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As Russell Westbrook spent the first decade of his career with the Oklahoma City Thunder, going from first-round pick to All-Star to league MVP, the idea of someday returning to Los Angeles to play for his The Lakers’ hometown seemed increasingly removed from reality. .
“Being from LA, you still wish you could play for your home team and be able to do that,” Westbrook said Tuesday during his introductory press conference with the Lakers at Staples Center. “But it’s definitely something that’s always sort of turned on my mind. And maybe someday. But I would always come back and be like, ‘Ahh, that probably won’t happen.'”
As unlikely as it may sound when he became the first player since Oscar Robertson to average a triple-double for a season and stabilize the Thunder’s organization after Kevin Durant left for the Golden State Warriors, Westbrook has joined his third team in the past three years. since he left the Thunder. He’s been a Houston Rocket, a Washington Wizard, and is now a Laker, wielding a purple and gold No.0 uniform at the end of the day’s festivities.
“It’s surreal,” said the Long Beach, Calif., Native. “I think it still hasn’t hit me yet, being from LA, growing up not too far from here and being able to watch the parades – try to go there, try to miss school to try to go to them . Being a Laker fan and originally from LA, but now it’s all coming together for me. “
Westbrook said a few weeks ago a return to LA still seemed unlikely, with two years and $ 91 million still owed to the 32-year-old combo guard. But a conversation with LeBron James, whom he described as a friend before a teammate, started to turn things around.
“This thing happened so fast, it all happened so fast, over the last couple of weeks or so,” Westbrook said. “But we had brief conversations and obviously talked about what we need to do.”
LA traded Kyle Kuzma, Kentavious Caldwell-Pope, Montrezl Harrell and his 2021 first-round pick in Washington for Westbrook on draft day last month, the first stop in what turned out to be an almost complete overhaul of the last year’s roster who lost in the first round of the playoffs to the Phoenix Suns.
“I think it was an opportunity to make an aggressive move that we believe improved our likelihood of bringing the 18th title to the Los Angeles Lakers,” said vice president of basketball operations and general manager. team general, Rob Pelinka. “It was an opportunity to maximize the ability to do what we are obsessed with doing and that is to bring an 18th title to this city.”
Two of the titles won by the Lakers came at the expense of Westbrook. Kobe Bryant and LA’s 2010 race to the ring began with a first-round victory over the Westbrook Thunder. James and the Lakers’ bubble championship in 2020 included the victory over the Westbrook Rockets in the second round.
Although Westbrook never played with Bryant outside of the Olympics and All-Star Games, he felt a kinship with the late and great Lakers goaltender.
“It hasn’t left my head. Things that we talked about – me and him – just the potential for me to be able to be a Laker, to understand what that entails,” he said. “It’s just crazy to think about it, and it will be with me every time I put on that Laker jersey.”
Pelinka, who was Bryant’s agent and close friend, recalled fondly that Westbrook was on the shortlist of players his former client believed to be “Mamba Mentality.”
“The first thing that brought us together was being able to compete and not being able to take any nights off,” Westbrook said of Bryant.
And the Lakers’ addition of Westbrook should allow James – who is entering his 19th season and turns 37 in December – to offload some of the load.
“Bron is one of the best players to play this game, and his ability to be able to do anything on the pitch lets me just understand,” said Westbrook, who led the league in assists last year. . . “I’m coming to a championship-caliber team and my job is to make sure I’m able to make his game easier for him, and I’ll find ways to do that throughout the game.”
Lakers coach Frank Vogel joined Westbrook and Pelinka at Tuesday’s event and said LA would become an “extremely dynamic and fast team” with Westbrook added to the fold with James and Anthony Davis. And Vogel played down any adjustment issues between the trio because they are “all good play players.”
Westbrook, accompanied at the event by his father, Russ, mother, Shannon, and brother, Ray, however made one thing very clear: his fit with the city of Los Angeles couldn’t be better.
“Just being able to be with my kids all the time, being able to see my mom, dad and wife all the time is the best thing for me that you could ask for,” he said. “Be back home.”
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