This is the latest post for an ongoing media project — SoCal Sports History 101: The Prime Numbers from 00 to 99 that Uniformly, Uniquely and Unapologetically Reveal The Narrative of Our Region’s Athletic Heritage. Pick a number and highlight an athlete — person, place or thing — most obviously connected to it by fame and fortune, someone who isn’t so obvious, and then take a deeper dive into the most interesting story tied to it. It’s a combination of star power, achievement, longevity, notoriety, and, above all, what makes that athlete so Southern California. Quirkiness and notoriety factor in. And it should open itself to more discussion and debate — which is what sports is best at doing.
The most obvious choices for No. 0:
= Russell Westbrook: UCLA men’s basketball, Los Angeles Lakers and Los Angeles Clippers via Leuzinger High
= Orlando Woolridge: Los Angeles Lakers
The not-so-obvious choices for No. 0:
=Kyle Kuzma: Los Angeles Lakers
= Al Oliver: Los Angeles Dodgers
= Kobe Johnson: USC and UCLA basketball
= Jamal Jarrett: USC football
= Jack Flaherty: Los Angeles Dodgers
= Nick Young: Los Angeles Lakers
The most interesting story for No. 0:
Russell Westbrook: UCLA guard (2006-07 to 2007-08); Los Angeles Lakers guard (2021-22 to 2022-23); Los Angeles Clippers guard (2022-23 to 2023-24)
Southern California map pinpoints:
Hawthorne (Leuzinger High); Westwood (UCLA); Los Angeles (Staples Center), Inglewood (Intuit Dome)
Zero in on the Russell Westbrook Experience. Form, fashion and a fighting spirit are embedded in his triple-double basketball DNA.
He does particularly well when it comes to style points, too.
GQ Magazine June 2015: “Russell Westbrook: Most Stylish Man Alive.”
GQ Magazine September 2016: “How To Dress Like Russell Westbrook.”
GQ Magazine October 2016: “17 Looks Only Russell Westbrook Could Pull Off.” Including the photo above.
GQ Magazine September 2017: “Why Russell Westbrook Won’t Wear Off-White Jordans On the Court.” (Because he doesn’t want to get them dirty and lower the value even if they are game-worn?)
GQ Magazine March 2018: “Russell Westbrook’s Game Day Style Look Book.“
Some claim no one really goes to the Clippers, they just end up there. That was the Donald T. Sterling era of errors with Elgin Baylor as the GM.
Westbrook was supposed to be part of the Steve Ballmer Reboot. He saw something happening and wanted to be part of it, sensing he wasn’t going to be much help for the Los Angeles Lakers in the LeBron James’ friends-and-family experience.
As a regular New York Post Page Six magnet, Westbrook became someone who demanded attention. And respect. Yes, demands it.
While wearing No. 0. If that’s a much a real number as white is a real color. It’s kind of a place holder, a starting point.
A blank canvas. A starting point to fill in with color and flair.
Born in Long Beach, Westbrook grew up in Hawthorne and found his way to Leuzinger High and took No. 4 (since retired by the school in 2010) as a scrawny point guard running with size 14 shoes. Between his junior and senior year, he grew to 6-foot-3 and averaged 25.1 points, 8.7 rebounds and 2.3 assists, recording 14 double-doubles.
Westbrook’s goal was end up at UCLA ever since he and his Leuzinger High school pal, Khelcey Barrs III, played together. But in 2004, Barrs died from an enlarged heart in a pick-up basketball game. Westbrook has worn a KB3 wristband in his honor ever since. He also honored him with a Jordan shoe. They bonded, in part, because Westbrook is also a III in his family male lineage.
Once Jordan Farmar left UCLA for the NBA, Westbrook took up coach Ben Howland’s scholarship offer and started his No. 0 makeover. That only lasted two seasons – 2006-07 and 2007-08, and he only got to start as a sophomore. Both seasons ended in trips to the Final Four. And zero titles to show for it.
