Los Angeles Notes: Bogut, Hart, Teodosic

Andrew Bogut broke his leg less than a minute into his Cavaliers debut last March, prematurely ending his 2016/17 season, Cavaliers tenure, and possibly his career. After a long summer of rehab, Bogut signed a one-year deal with the Lakers and has served as a mentor for the young NBA team, ESPN’s Nick Metallinos writes.

Bogut has not played much this season; he is averaging a career-low 7.7 minutes per game. He also has taken a DNP in 10 of the Lakers’ 26 games. Still, the Australian big man said he understood playing time would be limited when he signed with the team.

“I knew there wasn’t going to be a whole lot of minutes because I was the 15th guy signed to the roster,” Bogut said to ESPN. “I’ve just been trying to mentor some of the younger guys. We’ve got a really young and inexperienced team that bring a lot of energy and talent, so just some direction is needed every now and then and being one of the elder guys, [I’m] just trying to help them in the locker room.”

The Lakers are built on young talents such as Lonzo Ball, Kyle Kuzma, Brandon Ingram, and Jordan Clarkson. In his age 33 season, Bogut said that being a mentor is more important than having minutes.

Check out other news coming out of Los Angeles:

• Lakers rookie Josh Hart had an impressive first NBA start on Wednesday against the Cavaliers, posting 11 points and 10 rebounds in the loss. After four collegiate seasons at Villanova, Hart said he is prepared for the big stage and head coach Luke Walton agrees, Bill Oram of the Orange County Register writes.“It showed where he came from as a college player winning a national title and playing with a big-time program for many years,” Walton said of Hart’s performance. “That big stage did not faze him at all today.”
• After missing two months due to a foot injury, Clippers point guard Milos Teodosic will be on a minutes restriction as the organization tries to keep him healthy, Broderick Turner of the Los Angeles Times writes. “Milos, because of the minutes restrictions, we can’t play him on back-to-backs,” Clippers head coach Doc Rivers said. “So we have to sit him.” However, Rivers noted that this is temporary and that Teodosic’s minutes restriction should be lifted later in the season.