A part of the 2009 Championship winning Los Angeles Lakers team, Trevor Ariza, did not actually want to be a part of the Lakers team.

After coming into the NBA as the second overall pick into the New York Knocks lineup, Ariza played two seasons with them. He then played the 2006-07 season with Orlando Magic before joining the Lakers in 2007. He won the Championship with them in his second and final season with the Los Angeles franchise.

In a recent appearance on the Knuckleheads podcast, Ariza revealed that he never actually wanted to play in purple and gold but wanted to go the other side of the city with the Clippers

“First, I am going back home to my momma! It was kinda.. weird. I didn’t really want to play for the Lakers, I wanted to play for the Clippers. That is what I told the GM, at the time,” said Ariza who was then traded by Orlando Magic in exchange for Brian Cook and Maurice Evans.

Trevor Ariza did not expect much game time with Los Angeles Lakers

Ariza did not expect much game time with the Lakers. When he received a call from his agent in 2007, Ariza told Darius Miles and Quentin Richardson in the podcast, his reaction was, “Oh Sh**, I’m never going to play.”

On contrary to his beliefs, Ariza had got decent playtime during his two seasons- at least better than his two previous stints in NBA. He made 106 appearances for the Lakers playing an average of 22.9 minutes per game.

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His performances for the team also seemed decent as his teammate then would later say. Derek Fisher, a part of the Championship winning team, named Ariza among the players that deserved more credit for their part in the title run.

“In terms of the 08-09 team, I would say, Lamar Odom and Trevor Ariza,” Fisher said as per Clutchpoints. “And then I would say the 09-10 team, I think Ron [Artest], everybody remembers what he did in the Finals against Boston hitting a three it really gave us a big push of momentum in that final game, but I thought that we were all kind of confused after Trevor didn’t come back after the ’09 win.”