Don’ be a Sabo while chasin’ 4 rings in LA: 2021-22 GOAT franchise Boss Angeles Lakers season thread
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- Start date
His article on The Athletic mentioned Brogdan and Buddy. I can understand Indy wanting to move those contracts but why would they want to bring Westbrook around Haliburton?
BOOKmarked. Cuz a lotta yall said He couldn't do it Cleveland when he came back. MOST of yall said he couldn't in LA. Bubble or not every team had a chance. They didn't. Im just saying lakers could lose next year...and he could still win one at 39 averaging 20 7 and 7. Yall should learn by now Bron win chips at the unlikeliest of times
THE MACHINE
night owl
It’s crazy….
KD won all his scoring titles alongside Russ
Russ wins a scoring title in 2016
PG was an MVP candidate for most of a season alongside Russ and posted his highest ppg by far in his career
Harden won a scoring title alongside Russ
Beal had his highest PPG and was a hair from a scoring title alongside Russ
Bron had his best scoring season in 15 seasons and very well could’ve won a scoring title alongside Russ
I’m not even on some troll shyt but is the “stars can’t play alongside Russ” thing a bit overblown?
KD won all his scoring titles alongside Russ
Russ wins a scoring title in 2016
PG was an MVP candidate for most of a season alongside Russ and posted his highest ppg by far in his career
Harden won a scoring title alongside Russ
Beal had his highest PPG and was a hair from a scoring title alongside Russ
Bron had his best scoring season in 15 seasons and very well could’ve won a scoring title alongside Russ
I’m not even on some troll shyt but is the “stars can’t play alongside Russ” thing a bit overblown?
Oh I thought he was talking Turner
I just read itWestbrook probably gets bought out in that scenario. Can't see why Indiana would want to play him and he wouldn't come off the bench and your floor spacing will suffer if you're starting him.
I don't see Indiana just dumping Brogdon/Hield in a salary dump for 2023-24. Wouldn't they want more immediate assets that fit building around Haliburton, Turner, and Duarte?
iceberg_is_on_fire
Honolulu Blue Ski Mask Way
This is an insane tweet.
Yeah, it makes no sense. There's no way Indy is making a deal like that.Oh I thought he was talking Turner
Westbrook probably gets bought out in that scenario. Can't see why Indiana would want to play him and he wouldn't come off the bench and your floor spacing will suffer if you're starting him.
I don't see Indiana just dumping Brogdon/Hield in a salary dump for 2023-24. Wouldn't they want more immediate assets that fit building around Haliburton, Turner, and Duarte?
threattonature
Veteran
I wouldn't go that far. The Lakers at least have a chance at not finishing last in their division over the next five years.This shyt the epitome of an unforeseen turn of events. Raiders having a more promising future than GOAT franchise is unbelievable….
Redguard
Hoonding
Oram crushed the front office in The Athletic about the Vogel firing and no lies were told.
Oram: Lakers' shameful handling of Frank Vogel should be warning to potential replacements
Oram: Lakers' shameful handling of Frank Vogel should be warning to potential replacements
Oram: Lakers’ shameful handling of Frank Vogel should be warning to potential replacements
Bill Oram Apr 11, 2022
304
HELP WANTED
Are you a proven NBA head coach who doesn’t mind being hung out to dry and humiliated? Who enjoys being second-guessed and micromanaged?
The Los Angeles Lakers have just the job for you! The ideal candidate understands the privilege of working for the 17-time champion Lakers vastly outweighs things like job security, input on personnel and professional courtesy.
Dignity is far from a way of life with the Lakers. In fact, it’s a word.
Success will be duly rewarded with a contract extension, but not just any contract extension: an extension for one entire year.
You will be the envy of your peers because, um, you get to work for the Lakers. You will be provided a roster of only the finest remaining participants from the 2007 All-Star Game.
And here’s the most exciting part: When your time in the Lakers family comes to an end, you won’t have to suffer the indignity of being told face-to-face by your supervisor. No, you can have the comfort of knowing millions on Twitter are learning your fate at the exact same time you are.
