With the latest coaching hire, the Lakers may have found the right fit, but it’s easy to imagine it going other directions.
Former player and broadcaster J.J. Redick, who has never held a head coaching position above the youth level, is the Lakers’ new head coach. Maybe JJ Redick will, indeed, be the next Pat Riley. After all, Riles stepped from his spot alongside Chick Hearn to the Lakers sideline all those years ago, serving an apprenticeship to Paul Westhead before sliding over to the first chair when Westhead was fired in November of 1981.
If this is a failure, does Pelinka go out the door as well? There’s a lot of risk here, and it’s not all on the new coach’s shoulders. Maybe he can. Who anticipated that Riley, everybody’s favorite guy as a broadcaster and the good cop as Westhead’s assistant coach, would ultimately become the czar of all he surveyed? Who knew that Kerr would take to the job the way he did?The Lakers that Riley took over in 1982, after 161 games as Westhead’s assistant, had already won a championship and had the main pieces in place – specifically Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Earvin Johnson – to win four more rings before the ’80s were over.
Beyond that, and maybe Austin Reaves as he develops into a third option, how many of the other pieces of this roster resemble championship material? Can you depend on them to play any harder, or better, for Redick than they did for Darvin Ham? Yes, it is a different era and a different environment. During the Lakers-Warriors 2023 playoff series I asked Kerr about Draymond Green doing a podcast during the postseason and whether there was a gray area.
But when Redick addresses his new team, do you think some players might find themselves wondering if LeBron’s lips were moving while Redick was talking? In other words, whose message is really being delivered? That’s a delicate issue to straddle, especially for a first-time coach.Part of Redick’s appeal seems to be as someone who can take a key role in developing young players.
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