"Our team has bigger problems than how to fit (Donté Greene) in right now. There may be a time when that does get to be a priority. Right now, it's not."

The team's biggest problem is perimeter defense. Greene was believed to be one of the team's better perimeter defenders. You may remember that Westphal himself put a young Greene on Kobe Bryant, LeBron James and Carmelo Anthony (instead of using Ime Udoka or Andres Nocioni) last season.

"There may be a time when that does get to be a priority." Is doesn't get to be a priority when you have to play a 6'11, 250-pound power forward/center with one career three-pointer at small forward? Or when you play Antoine Wright for chunks of games?

Is doesn't get to be a priority when you have four straight losses at home, the last three being to Minnesota, Memphis and Detroit? If not now, when? Never?

Paul Westphal is a smart man. He can connect the dots, and he has to know defense is killing the team. But if he ever re-inserts Greene into the rotation, it'll be completely on his own terms. Hell, maybe he's miffed anyone cares about Donté. Proud men don't like being questioned.