Apply today! (As soon as we tell our old coach.)
Note: Candidates with famous names will be given priority.
Frank Vogel knew it was coming. Everyone did.
There was the below-market three-year contract to start his tenure, the tepid one-year extension 10 months after he won a championship and the roster that defied every one of his core coaching values.
Those aren’t exactly signs of support.
By Sunday night, the only remaining questions of Vogel’s firing were how and when.
The answers: a) By tweet and b) while the buzzer was still echoing after one of the very few feel-good moments in the Lakers’ season.
The Lakers should be embarrassed. Rob Pelinka should be admonished. And potential candidates should be paying attention.
Quin Snyder? Nick Nurse? Doc Rivers?
Who among them would sign up for what Vogel just went through?
Pelinka has spent the last two years fighting the reputation Magic Johnson hung on him of being a backstabber. How is that going today?
Sunday’s disgrace was just the latest reminder that the Lakers do not value coaches. They lowball them, berate them and discard them.
Until the Lakers decide to treat a head coach like a true priority instead of just an extra on set, fans should expect a revolving door of short-timers rather than any of the big names that have already begun circulating.
Seventeen minutes after the world learned Vogel would be fired — but, laughably, that he, himself, would not be informed until Monday — Vogel made his way into an interview room inside Ball Arena after spending several minutes in the hallway consulting with a member of the team’s public relations staff.
“I haven’t been told shyt,” Vogel said when asked about the report, “and I’m going to enjoy tonight’s game. … We’ll deal with tomorrow tomorrow.”
Late Sunday night, the Lakers released a schedule for Monday’s exit interviews with the media. Vogel, still not informed directly of his fate, was not on the list. One more twist of the knife.
By letting Vogel’s fate be reported when it was, in the manner it was — within seconds of the Lakers’ improbable 146-141 overtime win in Denver — the Lakers robbed Vogel of the opportunity to talk about a really wonderful night for some young players trying to gain a foothold in the NBA. They hijacked that moment from Austin Reaves, Mason Jones and Mac McClung, too.
Vogel was made to answer questions on a decision about which he had not been informed. To fly home carrying the burden of knowledge without the benefit of certainty. To land in Los Angeles not knowing if Pelinka might be waiting on the tarmac.
The most disastrous season in the history of the Lakers franchise was punctuated by one of its most deplorable moments. A proud franchise brought shame upon itself by being unable to remember that on the receiving end of that pink slip is a human being.
Imagine any other organization doing that to a championship coach. To an employee who was so loyal that, after learning he’d been fired, still mustered a smile as he talked about his team’s effort.
And it really was, for once, something to smile about after this wretched season.
The Lakers didn’t have LeBron James against the Nuggets; he was home in Los Angeles. Anthony Davis, Carmelo Anthony and Russell Westbrook all were in street clothes. The Lakers rallied from a nine-point deficit with 1:02 left in the fourth quarter behind 41 points from Malik Monk and a 31-point, 16-rebound, 10-assist triple-double from Reaves, whom Vogel likened to Pete Maravich in the fourth quarter and overtime.
The Lakers got to enjoy it for roughly half a second. The news of Vogel’s expected firing spread before players had even left the court.
DeMarcus Cousins shook his head as he walked through a back tunnel leaving Denver’s locker room.
“The man didn’t even make it to the fukking flight!” said the Nuggets center, who was on the Lakers roster in Vogel’s first season in L.A. “The NBA getting brutal, ain’t it?”
Lakers coaches and staffers walked briskly to the team’s bus, speaking in hushed tones.
Vogel wandered the hallway with a cell phone pressed to his ear, later telling a group of reporters he was speaking to his wife.
The implication: Still no word from Pelinka.
The Lakers’ vice president of basketball operations probably thinks he played his hand perfectly. At least up until Sunday night.
Back in 2018, in the wake of Johnson’s stunning exit and the subsequent firing of Luke Walton, Pelinka did not overcommit, even as Tyronn Lue and Monty Williams balked at the meager terms the Lakers were willing to offer.
