Lakers' Randle helped through recovery by Bryant, learning from World Peace

There are benefits of playing for the Los Angeles Lakers that extend beyond the market, the history, and the championship culture. There's also the luxury of being teammates with Kobe Bryant, and having access to any number of former Lakers as mentors.

And while it may have been Bryant who helped Julius Randle through the mental side of his recovery, it's Metta World Peace acting as the driving force in the necessary improvements to his game.

Randle lost all but 14 minutes of his rookie campaign last year, breaking his leg in his first career game. He's at times become impatient in the slow recovery process, something that Bryant helped him through, Randle told Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo Sports.

"I do see it now," Randle said of the need to be patient espoused by Bryant, who himself has had to exercise far too much patience in recovery over the last two-and-a-half years. "The biggest person to help me through this was Kobe, by far."

Bryant's support, counsel, and example are surely invaluable, and Randle is hopeful the young Lakers core can give him a reason to keep playing beyond 2015-16.

Joining Randle and Bryant for the coming season could be World Peace, who has been linked to the Lakers in rumors for some time. Even without a deal, he has been working out with Randle, who's learning just how difficult it can be to score on the NBA's elite defenders - a group he clearly thinks World Peace still belongs to:

He isn't biting on anything. He has the greatest hands I've ever seen play. You've got to give him everything you've got to get a bucket on him. Everything.

I played one on one against Kobe in the preseason last year, and you'd play perfect defense against him; you can guess right on everything and it still doesn't matter. He's still going to make the shot. Metta is the same way. He's going to guess everything right. He disrupts your rhythm. You're going to have to make the tough shot over him.

For his part, World Peace sounds impressed with the youngster, and he's been hammering home the need to play intelligently above all else. As World Peace told Los Angeles Daily News:

I think he’s definitely physical. I want to continue to teach him on how to use his body positioning. Right now, I think he’s quick and he’s physical. But he has to continue to learn the angles on the court that’s going to benefit him right now.
...
He’s going to continue to gain advantages as long as he continues to gain intelligence. I’m always talking about the intelligent part of the game. He’s getting that.
...

Not being afraid and being intelligent is different, right? I talked to him about making sure every aspect of his game is at a high level. OK, so you’re not afraid. From 0 to 100 your level of fearlessness is 100, great. If your level of physicality is 100, great. If your level of athleticism is 100, great. But where is your level of intelligence? Is it 50 or is it 70? Now we have to get your intelligence up.

The tutelage of a pair of former champions on the comeback trail may wind up making Randle's injury a blessing in disguise in retrospect. Fully cleared ahead of training camp, his development will be one of the primary points of interest during the preseason.