Getty LeBron James and Rob Pelinka of the Los Angeles Lakers.
LeBron James distanced himself from the Los Angeles Lakers‘ coaching search. But his words carried weight nonetheless.
According to ESPN’s Brian Windhorst, James told the Lakers to look for a coach who would lead the franchise beyond his playing years. And that’s what they are doing, pursuing back-to-back NCAA champion coach Dan Hurley of UConn, according to ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski.
“When LeBron met with the Lakers to talk about the head-coaching searching, what he told them was, ‘Don’t make a decision based on me for this next year or two. Make the best decision that you can make for the Lakers franchise for the next decade,'” Windhorst said June 6 on “Get Up.”
“That was the message, and it wasn’t, ‘Hire JJ Redick.’ It wasn’t hire this guy over here. It was, ‘Make the best decision for the franchise.’ That was what he’s been standing on and has been [relaying] for actually longer than just this search, but that’s what he told them.”
Post-LeBron Lakers Coach
Hurley is the most successful college coach over the last two seasons, winning 52 of his last 57 games at UConn.
The expectation is not for the Lakers to rebuild but to try to win in the final years of the James-Anthony Davis era while also developing young players as star-chasing slowly becomes passe in the wake of the new restrictive collective bargaining agreement.
“This potential hire is not about the 2024-25 Lakers. Yes, he would come in and there would be expectations that he could hopefully, if this happens, improve them and work with LeBron. But this would be something that they’d be investing in for a long period of time post-LeBron, Anthony Davis — players that are not even on their map right now,” Windhorst continued.
Hurley could also be the right coach to develop Bronny James if the Lakers select him in the upcoming NBA draft, Wojnarowski said on “Unsportsmanlike Radio.”
JJ Redick as Front-runner Was a Smoke Screen
The Lakers’ top target was Hurley all along, according to Wojnarowski, contradicting The Athletic’s Shams Charania’s June 4 report that the team was zeroing in on Redick and that his hiring would be announced after the NBA Finals.
Redick did not refute Charania’s reporting.
“My focus is on the NBA Finals. In terms of Shams, that will be addressed once the season is over,” Redick said June 5 on the “GoJo and Golic” podcast. “I’ll just say that.”
“My focus is on the NBA Finals. In terms of Shams, that will be addressed once the season is over. I’ll just say that.”
@jj_redick addresses the elephant in the room — the rumors of the Lakers’ interest in him as their new Head Coach
According to Los Angeles Times’ Dan Woike, the Redick news was just a smoke screen.
“Internally at the top, though, that assessment was met with talk of a wide-open process, with some dismissing the Redick talk as the leader as just “noise,” Woike wrote on June 6.
The level of secrecy surrounding the Lakers’ head-coaching search has even sent shockwaves within the organization.
“I don’t know if I’ve ever been more shocked,” one high-ranking official told Woike in regard to the Hurley report.
Hurley’s emergence from out of nowhere also left oddsmakers stunned.
As of June 5, Redick was the odds-on favorite to become the Lakers’ next coach. DraftKings listed Redick as a -210 favorite (67.7% probability) with James Borrego a distant second at +400 (20% probability). They listed 19 candidates as they even included former Lakers players Rajon Rondo and Pau Gasol, for bettors, who can track all the odds from their favorite sportsbooks at Bettor In Green, to choose from.
But Hurley was not on the list.