There’s at least one player who’s thinking of regular workers who have been harmed by the NBA work stoppage. Los Angeles Lakers star Kobe Bryant has given some of the team’s playoff bonus money to two members of the video department who were let go.

Chris Bodaken and Patrick O’Keefe are splitting about $65,000 thanks to Bryant’s generous gesture.

“He always looks out for people who are lower on the totem pole,” O'Keefe said to the Los Angeles Times.

While the money won’t totally make up for the loss the two workers are experiencing largely because of the lockout, it obviously helps two people more adversely affected than most NBA players.

“At the end of the day, he told us he was going to take care of us and he did, and that's not how most people in the world operate,” Bodaken said to the newspaper. “He not only talks the talk. He walks it.”

According to the Times, the Lakers bonus-money pool from their disappointing second round exit from the playoffs last spring was $604,000. Team captains Derek Fisher and Bryant voted to give some of the money to O’Keefe and Bodaken.

The Lakers apparently laid off 20 workers as a cost cutting measure once they realized the lockout was inevitable prior to the July 1 deadline.

Contact Terrance Harris at terrancefharris@gmail.com or follow him on Twitter @Terranceharris

(Photo: Chaz Niell/Picture Group)