard lead Spurs over Lakers 109-87

Now, obviously Bryant doesn’t “deserve” to be there based on his play this year.

Lakers coach Byron Scott, right, is deferring to what guard Kobe Bryant thinks the team should do, why why keep Scott as coach?

The Lakers play one more road game – against Houston on Saturday – before returning home to Los Angeles.

When the family eventually returned to Philadelphia in 1991, Bryant joined the Lower Merion High School basketball team, leading it to the state championships four years in a row. However, Bryant has had a tendency to stiffen up and lose his shots in second halves of games.

Despite his success in San Antonio, Bryant is extremely popular in the city and a large contingent of fans came to see what could be his penultimate appearance at the AT&T Center. Kobe checked in and immediately scored, but the Lakers could not stop the Spurs on the defensive end and trailed 75-91 with 9:00 remaining in the game.

The Lakers are expected to start rookie Larry Nance Jr. against Aldridge, but the more intriguing matchup will be when Julius Randle comes in off the bench.

After balloting for the All-Star game opened Thursday, Silver spoke with SiriusXM NBA Radio and admitted he thinks Bryant should get a sendoff at the midseason exhibition. The 23 year old out of the University of Missouri was a pleasant surprise for the Lakers as he was named to the National Basketball Association all-rookie team last season and so far this season he hasn’t been hit by the sophomore slump.

They played against LaMarcus Aldridge for the first time since he rebuffed them in the wild first few days of July. Russell is finally showing the qualities as a point guard that make him such a special prospect and paint the picture of his enormous potential. Scott remains mindful of Bryant’s struggles, averaging 15.9 points per game average on 30.9-percent shooting in 30.6 minutes per game. “I think we found from a great player that he was more interested in the basketball on-the-court stuff than anything else”. However, the results are relatively inconsequential at this point as the Lakers have seemingly (or hopefully) moved to the next phase of this season. Jordan Clarkson will also take the night off after spraining his ankle in Wednesday night’s game in Minnesota, but his status is day-to-day.

Now, with more than a quarter of the season having passed, Aldridge is more comfortable as a San Antonio Spur after signing with them as a free agent over the summer. Tony Parker had the night off, so Mills’ contribution helped the Spurs run away with the victory.

“I’m getting into a rhythm now and feeling more comfortable”, Aldridge said.

“Just knowing any given night you don’t know who’s going to be that guy, that’s the strength of this team”, Thomas said. “I’m not going to force anything”, Bryant said.

The question becomes whether the Lakers decide to give Clarkson the max contract they can or if he gets a lesser contract from them.