A 2007 New York Times article titled “The Value of Zero Is Increasing” makes the observation: On the surface, zero is a strange and disturbing choice for a jersey number. By selecting it, a player seems to be implying that he has no tangible value, that he is worthless, a total nonfactor. But the zero’s negative connotation has actually driven its recent spike in popularity. Players do not choose the number because they lack confidence, but because they believe others lack confidence in them. They believe they are viewed as zeros.
Westbrook explained how he entered upon Westwood with a new branding idea for his UCLA attire: “You go with the zero when you’ve been through something and you are looking to get a new beginning. It helps you get going again. It helps you get the swag back.”
It should be noted: Westbrook admitted he asked for his No. 4 high school number as a UCLA freshman in 2006 but it wasn’t available. Sophomore Aaron Afflalo, another future NBA player, had it and would keep it for his three seasons. The previous UCLA roster had a 5-foot-10 freshman guard named Nican Robinson wearing No. 0, but he transferred to Cal to be closer to his Oakland home. So it was available. He took it. Look where it got him.
Westbrook was restless, and the Seattle Sonics made him the No. 4 overall choice in the 2008 NBA draft, but then moved to Oklahoma City six days later. Westbrook turned out, by far, the best choice of that class, sandwiched between USC’s O.J. Mayo going to Memphis at No. 3 and UCLA teammate Kevin Love going to Minnesota at No. 5. (Derrick Rose was No. 1 overall to Chicago).
Taking over a Thunder game when star player Kevin Durant was injured, Westbrook recorded his first triple-double came in March, 2009, during his rookie season: 17 points, 10 rebounds, 10 assists against a solid Dallas team in a nine-point home win for a 15-45 OKC squad.
That achievement became as much Westbrook’s calling card as his apparent obsession for validity.
A traditional triple-double doesn’t seem to be as rare a thing any more in NBA lore, something created long ago in the Oscar Robertson era and re-defined by Magic Johnson. If they convert them into NBA titles, it’s worth marveling at. If they don’t, it can be considered just another way to pad statistics.
Whatever three categories come in play — usually points, rebounds and assists, but it can also include blocks and steals — it’s worth noting there are four instances of a quadruple-double. There has never been a quintuple-double).
In that previously mentioned a 2007 New York Times article, it describes the accomplishment of averaging a triple-double for an entire season “like having a helicopter that is also a boat that can also write the Great American Novel. It is more than just an engineering impossibility — it is an existential cheat.”
Westbrook hasn’t cheated anyone.
In the triple-double tomfoolery of NBA bookkeeping, Westbrook is the only one with more than 200 of them for his career. In 1961-62, Oscar Robertson averaged 30.8 points, 12.5 rebounds and 11.4 assists, the first to hit a seasonal mark in all three. Since then, Westbrook did it four times in a five-season stretch from 2017 to 2021, the last season of which he led the league with 11.7 assists a game. He has been the assist leader three times and the points overall leader twice.
All of Westbrook’s triple-doubles, including 12 in the playoffs, have been points-rebounds-assists. His latest teammate in Denver, Nikola Jokic, is one of the only likely NBA players currently within range of catching Westbrook.
It is quite impressive to note that Westbrook’s career high single-game production in points, rebounds and assists are 58-21-24. His career-best in steals is 8. In blocks, 4.
His most impressive single-game statistical performance: 50 points, 16 rebounds and 10 assists in an OKC one-point win at Denver in 2017. After getting a defensive rebound with three seconds left, Westbrook hit a 3-pointer from 36 feet out at the buzzer to clinch the victory. Less than two weeks earlier, Westbrook had 57 points, 13 rebounds and 11 assists in an eight-point home win over Orlando.
In their storied careers, Magic Johnson had 138 triple-doubles.LeBron James has 122 and counting. It is interesting to note on the all-time list, there is Foots Walker, Alperen Sengun, Immanuel Quickley, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Si Green and Mason Plumlee have the same number of career triple-doubles – two – as Hall of Famers Bob Pettit, Dirk Nowitzki, Carmello Anthony and Shaquille O’Neal.
