Lakers Fire Mike Brown.

[mac]

hm. dunno how d'antoni is gonna install an uptempo offense with a team that already looks so terribly old and slow. i also don't know why they revved up talks with jax just to go a completely different direction with d'antoni. now, if d'antoni fails (and it is pretty likely that he could, given his inability to motivate a similarly-constructed knicks team), the fans are gonna turn on the organization for passing on the zen master. i hope it all implodes, because kobe will be there waiting with his death stare. dude certainly would have rather been reunited with phil jackson...

PJax was reportedly asking for too much.

does this mean phil is available in case we have an opening?

If the Lakers couldn't afford him ...

 

[Padrino]

PJax was reportedly asking for too much.

i'd offer a resounding "hm" yet again. if the lakers are willing to incur endless luxury tax penalties as a result of their uber-expensive roster, all for the sake of pursuing further finals appearances, why wouldn't they acquiesce to phil jackson's requests for the same reason? dude's got 11 rings!! not to mention existing relationships with kobe bryant, pau gasol, and metta world peace, the undying respect and support of their fanbase, and a media legacy 10,000 miles wide. jax was the choice, and he was apparently ready and waiting to return. while mike brown was, in my opinion, certainly unqualified for the job, at least he had a conference championship under his belt. d'antoni doesn't even have that, and he most recently failed mightily in coalescing a knicks roster that bears some resemblance to this lakers roster, in terms of its construction...

ultimately, of course the lakers could afford p-jax!! for LA, it is never about cost, because winning championships is what they do. bringing another banner back to LA justifies any expense they might incur along the way. to me, this whole situation reeks of VP jim buss' influence. he's never been fond of phil jackson, and hiring mike brown in the first place, over then-assistant brian shaw (the popular choice amongst the players) was a jim buss move. it was clearly a tactic meant to obliterate anything that was left of phil jackson's tenure. and opposing phil jackson's hire this time around sounds like a jim buss move to me, too. jim buss likely took it as a personal slight that jackson was asking for so much, and refused to support the hiring, because his ego is just that inflated. d'antoni then becomes the next most likely candidate, as someone who runs the kind of exciting offense that will distract fans from the fact that phil jackson will never coach another lakers game ever again. either way, the very notion that the lakers seem unable to move on from phil jackson is a wonderful sign for those who despise them. there is so much upheaval and desperation in laker-land right now, and i find it hilarious. mike d'antoni seems like a nice guy, and his offensive philosophy of 7-seconds-or-less is cute enough, but i truly hope he fails as badly as he did in new york...

 

[butteredbiscuit]

does this mean phil is available in case we have an opening?

I was thinking about this for some time. If you have Phil Jackson coming to the Kings, you would get good players to come play for you because you have Phil Jackson as an owner. You would let him run things and he probably would bring in Brian Shaw to be your coach. The kings would definitely improve and would be battling for the 8th position in west.

Problem is though that Phil Jackson would want to be President as well and he wants to live in his Montana home and do work out of there. So you will need another top notch Vice president to run it.

Next: Phil Jackson would want ownership and dont think Maloofs are interested. But if your the Maloofs, would you want to build a winner or you just playing it out?

 

[Gargamel]

i'd offer a resounding "hm" yet again. if the lakers are willing to incur endless luxury tax penalties as a result of their uber-expensive roster, all for the sake of pursuing further finals appearances, why wouldn't they acquiesce to phil jackson's requests for the same reason? dude's got 11 rings!! not to mention existing relationships with kobe bryant, pau gasol, and metta world peace, the undying respect and support of their fanbase, and a media legacy 10,000 miles wide. jax was the choice, and he was apparently ready and waiting to return. while mike brown was, in my opinion, certainly unqualified for the job, at least he had a conference championship under his belt. d'antoni doesn't even have that, and he most recently failed mightily in coalescing a knicks roster that bears some resemblance to this lakers roster, in terms of its construction...

