No. 1 pick, 16 years later, loving life on the Lakers' bench

He is the valedictorian who settles into a quiet, contented life as a plumber. He is the heir apparent who never grabs at a rung on the corporate ladder higher than mailroom.

Joe Smith is a member of one of the most exclusive clubs in professional sports -- a No. 1 Draft pick -- but he seems fine with standing politely aside while others crowd behind the velvet rope. His NBA career has been non-descript and largely anonymous, as plain as his name: "... at one forward, out of the University of Maryland, John Doe!" And in a league that beats with hip-hop, R&B and classic rock, Joe Smith might as well be Muzak pumping those Dr. Dre's.

And yet here he is, still plugging, 16 years in. Positioned as well as anyone in the league right now -- as a deep reserve on the Los Angeles Lakers' bench -- to earn an NBA championship ring this spring.

Playing for Phil Jackson. Teaming with Kobe Bryant, Pau Gasol, Lamar Odom, Derek Fisher and the rest. Sitting on the bench for the two-time defending champs, an insurance policy for the team's bigs that the Lakers hope they never need. Enjoying every sandwich.

"Anytime you last this long in this league -- I've seen a lot of people come and go -- it's a blessing," Smith said. "That's the way I look at it. It's been a blessing to be able to play for different teams, for different coaches, and stick around this long. I've enjoyed my run and hopefully it'll continue. Hopefully we can do something special this year to make it even better."

Began the season in New Jersey, might end it with champagne, helping the Lakers -- even in some small, unnoticed, practice-y kind of way -- hang another banner high in Staples Center. Not bad.

"He's an incredible dude," Odom said recently. "His energy is always up. We're lucky to have a guy with so much experience, knowledge of the game. He's played with so many players and so many coaches. ... He's ready for anything. In a short period of time having him on our team, I've learned a lot. He's been around. He's seen a lot."

Odom has no idea. Though he might feel some kinship with Smith -- both arrived in the NBA early (drafted at 19), both are staying late (Odom is a top candidate for Sixth Man of the Year at age 31), both have been with multiple teams under multiple coaches -- Odom has been a model of stability by comparison. Smith has changed teams 14 times in his 16 seasons. He has drawn paychecks from 12 of the league's franchises, twice playing for three of them. He has been traded seven times and signed seven times as a free agent.

Smith's longest stay? Three full seasons with Milwaukee from 2003-06. His shortest? He played four games for the Nets before they threw him into the three-team, Sasha Vujacic-Terrence Williams deal with the Lakers and Houston on Dec. 15.

"Time flies," Odom said. "I can remember, just the other day when I was watching Maryland ... he was one of the first people I saw swish-dunk. I was making fun of him the other day when he swished-dunk. They forgot that Joe Smith was one of the first people to do it. He had a great flair for the game and great feel. Seemed like yesterday."

It always has been easier -- snarkier, certainly -- to talk about what Smith isn't rather than what he is. OK, so he didn't live up to the potential Golden State -- and let's be honest, a whole bunch of other teams -- saw in him when the Warriors selected him No. 1 in the 1995 Draft.

He never became a superstar, never made it onto an All-Star team and got eclipsed in Rookie of the Year balloting in 1995-96 by Damon Stoudamire, the guy picked seventh, and 31-year-old Arvydas Sabonis. And if that Draft were redone today, in hindsight, Smith might be fortunate to crack the top 10 after Kevin Garnett, Rasheed Wallace, Michael Finley, Stoudamire and several others.

Seldom has a college nickname -- "The Beast" of the East, they called him coming out of Maryland -- fit so poorly in size, in style, in personality. Smith was a smart player, willing to defend and rebound, who quickly became one of the league's most savvy help-defenders in the frontcourt. He had a nice mid-range jump shot but a mechanical low-post game. His atheticism was limited and, from all appearances, he never ached to be great.

Bust? No, that's too strong a word for Smith -- or anyone, for that matter -- who plays in more than 1,000 NBA games, starts more than 600, scores more than 11,000 points with 6,500 rebounds, earns upwards of $61 million and last 16 seasons. Pervis Ellison, Michael Olowokandi, Kwame Brown might qualify as No. 1 "busts," but Smith deserves a softer landing. Something like "Drafted too high," for such a blue-collar guy.

What the heck, if you remember that Smith was the first No. 1 pick bound by the rookie salary scale -- his first deal was worth $8.5 million compared to Glenn Robinson's $68 million bonanza one year earlier -- you might even say "bargain."

"I've never tried to live up to anybody else's expectations," Smith said. "I've always put enough pressure on myself, year by year, game by game, to go out there and perform to the best of my abilities. What everyone else has kind of expected of me, it goes in one ear and out the other.

"I feel pretty good about [my career]. Everywhere I've been, I've been able to adjust my role accordingly. I think that's one reason I've been able to stick around, because I've been able to mix myself in and adjust and be a good locker-room guy as well. I've been able to play alongside the superstars, the role player who helps the team get better and win by doing the other things, doing the 'dirty work.' My expectations are high for myself, but I really don't feed into what other people expect for me."

His start was stellar enough, averaging 15.3 and 18.7 points in his first two seasons with Golden State, followed by a disastrous third year: In December 1997, Smith was witness to the Latrell Sprewell-P.J. Carlesimo choking incident that blew up the Warriors' season. By February, with the front office convinced it would lose Smith as a free agent, he was traded to Philadelphia.

Next came the 1998 lockout that scrunched the 1998-99 season into a few months, on the heels of an official "offseason" crammed into a couple of weeks. It was during that frenzy that Smith -- on the advice of his then-agent Eric Fleisher -- signed a series of illegal contracts with the Minnesota Timberwolves that violated the salary-cap and, when discovered prior to the 2000-01 season, voided his deal with the Wolves. He spent a season in exile in Detroit, then returned to Minnesota for two years. But what was supposed to be a long stay at Garnett's side turned into something quite different and Smith's career as a journeyman was under way.

"When I was coaching in Dallas and he was at Golden State, I had nobody who could guard him," Lakers assistant coach Jim Cleamons said. " I would be wondering who on my team could guard him -- he'd light us up. He'd always be open on the baseline or open at the elbow spots and knocking down jumpshots. He had a wonderful career in Minnesota. We know he's a player. If we have to call on him, I know he has something left in the tank."

So many others have nothing left. Of the 11 No. 1 picks drafted after Smith, from 1996 through 2007, five are either out of the league or seem destined through injuries or circumstances to have lesser careers than Smith. If he hasn't outplayed them, at least he has outlasted them, from Allen Iverson (1996) and Olowokandi (1998) to Brown (2001), Yao Ming (2002) and Greg Oden (2007).

Then there are the other big names, highly-touted players taken within a few spots of No. 1, who have come and gone: Shareef Abdur-Rahim, Antoine Walker, Keith Van Horn, Steve Francis, Stromile Swift, Darius Miles, Eddy Curry.

No way Smith would swap careers with them. Or current situations.

"Oh yeah, I have no complaints," said Smith, ever mellow, heading toward the Lakers' bus -- the Lakers! -- after a recent road shootaround. "Everything's worked out good."

NBA.com's Bryan Chu contributed to this report.

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Steve Aschburner has written about the NBA for 25 years. You can e-mail him here and follow him on twitter.

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