All but 40 of Westbrook’s career triple-doubles came while wearing the single digit No. 0, number he kept from UCLA through eight-time All-Star seasons in OKC (including a 2017 regular-season MVP Award), in one trip to Houston (his last All-Star year) in 2019-20, and then with the Lakers for 2021-22 and half of 2022-23. Even though No. 0 was available when he played one season at Washington in 2020-21, he reverting to his Leuzinger High No. 4 instead.
Was it possible Washington was holding No. 0 in case it wanted to retire it in honor of Gilbert “Agent Zero” Arenas, another SoCal native from Grant High in North Hollywood who had it for three All-Star seasons from 2003-04 to 2010-11? Even Arenas ditched No. 0 in his last season and wore No. 9.
Thirteen of his career triple-doubles still came as a Laker during a LeBron James panic attack where he thought Westbrook, his 2012 London Olympic Games teammate, might be of help. It turned out Westbrook really wasn’t all that fond of James’ “fake act” (especially when he just dropped the phrase “That’s Russ being Russ” in a cavalier way).
That path back to SoCal happened just before the 2021 season as part of a five-team trade, when Washington gave the Lakers gave him and several draft picks, but also had to give up Kentavious Caldwell-Pope and Kyle Kuzman (who had been wearing No. 0, making it available), among others, to the Wizards.
Why didn’t it work with Westbrook and the Lakers? He made $44.2 million in the ’21-’22 season. How is one supposed to share a basketball with LeBron James and Anthony Davis? The Lakers sent him to Utah in Feburary of 2023 as part of another complicated three-team deal. Maybe he wasn’t dressed for Laker success?
During his stint with the Lakers, Westbrook made it onto the NBA’s 75th Anniversary team in 2021-22 with a 99.9 percent Hall of Fame Probability according to Basketball-Reference.com.
When Utah (who had to pay him $46 million in ’22-’23 waved him in Feburary of 2023, the Clippers scooped him up and gave him a multi-year extension that summer, but it topped out at just $3.8 million in ’23-’24.
“I know what I want to do,” Westbrook declared before the 2023-24 campaign, now asked to share a basketball with Kawaii Leonard, Paul George and James Harden.
How’d that turn out?
The Clippers traded him, with cash, back to Utah, which waved him two days later, and Westbrook ended up with Denver for a season, and then the Sacramento Kings before the ’25-’26 season for the veterans minimum.
In all, Westbrook’s NBA contract haul has been nearly $350 million for his 17 seasons.
Meanwhile, the Ballmer-run Clippers have been like watching a barnyard musical — lots of glitz, but hardly a factor when it comes time to making hay. They are often referred to as the Paper Clips, because, on paper, they seem reasonably well constituted. But there always seems to be a pink slip clipped to the franchise’s resume.
Which Westbrook may know about, seeing as how he now owns the Russell Westbrook Auto Group, serving Van Nuys and Anaheim. As it says on the group’s LinkedIn page: “When Russell Westbrook asks himself “Why not?” on the basketball court and in the game of life through his eponymous Russell Westbrook Why Not Foundation, he positively pushes the limits, defies expectations and drives great change in his native Los Angeles community and well beyond. And that’s exactly what he’s done at our Russell Westbrook Chrysler Dodge Jeep Ram of Van Nuys dealership, too, where he’s taken a page from his superstar playbook, applied it to an entire culture and delivered a car buying experience that’s refreshingly different.”
Zero down, zero credit? Just asking.
Westbrook’s 2017 book “Style Drivers” has helped him maintain his overstated existence off the NBA court in perspective.
It is interesting how the publishers’ marketing blurb mentions NBA All-Star Game MVP Awards — where it all remains just a glorious exhibition — but not his regular-season NBA MVP award of his Olympic team status. And his lack of an NBA title.
“For NBA superstar turned style icon Russell Westbrook, fashion is not just a spectator sport — it pushes boundaries, blurs lines, and drives culture. This book is a celebration of Westbrook’s style on and off the court, and the creative people he admires and works with. This book was created with three different covers designed by Raymond Pettibon and will be shipped to customers at random.
