{"id":77057,"date":"2024-05-11T15:22:30","date_gmt":"2024-05-11T19:22:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/?p=77057"},"modified":"2024-05-15T18:48:26","modified_gmt":"2024-05-15T22:48:26","slug":"lakers-set-to-interview-4-head-coach-candidates","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/2024\/05\/11\/lakers-set-to-interview-4-head-coach-candidates\/","title":{"rendered":"Lakers Set to Interview 4 Head Coach Candidates"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The Los Angeles Lakers\u2019 head coach search is heating up, with several candidates \u2018expected to interview\u2019 for the vacancy next week, per The Athletic\u2019s Shams Charania (h\/t Evan Sidery of Forbes Sports).<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\">\n<p dir=\"ltr\" lang=\"en\">Candidates expected to interview for the Lakers\u2019 head coach opening next week, per <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/ShamsCharania?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">@ShamsCharania<\/a> on <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/PatMcAfeeShow?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">@PatMcAfeeShow<\/a>:<\/p>\n<p>Kenny Atkinson<br \/>\nJJ Redick<br \/>\nDavid Adelman<br \/>\nJames Borrego<\/p>\n<p>Los Angeles is expected to conduct a very thorough search. <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/0uSp1UAbPj\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">pic.twitter.com\/0uSp1UAbPj<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Evan Sidery (@esidery) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/esidery\/status\/1789037891915591700?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">May 10, 2024<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>With L.A. hoping to convince <a href=\"https:\/\/www.basketball-reference.com\/players\/j\/jamesle01.html\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">LeBron James<\/a> to retire a Laker, this hire is particularly important.<\/p>\n<p>James can become a free agent this summer if he declines his player option for the 2024-25 season. The Philadelphia 76ers are the only championship-contender currently projected to have enough cap space to sign James. However, multiple contenders will be willing to reshuffle their roster to make room for him.<\/p>\n<p>Here\u2019s more on the Lakers\u2019 purported head coach candidates:<\/p>\n<h3>JJ Redick<\/h3>\n<p>Former Lakers head coach Byron Scott <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/2024\/05\/09\/byron-scott-lebron-james-doesnt-trust-anyone-but-himself\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_self\">doesn\u2019t see it happening<\/a>. Nonetheless, basketball analyst and former 3-point specialist JJ Redick is regarded as a serious contender for L.A.\u2019s coaching gig. While having no coaching experience above the youth level, he\u2019s a high-level basketball mind who would be making the same jump as Steve Kerr if hired by the Lakers.<\/p>\n<p>Another former player, Kerr spent several years as a broadcast analyst for TNT. Despite having no coaching experience, the Golden State Warriors hired Kerr in 2014. The rest is history, as he\u2019s won four titles since then. L.A. would hope to recreate that magic with Redick.<\/p>\n<h3>David Adelman<\/h3>\n<p>Denver Nuggets lead assistant David Adelman has been coaching since 2011. He\u2019s been on the Nuggets bench since 2017. This is one of the reasons that he\u2019s an attractive head coach candidate. He\u2019s had a behind-the-scenes look at how the Nuggets have become a perennial championship contender. Considering how well Denver has played against L.A. the last couple of seasons, he might help the Lakers might find their missing ingredient.<\/p>\n<p>Adelman also coached for the Minnesota Timberwolves for five seasons, primarily learning under his Hall of Fame father. Adelman\u2019s father is one of 10 head coaches to win 1,000 games, taking the Portland Trail Blazers to the NBA Finals twice.<\/p>\n<h3>Kenny Atkinson<\/h3>\n<p>Kenny Atkinson is a respected coach with ample experience. He\u2019s spent the last three seasons coaching under Steve Kerr with the Golden State Warriors. The season prior, he coached under Los Angeles Clippers head coach Ty Lue. Both opportunities gave Atkinson an opportunity to learn from head coaches who have won NBA championships, particularly his three seasons with Kerr.<\/p>\n<p>However, Atkinson also has head coaching experience. Taking over for a rebuilding Brooklyn Nets team, he went 118-190 in four seasons, leading them to the playoffs in 2019. In that time, he was regarded as a culture-builder.<\/p>\n<h3>James Borrego<\/h3>\n<p>James Borrego hasn\u2019t been a head coach since 2021-22. When he was last seen in that role, he was roaming the sideline for the Charlotte Hornets. In four seasons with the woebegone franchise, he went 138-163, bringing his career record to 148-183.<\/p>\n<p>Borrego is somewhat of a popular head coach candidate. He spent three seasons learning under legendary San Antonio Spurs head coach Gregg Popovich. He also coached the Hornets to a top-10 offense in his final season with Charlotte. However, his teams often lacked discipline and competitiveness as he failed to hold them accountable.<\/p>\n<p>Now the associate head coach of the New Orleans Pelicans, Borrego may have improved since then.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Los Angeles Lakers\u2019 head coach search is heating up, with several candidates \u2018expected to interview\u2019 for the vacancy next week, per The Athletic\u2019s Shams Charania (h\/t Evan Sidery of Forbes Sports). Candidates expected to interview for the Lakers\u2019 head coach opening next week, per @ShamsCharania on @PatMcAfeeShow: Kenny Atkinson JJ Redick David Adelman James [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5008,"featured_media":77081,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[26,1608,7,25,62,3],"tags":[49164,1557,2279,236,38,4557],"class_list":["post-77057","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-lakers","category-basketball","category-hornets","category-warriors","category-nba","category-news","tag-david-adelman","tag-james-borrego","tag-jj-redick","tag-kenny-atkinson","tag-lebron-james","tag-nba-offseason"],"modified_by":"Quenton S Albertie","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77057","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5008"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=77057"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77057\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/77081"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=77057"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=77057"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=77057"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}