Turiaf sprain ends Lakers' healthy spell

EL SEGUNDO -- When you look back at last season through purple-colored glasses, the Los Angeles Lakers' record wasn't 42-40. It was 26-13 … which was the Los Angeles Lakers' high point before injuries to Luke Walton and Kwame Brown and again Lamar Odom depleted and demoralized the team.

Given all three players have lengthy injury histories, the Los Angeles Lakers knew maintaining health would be a monumental prerequisite to a better overall record this season. Walton navigated a hamstring strain in training camp, but Kwame Brown already has missed time because of a heel injury and Odom didn't debut until the season's fifth game while recovering from shoulder surgery.

Nevertheless, the Los Angeles Lakers were thrilled that they were basically the picture of health for an NBA team on their two-game trip to Texas. It was the first time since Phil Jackson returned to coach the Los Angeles Lakers in 2005 that they didn't have someone injured.

That changed Thursday – albeit not in a gravely serious manner – when starting power forward Ronny Turiaf suffered a moderate sprain of his left ankle during a short practice. Turiaf isn't expected to play Friday against Detroit, and Los Angeles Lakers coach Phil Jackson said Turiaf's absence "could span a little spell."

"The good thing is we got on it right away and there's not a great deal of swelling on it right now," Jackson said after practice Thursday.

Vladimir Radmanovic, Walton and Chris Mihm would be the primary options to pick up additional playing time in Turiaf's place, with Odom swinging more often from small forward to power forward.

Odom suffered his own additional injury Tuesday night in San Antonio when he tore a tendon in his right pinky finger. It's not something that is keeping him from playing, but he was in obvious discomfort at times Wednesday night in a shaky individual performance in Houston. After the game he gave up trying to knot his tie because it was so difficult with the protective splint Odom wears over his finger off the court.

The only other time before Tuesday that the Los Angeles Lakers had their entire roster healthy since the inception of the inactive list in 2005 was the last game of the 2005-06 season. Still, that's somewhat misleading because even though Mihm was on the active roster for that one game to test his sore ankle, he had a serious injury that kept him from participating in the playoffs.

NOTES

Jackson added one more comment about being reprimanded by the NBA for his "Brokeback Mountain" comment and then apologizing for it: "There's a great quote, and it comes something like: 'To the people who know me know me, no apology is necessary. To the people who want an apology, an apology probably won't work.' " … Center Andrew Bynum's rebounding has been vastly improved this season. Since a four-rebound opening game, Andrew Bynum has had 13, 9, 13, 10, 12 and 9 rebounds despite splitting playing time with Kwame Brown and Mihm. ... Home games against Detroit on Friday night and Chicago on Sunday night wrap up the Los Angeles Lakers' opening stretch of seven out of nine games against 2007 playoff teams (the Los Angeles Lakers played Houston twice). Those eight teams had a .659 winning percentage last season. Even though the Los Angeles Lakers are 4-3 this season, the six teams they've played so far this season are 34-15 (.694).

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