“Russell Westbrook, a reigning two-time NBA All-Star MVP, is not your average basketball superstar. Apart from his meteoric rise within the ranks of the NBA, Westbrook is a creative force prominently known and admired by the fashion industry and his fan base for his daring sartorial experimentation and love of all things fashion. Whether he is seen at the front row of a runway show during Milan Fashion Week, within the pages of Vogue, GQ, and the New York Times style section, or collaborating with Barneys New York or the Jordan brand, Westbrook has garnered the reputation of being the NBA’s real fashion insider. … This all-access volume is an essential for his fans and readers interested in sports, style, design, and popular culture.”
When the Clippers signed him prior to the 2023-24 season, president of basketball operations Lawrence Frank only noted his performance in 21 games the prior season (15.8 points, 7.6 assists, 4.9 rebounds) and leading the team in its five-game first-round playoff disaster.
“In the two months Russ spent with the team, he was everything we hoped he would be and more,” said Frank. “He made a huge impact on the court, with his play, and off it, with the urgency, intensity and professionalism he brings to the gym on a daily basis.”
Westbrook still appears to be under the guise of a misunderstood genius, which the New York Times labeled him in 2017.
Explosive. Powerful. Quick. Mentally tough. Unpredictable.
Yet, still the self-proclaimed #FashionKing of 2016 New York Fashion Week, you silly defenders.
Meanwhile, Westbrook is constantly challenged by fans, the media and likely his peers about what is left to achieve on a basketball court these days.
During the 2025 NBA playoffs, Westbrook had this post-game question about how he feels when he’s in the middle of a stealing an outlet pass and turning it around for a memorable play, something that looks like an “out-of-body” experience second-nature to him:
“I think a lot. As much as people may not think, I’m very smart, I understand the game, I understand what’s going on. So I am thinking and … it’s a force, my ability to be able to be a force of nature on the floor is what I pride myself on, so whatever that looks like — it may be a turnover, it may be a missed shot, but it may be a steal, maybe a dunk, maybe a missed three, maybe a made three … it’s gonna be all of that. It’s gonna be everything. So you just take it for how it comes. And whatever happens you go with it. I’ve always been like that. As long as I leave it on the floor, and God willing, I’ll continue to compete and I’m grateful for it.”
Who else wore No. 0 in SoCal sports history?
Make a case for:
Nick Young, Los Angeles Lakers guard (2013-14 to 2016-17):
The fading legend of Swaggy P came after his heralded run at USC (wearing No. 1) and a stopover for the Los Angeles Clippers for 22 games in 2011-12 (wearing No. 11). As Kobe Bryant was out with a torn Achilles in 2013-14, Young led the Lakers in scoring at 17.9 points a game, but the team would average just 22 wins in his four seasons. Then there was some weird video thing with D’Angelo Russell and a falling out with coach Byron Scott. He started 60 games in 2016-17 under Luke Walton and averaged 13.2 points a game, mostly as comic relief. Befitting the No. 0 in many record books.
Kobe Johnson, USC basketball forward (2021-22 to 2023-24); UCLA basketball forward (2024-25):
At a time when transferring between college programs became more and more prevalent, the 6-foot-5, 170-pound Johnson decided he would see what the reception, and perception, could be bouncing between the rival USC and UCLA basketball programs. He arrived at USC from Milwaukee and after wearing No. 2 as a freshman, became a two-time Pac-12 All-Defensive team player wearing No. 0 during his sophomore and junior seasons. He was second in the conference with 72 steals in ’22-’23. At UCLA, during its first season in the Big Ten, Johnson started every game his senior year.
