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[pdxKingsFan]

All Kobe? That wasn't the first time Coach K was sought after by the Lakers. It was the first time he actually considered it though. Plenty of NBA teams have tried getting him to leave Duke but he won't.

It was all Kobe as far as Jackson leaving. The dude has extreme ties to ownership of the team and basically has the job for life so long as he wants it. He wasn't "fired".

Remember it however you want, just about everyone in LA from the fans to the team were begging Jackson back. I lived there at the time and remember it quite well.

 

[vladetomiller]

Huh, maybe some fans wanted PJ back, but if management wanted him back they would have said so and worked on getting him back. The dude has ties with the ownership of the team and still was not signed for an extension in the last year or the year before. Magic Johnson has extreme ties to the organization, but still his coaching stint was not something the organization wanted.

By the way, if you lived in LA and followed the action, what happened first, PJ leaving town or Kobe signing the contract. If you actually followed that team in the period then you would know how that sequence is important to your argument.

Kobe has been on winning teams for only 3 years of his career. Even if we buy your argument, Phil was brought back and what did that team do, nothing again. Its just that the team just did not have enough talent outside of Kobe and Lamar, the coach whom they hired had medical problems and had to leave halfway through the season (or are you going to say that Kobe chased him out of town as well ). When you change coaches teams do take some time to get used to the new system.

Lastly, LA was divided in the lakers fan base, Shaq supporters and Kobe supporters, some of Shaq supporters wanted PJ back. Same thing you will see with any fan base, pro and against. Many teams would love to be in Spurs position now, but you can see that the spurs fans are complaining about the team, Pop, manu, tony and even duncan. there are people who want rasho back, there are people who want to trade bowen, brent and finley for a bag of chips.

There are fans in Phoenix who want to trade for KG cos they believe this team cannot win the ring with this team. There were fans here who didnt want to trade for Artest and didnt want to lose Peja. They are all out there

 

[acisking]

All Kobe? That wasn't the first time Coach K was sought after by the Lakers. It was the first time he actually considered it though. Plenty of NBA teams have tried getting him to leave Duke but he won't.

Although if he ever came to the NBA, he would have Agent Zero scoring "84 or 85" on him as he claims he will do if ever got to play Duke again.

 

[Gargamel]

And, for the record, I thought Phil Jackson walked away from the Lakers. He wasn't fired.

It was neither. Buss didn't want to pay what Jackson was demanding. Contract negotiations were ongoing way before the end of the season. Both parties knew it was over as early as midseason. Subsequently, Phil knew he was coming back sometime during 2005. Additionally, Rudy T didn't quit of his own as reported -- he was eased aside and reassigned so the triangle could be installed midway thru the season for the benefit of Phil sitting at home. That essentially closed up shop on the season and Hamblen would make cute comments about being a retread (while they lost 19 of the last 21 and positioned themselves for a lottery pick).

Sidebar: BUSS makes the calls, not Kobe. The claim that Kobe "pushed Phil out" ignores the paragraph above and it also ignores that Buss is a magnate -- they don't get pushed around by anyone. Matter of fact, you can't find too many better examples of an owner who does things his way more than Buss. He may have considered Kobe in the decision.......but it was HIS decision.

Additional sidebar: I don't think Jackson was Kobe's gripe. Kobe has more in common with Jackson than he did with Shaq. Kobe and Phil at least have exacting standards in common. Shaq was Kobe's gripe. Shaq was a wedge between Phil and Kobe because Phil knew how much placation Shaq required. It took till last year for Phil to finally put his eggs in Kobe's basket.

 

[Gargamel]

That was all Kobe. I know sometimes its hard to distinguish the difference between "The Lakers" and "Kobe Bryant" but there is one. Phil basically threw his hands up in the air and left town.

Its something he had obviously been planning for a while as he immediately released a book about the Kobe Bryant experience and a humbled Kobe stuck on a losing team for the first time in his career immediately made amends and Phil was brought back in.

If Kobe was humbled, why did Jackson allow him to score at will last year? That's counter to Jackson's gripe in the first place. That was Jackson cowtowing to Kobe.

Jackson did not throw up his hands. He went in demanding an obscene figure. Dr. J didn't like that, esp considering that he's very generous to superstars who win. But when you LOSE two years in a row, your bargaining position is weak. Shaq tried the same thing, yelled "Pay me now, MF!" on camera. Shaq got traded.

Kobe is the most obvious slant in Shaq's anger towards the Lakers. What Shaq is really pissed about is that wanted to extend his grandfathered contract to the tune of 30+ million a year and Buss held out while Shaq racked up consecutive playoff eliminations. By the time he was traded, you could add years of malingering and poor conditioning on his record that Buss didn't forget. It hurts Shaq's feelings that he wasn't given the lifetime pass that Kareem, Magic, and Kobe got, especially after he left Orlando for them and he thought that he could rest his laurels on 3 titles.