He trusted that savvy roster construction could transcend a big-name coach. And for one year, much to Vogel’s benefit, it did.
Bill Sharman, Paul Westhead, Pat Riley, Phil Jackson … Frank Vogel.
That’s the list. Those are the coaches who have led the Lakers of Los Angeles to NBA titles. That’s something Vogel will always have to his name. When he leaves here, it will be as a far more hirable coach than when he arrived having spent two seasons losing in Orlando.
And in the process, Pelinka avoided costing the Buss family extra money by caving to a long-term extension.
This season, he gave Vogel a roster that all but ensured an easy exit for the Lakers. Vogel endured a constantly revolving rotation of available players and deployed the 41st starting lineup in 82 games in Sunday’s finale.
Trying to make Westbrook fit was an all-consuming task and was seen internally as an obstacle to Vogel and his staff being able to ever direct their attention fully to other areas of need.
“It never came together for him,” Anthony said of Vogel before Sunday’s game. “Had to hit the reset button a couple of times. It was a tough situation for him. It was a very tough, tough situation for him.”
Said Davis: “He knows what he’s doing. He goes to war for his players, and he wants to win.”
Vogel was far from perfect: His rotations were inconsistent and uninspiring, and he relied too heavily on certain players while giving up on others too quickly.
But he was, without question, the perfect man for the job at a very specific time. He restored a defensive ethic the Lakers had long lacked, bringing the best out of James on that end of the court at a time James most needed team success in L.A.
He had the unthinkable task of steering the team through the Kobe Bryant tragedy, serving as both head coach and spokesman in the early days following the helicopter crash. He should be canonized in Lakers history for accepting that unthinkable duty.
He was an even-handed presence through disruptions that ranged from getting stuck in China in the 2019 preseason to the pandemic five months later.
When the Lakers hired Vogel, he was not on the radar for head coaching jobs anywhere else. Coming off a year-long hiatus after two losing seasons in Orlando, Vogel was in line for a lead assistant job on Lue’s bench before Lue excused himself from negotiations.
As a result, Vogel earned the fastest promotion from assistant to head coach in league history. Unlike Lue and Williams, Vogel had no cause to grumble about a three-year contract and, with that as a baseline, had to accept the Lakers job for what it was.
That meant hiring Jason Kidd — seen as his likely replacement until he left for Dallas last summer — and later having to accept a roster that was never going to be able to live up to the defensive standard his first two Lakers teams established. That meant taking a one-year extension that now serves as a parting gift but, even at the time it was signed, felt like a warning that this day was coming.
His final regular-season record: 127-98 through three COVID-impacted seasons. Only one of his teams advanced beyond the first round of the playoffs, and enough strain had been put on the relationship that by now no one could really argue with the decision for change.
The possibility of his dismissal hung over Vogel’s third season almost from the beginning, and the Lakers came close to making a change after the worst loss of the season in Denver in January. The Lakers recovered to beat Utah two nights later, but the damage was done, and The Athletic reported that Vogel remained at risk of being fired.
Vogel told me last week the news caught him off guard.
“I was kind of in shock because it was after the Utah game that we bounced back on,” he said. “That, like, ruined my off day on a great bounceback win, you know? You just get slammed with something like that, that brings your energy down.”
Imagine how he felt Monday.
Throughout his tenure, the Lakers seemed to strike an arrogant tone that Vogel should feel lucky to be there. If he didn’t like the terms, he could go back to coaching the players he had in Orlando instead of the Lakers’ stars.
So Vogel tolerated regular drop-ins from Pelinka and Kurt Rambis in coaches’ meetings and film sessions, something that has been normalized within the Lakers but is still seen as an oddity around the league.
When I spoke to Vogel about this season, I asked him about the hands-on approach of the Lakers’ front office.
“Their input is like the assistant coaches’ input,” he said. “To me, they have a vote, so to speak, in terms of who they like to see in there, and I make the final call. When they want to see somebody in there that I don’t think is best, I go with the guy that I want.”