Jack Flaherty, Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher (2024):
Almost by default, Flaherty was the Dodgers’ Game 1 starter in the 2024 World Series. It was noteworthy because it marked the first time in 58 years that a pitcher who grew up in Los Angeles started a championship series game for the franchise. Born in Burbank, and a star in the Sherman Oaks Little League, Flaherty was the CIF Southern Section Player of the Year and Gatorade Player of the Year in baseball at Harvard-Westlake School in Studio City in 2014. He posted a 35-3 record, including 23-0 in his last two seasons, and threw a no-hitter against Riverside North in his final prep appearance, a first-round playoff win. The St. Louis Cardinals made him the 34th overall pick in the 2014 MLB draft, and he was in the big leagues three years later. The Dodgers took him in a deadline trade acquisition from Detroit in July, 2024, and saw him put up six scoreless innings in a win at Oakland on Aug. 3. In 10 regular-season starts, he went 6–2 with a 3.58 ERA and 61 strikeouts. In the playoffs, Flaherty took the loss in Game 2 of the NLDS against San Diego. But he pitched seven scoreless innings to get the win over the New York Mets in Game 1 of the NLCS. That was followed by another loss in Game 5 of the NLCS (eight runs, eight hits and four walks in three innings). In the World Series opener at Dodger Stadium, Flaherty allowed a two-run homer to the Yankees’ Giancarlo Stanton (another Southern California-reared athlete) in the sixth after throwing five shutout innings. In Game 5, he gave up four runs in just 1 1/3 innings, but in both games, the Dodgers came back to win and eventually clinch the title. Flaherty was allowed to be a free agent after the Dodgers won the World Series, and he returned to Detroit.
Jamaal Jarrett, USC football nose tackle (2025):
Listed at 6-foot-5 and 360 pounds on the Trojans’ roster as a redshirt sophomore, the transfer from Georgia created a viral moment when he returned an interception 70 yards for a touchdown in USC’s Big Ten opening win at Purdue. Some called it a “Thick-Six.” Jarrett injured an ankle in a Week 6 loss at Illinois and was lost for the season. In five games, he had three tackles, including 0.5 tackles for a loss.
Have you heard this story:
Orlando Woolridge, Los Angeles Lakers forward (1988-89 and 1989-90):
The Lakers saw him as a bargain after he was suspended by the NBA for violating its substance abuse policy. He took No. 0 because it matched the “O” in his first name, something he wore it since his rookie year out of Notre Dame and going to Chicago (1981), then two seasons in New Jersey (’87 and ’88).
He found a pair of old New Jersey Nets socks he once wore and was wondering if he could bring some luck to his new start with the Lakers. He wore them underneath his pair of Lakers socks, and he felt revived. He only started two of 136 games in L.A, but he was back on track. When he retired, he became the first male head coach of the Lisa Leslie-led WNBA Los Angeles Sparks at the end of 1998 (promoted from assistant) and then got them to a Western Conference final in 1999, its first 20 win season in its third year of existence. Woolridge died at age 52 in 2012.
Byron Young, Los Angeles Rams outside linebacker (2023 to present):
Six years after he working to make ends meet as associate manager at a Dollar General store in Columbus, Georgia, Byron Young was the NFL Defensive Player of the Month for September of 2025 after recording five sacks in four games. According to a profile in the New York Times, Young began working at the outlet store after his high school football career ended in South Carolina . He didn’t have the grades to go to college or a single football offer, so he moved with his brother to Columbus and took a job to save money, working three years at the store. At nearby Georgia Military College, a walk-on tryout camp happened. Young went and was picked for the roster. He would later test at 4.43 seconds in the 40-yard dash at the NFL Scouting Combine, faster than all but one defensive end in the 2023 NFL Draft. Bryant transferred to Tennessee, had 12.5 sacks and 23.5 tackles for loss with the Vols in two seasons, and was the Rams’ third-round draft pick in 2023 at age 25 — an age given as a reason why other teams passed on him.
We also have:
Jerome Moiso, UCLA basketball forward (1998-99 and 1999-2000)
Kyle Kuzma, Los Angeles Lakers guard (2017-18 to 2020-21)
Al Oliver, Los Angeles Dodgers outfielder (1985)
Olden Polynice, Los Angeles Clippers (1990-91 to 1991-92, and back in 2003-04 wearing No. 30)
Anyone else worth nominating?
And these are the people who live among you:
Tom Hoffarth's The Drill: More Farther Off the Wall 
1 thought on “No. 0: Russell Westbrook”