"I didn't get nothing out of it. It wasn't real" - D'Angelo Russell felt his rookie year on the Lakers was useless

“I didn’t get nothing out of it. It wasn’t real” – D’Angelo Russell felt his rookie year on the Lakers was useless originally appeared on Basketball Network.

Current Dallas Mavericks guard D’Angelo Russell has always had a complicated relationship with the Los Angeles Lakers.

From the moment he was drafted by the team second overall in 2015, his tenure with the purple and gold already started on the wrong foot, at least according to the Ohio State University guard himself.

Russell felt that his rookie year colliding with Kobe Bryant’s farewell tour put his progress on hold because the Lakers spent the year focused on sending off the all-time great superstar instead of developing their young players.

“Last off-season was Looney Tunes,” Russell said in 2016. “Wasn’t real. I didn’t get nothing out of it.”

Russell just wanted guidance

D’Lo’s first year on the Lakers also happened to be Byron Scott‘s last season of coaching the team and it was well documented that the coach and player didn’t get along.

D’Angelo’s frustration was mostly towards the coaching staff who he felt didn’t help him navigate his way around the league during his rookie year. Russell said that he felt he had to do it all alone.

That’s not to say that Russell was taking a shot at Bryant at that time. Even if the point guard admitted that he was sometimes too naive to understand the advice that the Black Mamba shared with him, Russell didn’t have a problem with the fact that the Lakers spent his rookie season by putting together a farewell tour for Bryant.

He just wishes that there was an appropriate development approach by the coaching staff for him and his fellow young teammates like Julius Randle, Jordan Clarkson and Larry Nance.

“He deserved it; it was his time,” Russell said. “They expected so much from so many people and then Kobe had his farewell tour and it was just like, we put everything we had, expectations for everybody else, on hold. We gotta get through Kobe’s farewell tour and then we can continue with our process. So we kind of accepted that.”

Then the Lakers changed their coaching staff

Right after Bryant played his last game and the 2015-2016 Lakers season was over, the organization finally made it a priority to develop their young players. They did that by listening to Russell and firing Scott and his coaching staff who they replaced with Luke Walton and his own staff. That’s why, entering his sophomore season with the Lakers, Russell was confident that his situation was going to be so much more fruitful.

“I feel like if I came into the league this year, in this environment, it wouldn’t have been as tough,” Russell said. “Even if Kobe was here, it still wouldn’t have been as tough.”

“The coaching staff, the whole atmosphere that this coaching staff brings is different. I’m not saying better, I’m not downgrading the last coaching staff. I’m just saying the atmosphere they bring every day is a winning mentality,” said Russell when asked about Walton’s coaching staff prior to the start of his sophomore season.

Despite the switch in coaching staff, Russell’s time in Los Angeles didn’t last long as he was traded to the Brooklyn Nets right after his sophomore year. He reunited with the Lakers in 2023 and, after having a more productive tenure with them, returned to the Nets in the middle of the following season.

Suffice it to say that both Russell and the Lakers never found common ground and aren’t meant for each other.

This story was originally reported by Basketball Network on Jul 30, 2025, where it first appeared.

“I didn’t get nothing out of it. It wasn’t real” – D’Angelo Russell felt his rookie year on the Lakers was useless

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