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Russell Westbrook's willingness to come off of the bench was one of the hottest topics of the 2022 NBA offseason. He bristled at being benched for crunch time last season, gave one of the most bizarre end-of-season press conferences you'll ever see, and started the first three games of this season for the Los Angeles Lakers under Darvin Ham. When it quickly became apparent that it no longer made sense for him to start, Westbrook accepted a demotion to the bench.

Whether his time there was successful is ultimately a matter of debate. Westbrook quickly became the betting favorite to win Sixth Man of the Year, but the Lakers still never reached .500 with him on the team this season. Lineups with him and without him performed similarly, his tendency towards turnovers and poor shot-selection persisted and he was still often benched late in games.

Now Westbrook's brief tenure as a reserve is, for the time being, over. The Lakers traded Westbrook to the Utah Jazz in February, and after receiving a buyout, he signed with the Los Angeles Clippers and joined their starting lineup. Yet according to TNT's Chris Haynes, Westbrook still wants to win this season's Sixth Man of the Year award. Haynes explained it on the broadcast of Thursday's Clippers loss to the Golden State Warriors.

"Russell Westbrook came off the bench for the Lakers for 49 of 52 games. That would put him as still qualified to be a Sixth Man of the Year candidate. I was able to speak with him this morning, and even though he's going to be starting the rest of the way as projected for the Clippers, he told me that's an award that he wants," Haynes reported. "He said, 'look, I did a lot to buy into the system there with the Lakers,' and he said he felt like he had a lot of success and he bought into what the team wanted. And he said if he was able to get the award, that would just be the cherry on top of the cake."

No Sixth Man of the Year winner has ever changed teams in the middle of a season. In fact, Westbrook checks few of the boxes that a typical Sixth Man award winner would. The league's leading bench scorer has won 10 of the past 17 Sixth Man of the Year trophies. Westbrook trailed current teammate Norman Powell and Indiana's Bennedict Mathurin for most of the season. The award typically goes to players on playoff teams. The Lakers were out of the top 10 in the Western Conference when Westbrook played for them.

Beyond that, it's hard to reconcile his candidacy for any major award given how his tenure with the Lakers ended. "I would almost say that if Russell Westbrook was not traded yesterday that there was a decent chance the Lakers would have sent him home," ESPN's Brian Windhorst said on First Take after he was dealt to Utah. Westbrook and Ham had a heated exchange in his final game as a Laker due to Westbrook lingering on the floor after being removed. One source described Westbrook to ESPN's Dave McMenamin as a "vampire" in the Lakers' locker room.

Westbrook may have come off of the bench as a Laker, but all indications suggest that doing so wasn't exactly his choice. It was either that or disappear and await a trade, and once he did come off the bench, it doesn't appear as though he was thrilled about it, and the team didn't exactly seem thrilled to have him either. Both sides made the best of a bad situation. Neither side should receive an award for it.