Stan Van Gundy stated he will be shocked if JJ Redick proves to be a poor coach for the Lakers, but he is not at all shocked that Redick, his former guard for the Orlando Magic, has been appointed as the team’s new coach. Van Gundy recalls a player who prepared like a coach when Redick played for Stan’s Magic during the Dwight Howard era: he studied the game, reviewed footage, and looked for any hole in his opponent.
“He took a cerebral, analytical approach to the game even as a player,” recalled Stan, who watched Redick work his way from disgruntled benchwarmer to one of the Magic’s most reliable and popular players during his seven seasons in Orlando. “He knew the game inside and out because he had to. He wasn’t an overly big athletic guy, so he really had to know the game and apply himself. It was clear how much he knew about the game just by listening to him talk. I didn’t know it, but even back in his playing days maybe he was preparing himself to be a head coach someday.” While Stan believes Redick will be an excellent coach, he also acknowledges that running the Lakers is a “challenging first job.” If you ask me, “challenging” is a nice way of putting it.
As storied as the franchise is and as many championship banners as they have hanging in the rafters, the Lakers are a delusional franchise still living in the past. They still think they’re Showtime when really they’re Slowtime. Quite frankly, they are like a bicycle horn that thinks it is the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra. The Lakers keep firing coaches in search of the right one when really it’s their roster that’s the problem. Redick is the Lakers’ eighth head coach since Phil Jackson’s final season in 2011 and the fourth coach since LeBron James’ arrival in 2018.
The Lakers made two strange runs to the Western Conference finals before losing to the Denver Nuggets two years ago. The first run to the NBA title came in the Orlando bubble during the 2020 COVID season. Over the last three seasons, the Lakers have been a play-in team twice and missed the playoffs once, despite the fact that LeBron James, at 39, is still a factor and that Anthony Davis, when healthy, is still exceptional. Stan, who is currently regarded as one of the NBA’s top television pundits, stated, “Their expectations have been unrealistic based on their rosters over the last few years.” I’ve simply observed that they’re not a very good team. Given their current squad, I believe that their ceiling for the upcoming season would
