Seven weeks after firing Darvin Ham, the Los Angeles Lakers landed on their subsequent head coach on Thursday: JJ Redick, the 15-year NBA veteran turned podcaster and broadcaster, league sources with direct data of the scenario inform The Athletic. Redick is signing a four-year deal value within the neighborhood of $8 million per season with the Lakers, based on sources briefed on the deal.
Behind the scenes, the Lakers had been zeroing in on the 39-year-old Redick for the previous 4 weeks, infatuated together with his potential to be a coach for the current and future, past simply the following couple seasons of LeBron James’ legendary profession.
Redick had first interviewed with vp of basketball operations and normal supervisor Rob Pelinka for the Lakers’ head teaching job for about two hours throughout the week of Might 13 on the NBA Draft Mix in Chicago. Redick then entered the Lakers facility on June 15 to fulfill once more with Pelinka, in addition to house owners Jeanie, Joey and Jesse Buss, the remaining key stakeholders within the group.
A number of sources with direct data of the assembly described Redick as “spectacular” throughout his go to to Los Angeles, diving deep into his offensive and defensive philosophies and displaying his ardour for the game that foreshadowed a willingness to submit himself to the numerous working hours for the trendy head coach.
He defined his decision-making course of in the case of technique, how the evaluation and empirical proof would at all times information his decisions fairly than preconceived notions or outdated beliefs. Redick described a system molded round this roster, specializing in elevating Anthony Davis’ involvement, significantly late in video games, and assuaging the fixed ballhandling duties on James by using him extra off the ball. Maintaining James, who turns 40 in December, recent down the stretch of the common season and into the playoffs can be vital.
For these Lakers, Redick’s potential to entry his stars in James and Davis may very well be seamless because of the stature he could convey as a revered former participant, however how he unlocks the rest of the roster and coaches top-down stays essential to the job. Austin Reaves will certainly be a part of sturdy three-man assaults for the Lakers underneath Redick, who’ll be thrust into growing gamers corresponding to Rui Hachimura, Max Christie and whomever the franchise drafts.
Throughout his conferences with Pelinka and his go to with Lakers possession, Redick confirmed promise, group sources mentioned. However as with all first-time head coach, the true checks will come throughout the adversity of coaching camp and the season, the administration of participant relationships and the management of the locker room.
Redick has had a meteoric media rise since retiring from his enjoying profession in 2021, operating his podcast community, beginning the “Thoughts the Recreation” present with James and serving as a colour commentator throughout the NBA Finals all whereas concurrently chasing a head teaching job. Redick interviewed for the Toronto Raptors’ prime teaching job in 2023 and the Charlotte Hornets this yr. He has by no means coached professionally — his solely teaching expertise so far was together with his son’s youth basketball group.
League sources briefed on Redick’s mindset say he badly needs to make the bounce to NBA head coach and embrace the challenges the chair brings as he believes it’s the pure transition of his basketball life.
As Redick watched these NBA playoffs, each as a commentator and viewer, he envisioned how he would make the most of a possible James/Davis-led roster. Only a few years after ending his enjoying profession, Redick has his subsequent basketball problem.
The Lakers underwent some turbulence of their teaching search.
A lot of the method consisted of Pelinka assembly with candidates by himself off-site or just about, not inside Lakers headquarters. After his dialog with Redick, Pelinka met with Pelicans affiliate head coach James Borrego in Los Angeles on Might 20. A number of candidates — Boston’s Sam Cassell, Minnesota’s Micah Nori, Denver’s David Adelman and Miami’s Chris Quinn — performed digital conferences.
On Might 29, Borrego turned the primary candidate to enter the Lakers’ facility to fulfill once more with Pelinka and possession.
Within the days earlier than and after Borrego’s second in-person go to, some Lakers stakeholders believed the main focus of the pinnacle teaching search centered on Redick. Given the dearth of a championship experience-driven rent after Mike Budenholzer went to the Suns and the Clippers stored Ty Lue long-term on a five-year contract extension, league sources briefed on the matter say Redick’s probabilities grew for the Lakers, a high-ceiling candidate tasked to steadiness profitable and improvement and allowed to educate by way of early errors.
Then, seemingly out of nowhere, got here Dan Hurley. On June 6, ESPN reported that the coach of the back-to-back nationwide champion UConn Huskies was the “goal” of the Lakers’ search. Past Jeanie Buss and Pelinka, the pursuit was stored tight-lipped throughout the group.
Solely Pelinka and Jeanie Buss met with Hurley when he and his spouse, Andrea, got here to the Lakers facility on June 7.
