“I’m glad that he spoke his mind,” Gasol said after a 131-102 loss against the Oklahoma City Thunder on March 13, per Mark Medina of the Los Angeles Daily News. “He wants to win. He’s got two years under contract with the franchise. He wants to be in the best possible position to win. Whether you do that publicly or internally, that’s totally up to you. He spoke his mind and you have to respect him for that.”
Bryant voiced his opinion about the future of the franchise by saying the following, per the Los Angeles Times’ Mike Bresnahan:
Oh, yeah, let’s just play next year and let’s just suck again. No. Absolutely not. It’s my job to go out there on the court and perform, no excuses for it. Right? You’ve got to get things done.
Same thing with the front office. The same expectations they have of me when I perform on the court, it’s the same expectations I have for them up there.
Injuries have prevented the 35-year-old veteran from performing out on the court in 2013-14. He played just six games after returning from an Achilles tear he suffered last April before fracturing his left knee. He has missed every game since and was recently shut down for the remainder of the season.
By missing 76 games on a salary of more than $30 million, Bryant’s injuries became the most expensive in league history, per Rotowire’s Jeff Stotts via Twitter:
It’s certainly bold for Bryant to call out the Lakers’ brass when you consider that it signed him to a two-year, $48.5 million extension in November before he had played a single minute...
Article Source: Bleacher Report - Los Angeles Lakers
