Los Angeles Lakers Jim Buss regrets not taking Kobe Bryant into confidence before hiring Mike Brown
The Los Angeles Lakers decision of hiring former Cleveland Cavaliers coach Mike Brown to replace the retiring legend Phil Jackson has drawn mixed reviews from most quarters. By “mixed reviews”, we of course mean negative reviews.
The Lakers status as one of basketball’s elite teams, Phil Jackson’s status as the greatest coach in basketball and their rosters current status which reads “disgruntled and uninterested” was always going to make it a tough choice.
In the given scenario, the safest bet for the management would have been Brian Shaw. Shaw had been assisting Phil Jackson for the past few years. He had also played under the coach alongside Kobe Bryant. As such, he knew the franchise
and he knew the players inside out. What’s more, the players knew him and Kobe Bryant publicly backed Shaw for the job.
If the Lakers management did not have trust in Shaw’s ability, they could have perhaps gone for an experienced and well respected coach, such as Rick Adelman or Jeff Van Gundy. Such a coach could have been acceptable to the players,
especially star man Kobe Bryant. Therefore, the appointment of Brown just didn’t seem right.
To make things worse for the coach, the Lakers top brass failed to take Kobe Bryant into confidence regarding the issue. Media reports soon surfaced that Kobe Bryant was “surprised” at the decision and pundits have already begun
speculating the locker room turmoil that seems set to follow once Mike Brown arrives in Los Angeles.
The man behind the decision is one Jim Buss. Jim is the executive vice president of the Los Angeles Lakers and the son of owner Jerry Buss. The younger Buss has now come out to clarify the situation and things could have been handled
better,
“Looking back on it, we should have contacted Kobe,” Buss said.
He also added that Kobe Bryant had given the go ahead to the management to decide on the coach and Mike Brown was the type, a defensive specialist, which Kobe wanted. Therefore it was not as big an issue as it has been turned into,
“Kobe said it was management’s job to pick a coach. He just said, ‘Defense first.’ That’s what we were doing, but we should have reached out to him.”
It seems pertinent to mention here that Jim Buss and Kobe Bryant reportedly do not see eye to eye. Buss stopped some major trades when Kobe wanted a reshuffle of the Lakers roster before they went on to win two consecutive NBA
World Championships. Buss also had an uneasy relationship with Kobe’s mentor and long time head coach Phil Jackson, a man who brought the Lakers 5 NBA world titles.
It will be interesting to see how the decision to hire Mike Brown is looked back on after a season or two.
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