As a starter Clarkson was averaging 15 points, 4.7 assists, and 4.2 rebounds. Made the all-rookie team as the 46th pick despite not playing much until later in the year. I'd say that's more than role player status. He outplayed Wiggins if you ask me and would have won rookie of the year had he played the entire year.
He's certainly better than Russell at this point. Randle is going to be a beast, I'm not worried about him at all.
I'm more worried about Russell being a bust at this point but he's 19 and is going to need some time to grow.
Kobe had little to do with that opening night loss. Yeah, he wasn't good in the 2nd half, but the Lakers had a 16 point lead until Byron Scott decided to run Brandon Bass at center in the middle of the 3rd quarter. Then after watching the lead dwindle because we sent Kevin Martin to the line 500 times on touch fouls, instead of doing anything about it during the one timeout he called, he fucking put that exact same lineup back out there and let them start the 4th as well.
He ran that same lineup all preseason and it never worked. It worked in the first half because Lou and Nick hit some ridiculous 3 point shots. Zero defense small ball lineup with a 16 point lead, just genius level shit.
Scott is the worst coach in the NBA and it's not really close. How he managed to get another job after his Cavs stint I'll never know.