Los Angeles Lakers head coach Bryon Scott admitted that he really liked Nick Young's role as the team's primarily scorer off the bench, stressing Swaggy P is very much capable of winning the Sixth Man of the Year award this year.
Scott, who is very optimistic of the Lakers' campaign next season, told Mike Trudell of ESPN Los Angeles that he felt Young could be a better bench contributor than he was a season ago.
When asked if Young can be a legitimate candidate for the Sixth Man of the Year award at the end of the season, the Lakers head coach did not have any second thought about it, as he believed Swaggy P has the tools to compete for the hardware.
"As he's said repeatedly in the last few months, Scott likes Nick Young in the Sixth Man role. Thinks he can be a candidate for that award," Trudell posted on his Twitter account on Friday.
The 29-year old Young averaged 17.9 points and 2.6 rebounds in 28 minutes per game in his first season with the Lakers. He was among the early favorites to win the Sixth Man of the Year last season, but the Lakers subpar regular-season record really affected his chance of bagging the year-end award that went to Jamal Crawford for the second time in his career.
According to Young, getting toe-to-toe with someone as competitive as Kobe Bryant at training camp is a big plus for him heading into the next season. Last year, Bryant had to sit out most of training camp as he recovered from a ruptured Achilles Heel injury.
"It's a great feeling to have someone like Kobe pushing (me) every day." Bryant has definitely been going at @NickSwagyPYoung," Young told Trudell, who has been covering the Lakers training camp since Day 1.
Young will have the chance to show his improvement right away when the Lakers start their pre-season campaign against the Denver Nuggets on Monday.
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