Front of the Jazz Line

If you’re wondering whether rookie Kosta Koufos wants to play in the NBA, here’s one consideration: He’s showing up to work early.

At 4 p.m., Monday, 3 ‘ hours before tipoff of Game 5, Koufos was shooting at the Staples Center, the first Jazz player out of the locker room.

He was so early, in fact, that he was being squeezed from two directions. Stretched across mid-court were the Laker Girls, still in sweats, practicing their routines. Beneath the basket was a step-ladder, from which a technician was taping down a camera. Koufos was shooting around the technician.

Shortly after, Morris Almond, Kyrlo Fesenko and Ronnie Price came out to warm up.

***

As the ol’ man might say, “That’s HORRIBLE.”

Laker forward Luke Walton, son of TV announcer Bill Walton, has a partial tear of the deltoid ligament.

That means he’ll be out for the rest of the series against the Jazz, if not longer. A press release Monday afternoon said his “status wil be re-evaluated in approximately one week.”

Not to read too much into it, but it sounds like the Lakers intend to be playing well beyond then.