It is understandable why Vogel put up with that structure. But why would a top-dollar coach who likely has multiple options?
Times have changed for head coaches in the NBA. Teams are built around superstars, and all other positions are interchangeable — or, as Pelinka likes to say, a la carte.
Are the Lakers ready to make the kind of investment it would take to woo a figure like Snyder, who has been linked to the Lakers over the past several weeks? What if the longtime Utah coach insisted on a separation between the film room and the front office?
If the Lakers want to swing for the fences when it comes to the franchise’s 28th head coach, these are real questions they will have to consider. Otherwise, they will find themselves looking for the next Vogel: a coach with a proven track record who has fallen off the radar.
Terry Stotts? Dave Joerger? Mike Brown?
Maybe one of them would still be able to smile after being fired.
As the NBA’s most-celebrated franchise, boasting a roster anchored by LeBron James and Anthony Davis, the Lakers should have their pick of top candidates.
Will they?
Or have they scared them all away?
Before the Lakers bungled Vogel’s firing, I was inclined to say Pelinka, Rambis and Jeanie Buss had an opportunity to learn from Vogel’s tenure and make a real commitment to getting the very best candidate.
No more lowballing. No more undercutting. No more backstabbing.
But now?
The Lakers surely do need help. Just not the kind a new coach can provide.
(Photo of Frank Vogel: Ron Chenoy / USA Today)
Bill Oram Apr 11, 2022
HELP WANTED
Are you a proven NBA head coach who doesn’t mind being hung out to dry and humiliated? Who enjoys being second-guessed and micromanaged?
The Los Angeles Lakers have just the job for you! The ideal candidate understands the privilege of working for the 17-time champion Lakers vastly outweighs things like job security, input on personnel and professional courtesy.
Dignity is far from a way of life with the Lakers. In fact, it’s a word.
Success will be duly rewarded with a contract extension, but not just any contract extension: an extension for one entire year.
You will be the envy of your peers because, um, you get to work for the Lakers. You will be provided a roster of only the finest remaining participants from the 2007 All-Star Game.
And here’s the most exciting part: When your time in the Lakers family comes to an end, you won’t have to suffer the indignity of being told face-to-face by your supervisor. No, you can have the comfort of knowing millions on Twitter are learning your fate at the exact same time you are.
Apply today! (As soon as we tell our old coach.)
Note: Candidates with famous names will be given priority.
Frank Vogel knew it was coming. Everyone did.
There was the below-market three-year contract to start his tenure, the tepid one-year extension 10 months after he won a championship and the roster that defied every one of his core coaching values.
Those aren’t exactly signs of support.
By Sunday night, the only remaining questions of Vogel’s firing were how and when.
The answers: a) By tweet and b) while the buzzer was still echoing after one of the very few feel-good moments in the Lakers’ season.
The Lakers should be embarrassed. Rob Pelinka should be admonished. And potential candidates should be paying attention.
Quin Snyder? Nick Nurse? Doc Rivers?
Who among them would sign up for what Vogel just went through?
Pelinka has spent the last two years fighting the reputation Magic Johnson hung on him of being a backstabber. How is that going today?
Sunday’s disgrace was just the latest reminder that the Lakers do not value coaches. They lowball them, berate them and discard them.
Until the Lakers decide to treat a head coach like a true priority instead of just an extra on set, fans should expect a revolving door of short-timers rather than any of the big names that have already begun circulating.
Seventeen minutes after the world learned Vogel would be fired — but, laughably, that he, himself, would not be informed until Monday — Vogel made his way into an interview room inside Ball Arena after spending several minutes in the hallway consulting with a member of the team’s public relations staff.
“I haven’t been told shyt,” Vogel said when asked about the report, “and I’m going to enjoy tonight’s game. … We’ll deal with tomorrow tomorrow.”
Late Sunday night, the Lakers released a schedule for Monday’s exit interviews with the media. Vogel, still not informed directly of his fate, was not on the list. One more twist of the knife.