ultimately, of course the lakers could afford p-jax!! for LA, it is never about cost, because winning championships is what they do. bringing another banner back to LA justifies any expense they might incur along the way. to me, this whole situation reeks of VP jim buss' influence. he's never been fond of phil jackson, and hiring mike brown in the first place, over then-assistant brian shaw (the popular choice amongst the players) was a jim buss move. it was clearly a tactic meant to obliterate anything that was left of phil jackson's tenure. and opposing phil jackson's hire this time around sounds like a jim buss move to me, too. jim buss likely took it as a personal slight that jackson was asking for so much, and refused to support the hiring, because his ego is just that inflated. d'antoni then becomes the next most likely candidate, as someone who runs the kind of exciting offense that will distract fans from the fact that phil jackson will never coach another lakers game ever again. either way, the very notion that the lakers seem unable to move on from phil jackson is a wonderful sign for those who despise them. there is so much upheaval and desperation in laker-land right now, and i find it hilarious. mike d'antoni seems like a nice guy, and his offensive philosophy of 7-seconds-or-less is cute enough, but i truly hope he fails as badly as he did in new york...

I'll take a poke at this. There were a lot of conflicting media reports (or guesses) about what Phil did or didn't ask for, but in 2004, he admitted that he tried to strongarm Jerry Buss with demands and his contract talks were taken off the table. His 2004/05 sabbatical was not of his own choosing; which is what you could call "being fired". I have a hard time believing he didn't ask for a piece of the team or for greater stakes in upper management decisions. Jim Buss doesn't want that. I believe Phil was considered as much as the other coaches were and it was based on his current state and his potential merits for -this- team, not on his past history with previous Laker squads. As you mentioned, the 2011 season was a failure. I make a point to remind my fellow fans of that routinely -- the team was uncharacteristically unprepared for the entire season. Every coach eventually burns out on a team/franchise; Riley did too -- he actually lasted at least a year too long.

Judging from statements made by Mitch, timing was the critical consideration. They were already beyond training camp, working under a system they weren't getting, and players were looking frustrated with Brown's game management (his rotations were ponderous; the last straw was making Metta the 2nd string SG; he refused to play certain players who didn't seem to do anything obviously wrong; he installed a system that defeated the purpose of getting Nash; etc).

From all indications, they were looking to get someone in there who could hit the ground running with a system that was easy to comprehend and one familiar to the guy who will be orchestrating it (Nash). It's not a Laker lie for me to say the guy is best in a free-flowing offense, not the triangle, which Payton was never able to grasp in a full season. Tri is a hard system to put together on the fly, even with good players. If the Lakers' title window is still open, it's only open on a year by year basis. When you depend on two old 33 yr olds and a 38 yr old, you can't project beyond one season. Had they the full training camp, all of Phil's choices for assistants, and a roster to Phil's liking, maybe they go with him in spite of how his 2nd term ended. Things worked out differently.

This appears to be a talented team even with Bernie in charge, preaching a keep it simple, stupid, approach. Under Brown, it was an outright mess. They made the right choice doing a mea culpa on that mistake and moving forward in any direction. It was similar to how Westhead was dumped 30 yrs ago. System wasn't working, his need to dominate was on a path towards causing strife down the road. I don't think the players openly revolted, but it was clear they were frustrated and didn't know how to do what he wanted them to do. Lakers had to move forward in some direction. As of this post, D'Antoni has yet to coach a single game, so all I can say is that how he does remains to be seen.

 

[VF21]

Judging from statements made by Mitch, timing was the critical consideration. They were already beyond training camp, working under a system they weren't getting, and players were looking frustrated with Smart's game management (his rotations were ponderous; the last straw was making insert Kings player name here the 2nd string SG; he refused to play certain players who didn't seem to do anything obviously wrong; he installed a system that defeated the purpose of getting insert another Kings player name here; etc).

From all indications, they were looking to get someone in there who could hit the ground running with a system that was easy to comprehend and one familiar to the guy who will be orchestrating it ...

Amazing how, with just the change of a couple of words, this explanation could easily be used to justify the firing of Smart...