It was the breakfast heard around the world. When Kobe Bryant and Rajon Rondo were spotted sharing a meal together, the media began to speculate that it was actually a recruiting effort by the Los Angeles Lakers veteran to get the point guard over to the West Coast in free agency. The Boston Celtics are struggling and the Lakers have the money to give Rondo the long-term deal he will be requesting. However, Bryant is going on the record saying the breakfast was merely about breakfast and not basketball.
Bryant laughed off the idea that he was trying to convince Rondo to sign with the Lakers. The veteran simply made note that he and the point guard are good friends with a mutual respect and they simply were just taking time to hang out and discuss basketall.
"It was delicious," Bryant said, via ESPNLosAngeles.com. "Like a mutual intervention-type thing? Nah, not really. We just talked about the game, we talked about the league. We talked about good old memories of playing in the series against each other, stuff like that -- different strategies and things they tried to do against us and things we tried to do against them. It was a basketball geek conversation."
According to ESPN's Ramona Shelburne, the Lakers and Celtics did discuss a Rondo trade earlier in the offseason, but nothing came of it. Los Angeles would be hard-pressed to get a deal done for the point guard prior to the deadline. It would force the team to give up their first-round draft pick, something they would prefer not to have happen. However, it is clear that players like Carlos Boozer and Jeremy Lin are not the answer this season which could force Los Angeles to make moves. According to Bryant, he is not thinking about anyone's futures in regards to contracts.
Bryant might want to start thinking about those kind of things. Head coach Byron Scott announced that changes were coming to the starting lineup as both Lin and Boozer were to be replaced by Ed Davis and Ronnie Price. Boozer is struggling to make an impact on defense while Lin is showing no chemistry with Bryant. The Lakers own a 5-15 record with two straight losses and Scott is hoping a change like this can jump start the team for the future.