By letting Vogel’s fate be reported when it was, in the manner it was — within seconds of the Lakers’ improbable 146-141 overtime win in Denver — the Lakers robbed Vogel of the opportunity to talk about a really wonderful night for some young players trying to gain a foothold in the NBA. They hijacked that moment from Austin Reaves, Mason Jones and Mac McClung, too.
Vogel was made to answer questions on a decision about which he had not been informed. To fly home carrying the burden of knowledge without the benefit of certainty. To land in Los Angeles not knowing if Pelinka might be waiting on the tarmac.
The most disastrous season in the history of the Lakers franchise was punctuated by one of its most deplorable moments. A proud franchise brought shame upon itself by being unable to remember that on the receiving end of that pink slip is a human being.
Imagine any other organization doing that to a championship coach. To an employee who was so loyal that, after learning he’d been fired, still mustered a smile as he talked about his team’s effort.
And it really was, for once, something to smile about after this wretched season.
The Lakers didn’t have LeBron James against the Nuggets; he was home in Los Angeles. Anthony Davis, Carmelo Anthony and Russell Westbrook all were in street clothes. The Lakers rallied from a nine-point deficit with 1:02 left in the fourth quarter behind 41 points from Malik Monk and a 31-point, 16-rebound, 10-assist triple-double from Reaves, whom Vogel likened to Pete Maravich in the fourth quarter and overtime.
The Lakers got to enjoy it for roughly half a second. The news of Vogel’s expected firing spread before players had even left the court.
DeMarcus Cousins shook his head as he walked through a back tunnel leaving Denver’s locker room.
“The man didn’t even make it to the fukking flight!” said the Nuggets center, who was on the Lakers roster in Vogel’s first season in L.A. “The NBA getting brutal, ain’t it?”
Lakers coaches and staffers walked briskly to the team’s bus, speaking in hushed tones.
Vogel wandered the hallway with a cell phone pressed to his ear, later telling a group of reporters he was speaking to his wife.
The implication: Still no word from Pelinka.
The Lakers’ vice president of basketball operations probably thinks he played his hand perfectly. At least up until Sunday night.
Back in 2018, in the wake of Johnson’s stunning exit and the subsequent firing of Luke Walton, Pelinka did not overcommit, even as Tyronn Lue and Monty Williams balked at the meager terms the Lakers were willing to offer.
He trusted that savvy roster construction could transcend a big-name coach. And for one year, much to Vogel’s benefit, it did.
Bill Sharman, Paul Westhead, Pat Riley, Phil Jackson … Frank Vogel.
That’s the list. Those are the coaches who have led the Lakers of Los Angeles to NBA titles. That’s something Vogel will always have to his name. When he leaves here, it will be as a far more hirable coach than when he arrived having spent two seasons losing in Orlando.
And in the process, Pelinka avoided costing the Buss family extra money by caving to a long-term extension.
This season, he gave Vogel a roster that all but ensured an easy exit for the Lakers. Vogel endured a constantly revolving rotation of available players and deployed the 41st starting lineup in 82 games in Sunday’s finale.
Trying to make Westbrook fit was an all-consuming task and was seen internally as an obstacle to Vogel and his staff being able to ever direct their attention fully to other areas of need.
“It never came together for him,” Anthony said of Vogel before Sunday’s game. “Had to hit the reset button a couple of times. It was a tough situation for him. It was a very tough, tough situation for him.”
Said Davis: “He knows what he’s doing. He goes to war for his players, and he wants to win.”
Vogel was far from perfect: His rotations were inconsistent and uninspiring, and he relied too heavily on certain players while giving up on others too quickly.
But he was, without question, the perfect man for the job at a very specific time. He restored a defensive ethic the Lakers had long lacked, bringing the best out of James on that end of the court at a time James most needed team success in L.A.
He had the unthinkable task of steering the team through the Kobe Bryant tragedy, serving as both head coach and spokesman in the early days following the helicopter crash. He should be canonized in Lakers history for accepting that unthinkable duty.
