Aug. 5, 1999
SportsLine wire reports

INGLEWOOD, Calif. -- The Los Angeles Lakers did not get their man, but kept one of their own Thursday and reportedly inked a crosstown rival.

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The Lakers re-signed forward Rick Fox while reportedly reaching agreement with Los Angeles Clippers forward Lorenzen Wright. Team officials would not confirm a broadcast report that Wright agreed to a one-year, $2 million deal as the Lakers' salary cap exception.

Fox's deal came on the day that superstar guard Penny Hardaway, a former teammate of Lakers center Shaquille O'Neal, was traded from Orlando to Phoenix. The Lakers wanted to team Hardaway and O'Neal, who led the Magic to the 1995 NBA Finals, but Orlando was not interested in Glen Rice, the primary player Los Angeles offered the Eastern Conference team.

Fox will receive approximately $25 million over six years, according to Thursday's edition of the Los Angeles Times.

Fox, 30, was signed as a free agent by the Lakers in August 1997 and has spent the last two seasons with the them. He averaged 8.9 points, two rebounds and two assists in 1999 for Los Angeles, which was swept by San Antonio in the Western Conference semifinals.

Fox spent his first six years with the Boston Celtics but did not hide his desire to move west in order to further his acting career. He appeared in Spike Lee's film He Got Game and had a recurring role on the cable show Oz.

Fox was the lone Laker to start every game during the 1997-98 season but averaged only 12 points, over three points less than his career-best mark of his final season with the Celtics. During that campaign in Boston, he set the franchise mark with 167 steals, eclipsing by one the record held by Hall of Famer Larry Bird.

At 6-foot-7 and 242 pounds, Fox has the size to play power forward but is also quick enough and has the defensive ability for the smaller front line position.

The 6-11, 262-pound Wright is a true power forward and his signing would indicate the Lakers are out of the race for Toronto veteran Charles Oakley.

Wright would join the Lakers off a disappointing season with the lowly Clippers. He averaged only 6.7 points, off the production of his first two seasons after the Clippers made him the seventh overall selection in the 1996 draft.

Despite the low scoring output, Wright grabbed 7.5 rebounds per game last season, second on the Clippers to top draft pick Michael Olowokandi. Although they have the dominating 7-1 O'Neal at center, the Lakers have been lacking up front in recent years and even brought in unpredictable forward Dennis Rodman for a brief but disastrous stint during the 1999 season.

Wright averaged 7.3 points and 6.1 rebounds as a rookie with the Clippers and improved those totals to 9.0 and 8.8 the following year, when he was limited to 69 games because of several nagging injuries.