Hurley left Los Angeles after being supplied a six-year, $70 million contract, based on league sources briefed on the matter. He returned dwelling to Connecticut to mull his determination whereas the basketball world waited.
On June 10, he introduced he was staying with the Huskies. Hurley’s new contract with UConn is predicted to make him the highest-paid coach in faculty basketball — six years and upwards of $50 million, league sources mentioned.
Though the Lakers moved rapidly to supply Hurley a contract that might have made him one of many highest-paid coaches within the league, a number of folks contained in the Lakers group and externally puzzled concerning the true general genuineness of the pursuit and whether or not the franchise had been utilized by Hurley to get extra money to remain at Connecticut. The Hurley scenario was seen by one group supply with direct involvement within the search as a Hail Mary try.
This a lot is evident, although: When it got here to the Lakers’ final decision-maker, Jeanie Buss, group sources mentioned she was extremely motivated to make Hurley their subsequent coach and was genuinely upset when the try fell brief.
Hurley himself informed Dan Le Batard, as he made the media rounds, that the Lakers’ curiosity began on June 5. He denied needing the leverage to get a increase at UConn on “The Dan Le Batard Present with Stugotz” when requested about it, then later mentioned the varsity’s identify, picture and likeness collective and his staffing funds nonetheless wanted to be elevated going into the Lakers’ course of.
Identical to that, Hurley was out of the image nearly as rapidly as he’d entered it.
The Lakers’ brass regrouped on June 11, the day after Hurley’s announcement, and eventually went all in on their best choice in Redick, based on group and league sources. After assembly with the Lakers on June 15, Redick spoke on the cellphone with Davis on Monday, a vital relationship within the years to come back, the sources briefed on the scenario mentioned.
The choice to decide on Redick got here because the Lakers, led by Pelinka, prioritized Davis’ voice within the course of and ensured that he understood the shared imaginative and prescient. Different key gamers had been supportive of the hiring, these sources mentioned.
Los Angeles is assured that Redick would be the long-term teaching answer that has eluded the franchise for over a decade.
Since Phil Jackson’s departure in the summertime of 2011, the Lakers have now had seven totally different head coaches (eight if counting Bernie Bickerstaff’s five-game interim tenure in 2013). Successful hasn’t at all times equated to job safety in Los Angeles: Frank Vogel received a championship in 2020 and was fired two years later. Ham made the Western Convention finals in 2023 and was gone one season later.
However the 39-year-old Redick checks lots of the packing containers on the Lakers’ in depth guidelines for his or her subsequent coach. He’s drawn inside comparisons to a younger Pat Riley as a training prospect who jumped from enjoying to the published sales space to the teaching chair (although Riley spent two years as a Lakers assistant earlier than taking the highest job). Los Angeles is assured he will be its model of Erik Spoelstra or Steve Kerr — a culture-setter who can develop with the franchise for over a decade. There have been way more former-player, first-time head coaches who failed to fulfill expectations than those that succeeded, although, with the newest examples together with Steve Nash (Brooklyn), Derek Fisher (Knicks), Jason Kidd (Brooklyn) and Ham.
A number of sources briefed on the matter mentioned one one who turned a revered unofficial useful resource for the Lakers throughout the course of is famous former Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski, whose deep data of candidates, corresponding to Redick and others, offers a lens into the tradition the group needs and the traits of a possible employees across the subsequent head coach. Krzyzewski’s historical past with the Lakers goes again to 2004 when Dr. Jerry Buss made a powerful but unsuccessful supply to rent Coach Okay. Redick performed for Krzyzewski at Duke from 2002 to 2006.
Assistant teaching candidates for Redick’s employees will embody former head coach and up to date Path Blazers assistant Scott Brooks, former Lakers guard Rajon Rondo, ex-Laker and present Dallas Mavericks assistant Jared Dudley and Cassell, based on league sources.
The timing of Redick’s rent is notable, as he’ll be a part of Los Angeles’ roster-planning forward of the NBA Draft on June 26-27 — the primary day the Lakers can commerce their three tradeable picks (2024, ’29 and ’31). It additionally places a frontrunner in place forward of James’ looming free company. The 39-year-old celebrity should determine whether or not to train his $51.4 million participant possibility for the 2024-25 season by June 29. The Lakers are open to any contract construction that can preserve James in Los Angeles, league sources informed The Athletic.
James’ determination, and the way the Lakers reshape their roster round him and Davis, will decide Los Angeles’ route subsequent season. However Redick’s arrival is a big guess on an unproven coach — one the group is assured can bridge the hole into the following period of Lakers basketball.
(High photograph: Tyler Ross / NBAE by way of Getty Pictures)
