The Los Angeles Lakers were nowhere close to the playoffs this season, yet they are one of the most discussed franchises around the league. The Purple and Gold are entering an offseason where they’ll try to add the right pieces to compete next season while adding the right person to lead their squad to the promised land.
Frank Vogel was fired after a terrible 2021/22 campaign, and they are yet to make a decision on their head coaching job. Right now, their three candidates are Milwaukee Bucks’ assistant coach Darvin Ham, Golden State Warriors’ assistant coach Kenny Atkinson, and former Portland Trail Blazers’ head coach Terry Stotts.
Recently, Kevin Garnett criticized the team for their selections, mocking them on Instagram, saying that those coaches wouldn’t be enough to change anything the Lakers did this season.
Well, Kendrick Perkins thinks differently, as he recently defended the Purple and Gold’s list, citing recent examples of young coaches who used to play the game and are doing just fine in the 2022 playoffs (3:10):
“My former teammate, my brother, my mentor, but he’s dead wrong. When you look at a guy like Darvin Ham, a guy who’s been on the bench, a guy who has paid his due as a long-time assistant, an NBA champion, a former player. I think he’s deserving to be in the coaching seat. If you look around in the NBA right now, you get former players that have taken over the head coaching job. Look at the success rate, look at what they’re doing. Look at Ime Udoka, look at Jason Kidd, look at the success they are having with their ball clubs.”
As Perkins said, Udoka and Kidd are doing really good things right now. The former is leading the Boston Celtics to compete for a spot in the Finals, tying the ECF 2-2 with the Miami Heat. As for Kidd, the job is way harder, but he’s doing the right things with his Dallas Mavericks, taking them to the WCF and even eliminating the No. 1 seed in the conference.
The Lakers have big issues to fix, but these two teams have proven that the right coach can do a lot for a team. We’ll have to wait to see which coach will get the job, but the Lakers are hoping that whoever wins it brings something different to Crypto.com Arena.