He was an even-handed presence through disruptions that ranged from getting stuck in China in the 2019 preseason to the pandemic five months later.
When the Lakers hired Vogel, he was not on the radar for head coaching jobs anywhere else. Coming off a year-long hiatus after two losing seasons in Orlando, Vogel was in line for a lead assistant job on Lue’s bench before Lue excused himself from negotiations.
As a result, Vogel earned the fastest promotion from assistant to head coach in league history. Unlike Lue and Williams, Vogel had no cause to grumble about a three-year contract and, with that as a baseline, had to accept the Lakers job for what it was.
That meant hiring Jason Kidd — seen as his likely replacement until he left for Dallas last summer — and later having to accept a roster that was never going to be able to live up to the defensive standard his first two Lakers teams established. That meant taking a one-year extension that now serves as a parting gift but, even at the time it was signed, felt like a warning that this day was coming.
His final regular-season record: 127-98 through three COVID-impacted seasons. Only one of his teams advanced beyond the first round of the playoffs, and enough strain had been put on the relationship that by now no one could really argue with the decision for change.
The possibility of his dismissal hung over Vogel’s third season almost from the beginning, and the Lakers came close to making a change after the worst loss of the season in Denver in January. The Lakers recovered to beat Utah two nights later, but the damage was done, and The Athletic reported that Vogel remained at risk of being fired.
Vogel told me last week the news caught him off guard.
“I was kind of in shock because it was after the Utah game that we bounced back on,” he said. “That, like, ruined my off day on a great bounceback win, you know? You just get slammed with something like that, that brings your energy down.”
Imagine how he felt Monday.
Throughout his tenure, the Lakers seemed to strike an arrogant tone that Vogel should feel lucky to be there. If he didn’t like the terms, he could go back to coaching the players he had in Orlando instead of the Lakers’ stars.
So Vogel tolerated regular drop-ins from Pelinka and Kurt Rambis in coaches’ meetings and film sessions, something that has been normalized within the Lakers but is still seen as an oddity around the league.
When I spoke to Vogel about this season, I asked him about the hands-on approach of the Lakers’ front office.
“Their input is like the assistant coaches’ input,” he said. “To me, they have a vote, so to speak, in terms of who they like to see in there, and I make the final call. When they want to see somebody in there that I don’t think is best, I go with the guy that I want.”
It is understandable why Vogel put up with that structure. But why would a top-dollar coach who likely has multiple options?
Times have changed for head coaches in the NBA. Teams are built around superstars, and all other positions are interchangeable — or, as Pelinka likes to say, a la carte.
Are the Lakers ready to make the kind of investment it would take to woo a figure like Snyder, who has been linked to the Lakers over the past several weeks? What if the longtime Utah coach insisted on a separation between the film room and the front office?
If the Lakers want to swing for the fences when it comes to the franchise’s 28th head coach, these are real questions they will have to consider. Otherwise, they will find themselves looking for the next Vogel: a coach with a proven track record who has fallen off the radar.
Terry Stotts? Dave Joerger? Mike Brown?
Maybe one of them would still be able to smile after being fired.
As the NBA’s most-celebrated franchise, boasting a roster anchored by LeBron James and Anthony Davis, the Lakers should have their pick of top candidates.
Will they?
Or have they scared them all away?
Before the Lakers bungled Vogel’s firing, I was inclined to say Pelinka, Rambis and Jeanie Buss had an opportunity to learn from Vogel’s tenure and make a real commitment to getting the very best candidate.
No more lowballing. No more undercutting. No more backstabbing.
But now?
The Lakers surely do need help. Just not the kind a new coach can provide.
(Photo of Frank Vogel: Ron Chenoy / USA Today)
ALonelyDad
Veteran
Best Friend of Jeanie Chief of Staff
ALonelyDad
Veteran
Juwuan Howard and Snyder both repeatedly are out.
Darvin Ham is probably the best candidate out of Steve Clifford, Doc, and Terry Stotts
Darvin Ham is probably the best candidate out of Steve Clifford, Doc, and Terry Stotts