But there is another side to Buss, a no-nonsense side with a prideful streak. He is a successful businessman who enjoys competing and winning, and no matter what anyone thinks of his team’s recent fortunes, he does not like to be made a fool of by an employee, even one in the midst of a $136 million contract.

So when Buss made his pronouncement about Bryant, he touched off a frenzy of vigils, office pools and a scrum for information by reporters. The locker just happened to represent the most recent evidence of discontent and impending upheaval. Get used to it.

It seems obvious that although Buss only broke the moratorium on Kobe comments recently, he has been stewing about this for weeks. And perhaps he and the loose-knit coalition of advisors that purports to be running the team — his son, Jim Buss, his general manager, Mitch Kupchak, Jackson and Jeanie Buss, who is his daughter and Jackson’s turtledove — have been burning the phone lines seeking a deal for their narcissistic superstar all along.

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Trading Kobe Bryant, regarded by most to be the game’s best player, may seem insanely stupid, especially after the club already dealt away Shaquille O’Neal. Now there’s a legacy for you, dumping two Hall of Famers within three years of each other. That makes the Portland Trail Blazers passing on Michael Jordan seem like a decision grounded in common sense.

But what really jumps out first is not that trading Kobe is dumb or smart, but rather that it’s inevitable. There is no choice. Bryant can opt out of his contract in two years, and basically threatened to do so if his trade demand wasn’t met. He is the second most self-absorbed professional athlete playing today, behind Barry Bonds, and he is not the kind of individual to let bygones be bygones.

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If the Lakers don’t get moving now on moving this guy, they’ll have to deal with more locker stories, each and every day. When Kobe misses a practice because of a bout with indigestion, it will be interpreted that a trade is imminent. When he tweaks an ankle and leaves a game in the first quarter, it will be seen as the Lakers protecting him for his new team.

The distraction level figures to reach intolerable before November gives way to December, or, more likely, before October gives way to November.

In truth, Kobe Bryant’s locker is getting emptier by the minute.

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