The Houston Rockets had an impressive, if not ultimately disappointing campaign this season, winning 52 games en route to the second seed in the West, before losing in seven games to the Golden State Warriors in the first round.
Part of this impressive roster was Jock Landale, the Australian big man who had carved out a place for himself in the league over the past four seasons.
But according to the Boomers star, life as an NBA bench player can be a tough slog throughout the season.
MORE: Trade smarter with eToro, the world's leading social investing platform
Jock Landale breaks down struggle of NBA role players
Jock Landale has just completed the fourth season of his NBA career, coming off the bench for an elite Houston Rockets outfit and averaging 11.9 minutes per game, in which he scored 4.8 points and grabbed 3.3 rebounds.
@ausmerican_aces The Other Guys! Jock opens up about the dedication and hard work that goes into being a player who isn’t in the rotation, highlighting the crucial roles they fulfill behind the scenes. Tommy Talks with NBA centre from the Houston Rockets, Jock Landale is now online check it out! #ausmericanaces #nba #podcast ♬ original sound - Ausmerican Aces
Speaking to the Ausamerican Aces podcast, the 29-year-old explained that while his production on the court may not match some of the star players, his workload off of it far exceeded them.
"A lot of people probably don't understand that the guys that are playing, teams will cap them to a certain number of minutes on the court, so it might be 15, 20 minutes, get some shots, but then you got to go. Their days between games is borderline no basketball," Landale said.
"Guys like myself who are in and out of the rotation, it's more exhausting because we go through everything that those guys do, so day of a game, we'll go shoot around in the morning, then in our individual times we'll work twice as hard as they do because we're like, 'Right, we got to stay in shape, so let's get after it.'
"Then at the end of the game, you might get thrown in for 10 minutes. The next day we come in, the guys who haven't played or have played below a certain number of minutes, you come in and you play, and we'll play hard for an hour, and it's competitive because a lot of us are getting out our frustration of the fact that we're not playing in real games.
"You're working out like, no tomorrow. It's brutal work. Between that, there's a lot of other stuff, but that's something that I don't think people understand is when you're not playing, sometimes you're actually doing more."
Landale is now halfway through a four-year deal he signed with the Rockets in 2023, with the team hoping to go one step further next season after a disappointing playoff exit.