Dennis the Media Menace... (March 18, 1999)

What can we make of this Dennis Rodman debacle? I think everyone knew before hand that the Lakers were making a deal with the devil by signing Rodman. Sure, he's a great rebounder and defender and has a extremely high basketball IQ. But only when he's motivated. I think when the Lakers were winning and he was the focal point, he was living it up. He loves it. But the Lakers kept on winning and his play started to taper off. I do not think Dennis Rodman is able to play 35 minutes a game at power forward, diving, jumping, defending and playing generally insane basketball game in and game out. He's 35 years old and I think everyone has bad days. Unlike some other older players, especially forwards, like Karl Malone or Charles Barkley, who can score as well as defend and rebound, when they have a bad game rebounding or defending, they can score to compensate. Rodman can only play defense and rebound. When he's not doing that well, he's not doing anything on the court except take up precious space.

After the Lakers won 5 or 6 games in a row, Rodman's game started to taper. But the Lakers continued to win. Maybe it wasn't just Dennis Rodman, but maybe, just maybe, it was Kurt Rambis, the young Lakers jelling or luck (they did player the Clippers twice). The Lakers continued to win and Dennis Rodman wasn't the center of attention. Then Glen Rice was traded to the Lakers with B.J. Armstrong (who was waived) and J.R. Reid for Elden Campbell and Eddie Jones. All of a sudden, the center of attention was on Rice and how he could fit in with Shaq and Kobe, or would Rice resign with the Lakers, or would this be the final piece of the Lakers championship puzzle. Well, I think Dennis decided that he needed more attention paid to him. He bailed. Between what is fact and what is rumor, what I can tell you is this….Dennis is either playing blackjack in Vegas dropping some serious coin, or Dennis is trying to work out his marital problems with the beautiful Carmen Electra-Rodman, or Dennis is working with lepers in Nicaragua, or Dennis is working on a cure for Hepatitis-C, or maybe a bit of both. I read that he left the team for personal problems. I think he was personally offended when the national media stopped paying attention to him. Now he's back as the center of attention. You've got to give Dennis Rodman credit. He's a master manipulator.

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