The Los Angeles Lakers won’t have Rajon Rondo for a few weeks, as the veteran guard suffered a fractured hand earlier this week. Well, that isn’t 100 percent accurate, because while Rondo will be relegated to the sideline and won’t be able to suit up, he will play a major role as a veteran mentor for the Lakers’ younger players.
While Rondo is known for being a bit prickly, he’s been revered throughout his career for his eagerness to mentor young guys with the hopes of making them better. While that is applicable to a number of players on the Lakers, Rondo can specifically help Lonzo Ball as he tries to become a better point guard.
How? Ball spoke to Ohm Youngmisuk of ESPN about the ways Rondo specifically helps him. Among them are Rondo’s propensity to trash talk him in practice, which Ball says he asks Rondo to do.
Via ESPN:
“Yeah, he’ll try to get into me,” Ball said. “Just stuff to try to get me going. He talks a bunch of trash in practice all the time, which makes me pretty mad.”
“I told him, my whole life I [respond to] getting yelled at [by the coach] so that is how I respond … if you see stuff, just yell at me. I tune into it. That is how he tries to help me out.”
Ball’s workload will increase with Rondo on the sideline for the next few weeks, and it’s going to be fun to watch as he basically has to become the team’s primary creator outside of that LeBron guy. No matter how he does, though, it’s safe to assume Rondo’s going to be on the sideline trying to coach him up, even if that means talking some trash.
