I’m feeling good about where we’re at too, in fact I haven’t felt this good about where we’re at since the Pau trade (I hated Dwight Howard so trading for him was nice, but still somewhat like asking me to root for CP3 or a C bag). It’s been a long 6 year since with no playoffs, and suffering through Magic and Rob’s idiocy this last season was enough to push the most diehard to the brink. I’m excited, but I’m cautiously optimistic because again, they hurt me real bad after the LeBron signing last season with the rest of their moves aside from McGee, and a lot of other side stuff that’s been beaten to death here we don’t need to get into. A lot has gone on here in the time you’ve been gone I guess, some of us are still not quite ready to move on and say all is forgiven without seeing the finished product.
I think you are and it is really veiled. Just read that again bottom to top looking but only see the we don't need the media to validate what we're doing. That seemed national. Elsewhere? But it seemed to me her tone just from reading her comments that Magic really blindsided her with the out of the blue see you and was of course not going to mention his also screw you performance. I like her attitude. She's going to grow too. No one's standing still here.
LAKERS SPORTS Jeanie Buss has ‘100% confidence’ in Rob Pelinka running Lakers By TANIA GANGULI JUN 24, 2019 | 6:25 PM Lakers general manager Rob Pelinka and owner Jeanie Buss attend Kobe Bryant's jersey retirement ceremony in December 2017. Buss says she's completely confident in Pelinka running the team. (Allen Berezovsky / Getty Images) Lakers co-owner Jeanie Buss finally broke her silence about the state of the organization while walking the red carpet before the NBA Awards in Santa Monica on Monday. In her first interview since Magic Johnson stepped down as the team president, Buss said his decision caught her off guard, but that their relationship will “be fine.” She also expressed support for embattled general manager Rob Pelinka. “I’ve always had confidence in Rob, whatever the speculation is out there,” Buss said. “We don’t need outside media to validate the things that we do. I’m very happy and I think we’re on the right path.” Members of the media were not the only ones criticizing Pelinka. Johnson resigned on April 9, the date of the Lakers’ final game this past season. When he did it, Johnson alluded to “backstabbing and whispering” as part of why he was no longer happy doing the job. Johnson conducted interviews on the same day the Lakers introduced new head coach Frank Vogel, and he identified Pelinka as the source of the backstabbing and whispering. Lakers’ title aspirations could hinge on finding the right role players JUN 24, 2019 | 4:00 AM Pelinka has said Johnson’s accusations weren’t true. In Johnson’s absence, he was elevated to being the Lakers’ lead basketball executive. “I have 100% confidence in him in running his basketball operations,” Buss said. “He’s brought us a great new head coach in Frank Vogel, whose teams have had a lot of success in the playoffs and who have played consistently ranking high in defense, which means not only does he emphasize defense but the players buy into his defensive schemes.” Johnson resigned without telling Buss or anyone else in the organization. It was a move that rattled LeBron James and Buss alike. “As surprising as it was, it kind of reminded me of back in 1981 when he asked to be traded after winning a championship with the Lakers because he wasn’t happy with the way the offense had changed,” Buss said. “That led us to getting Pat Riley as our head coach. He’s got good instincts. He’s gotta stay true to who he is and do what’s right for him. I wish I would’ve had a little bit more notice but I think we’re gonna be just fine.” Johnson also said that he’d be interested in buying the Lakers, a comment that caused some to wonder if he was questioning Buss’ stewardship. “There’s probably like at least, I’ve had probably 20 to 30 people actually call and want to buy the team in the last five years but there’s probably, oh, a billion people who would like to own the Lakers, too,” Buss said. “That’s nothing new. It was no surprise. Who wouldn’t want to own the Lakers?” Sign up for our Lakers newsletter » Since Johnson’s departure, many have speculated about the rise in power of Kurt and Linda Rambis. Linda Rambis has been Buss’ confidante and coworker for four decades. Kurt has had an on-again-off-again history with the organization and was hired last summer as an advisor. He was a major part of the Lakers’ coaching search. “They’ve been part of the Lakers , surrounding me,” Buss said. “Linda Rambis and I have worked the exact same way for the last 30 years. Nothing’s changed but for whatever reason there’s things people want to hear about. They’re part of our team and they do a fantastic job.” There was one subject on which Buss couldn’t comment due to NBA rules: the Lakers’ pending trade for Anthony Davis. League rules stipulate that teams can’t comment on it until it becomes official. “I can’t say names,” Buss said. “… I think that there’s a lot of changes that have happened with the Lakers but all with the goal of getting back into the playoffs.” Times columnist Arash Markazi contributed to this story.
Thanks man. I guess nothing really surprising in here...I'm kinda annoyed at the Linda Rambis comments but it is what it is... Just don't let Linda/Kurt make decisions on the roster and we're good.
After listening to the latest Locked on Lakers and Laker Film Room podcast last night, I realized fair is fair when it comes to criticizing the FO. They recovered well, but Lakers exceptionalism is indeed over when it comes to free agency. When Kawhi requests to meet with only Jeanie and Rob, you have messed up in not hiring more qualified people
Man F Plaschke. Even when Kobe was winning rings with Pau he still found ways to disparage the org and Kobe especially. If OKC doesn't make the trade he doesn't go to the Clips and he either stays in Toronto or comes to the Lakers. Just a month ago we weren't even talked about having a meeting and the narrative changed to us having a chance to us being the front runners if the Clips can't find another star. This is not on Jeannie and Rob and since Kawhi announcement we have made some great moves, sans KCP (but that's for fixing Klutch's mistakes). If Plaschke wants to keep that narrative that got old a month ago then that's fine, i do not mind him not writing about the Lakers anymore. His hate filled rants always made me queasy.
Yeah pretty obvious he runs an agenda against the Lakers since forever. I literally ignore anything this moron writes.
The Lakers exceptionalism has got to go though. This is the first time I’d ever heard of Jeanie mocking Balmer and the Clippers through email exchanges, that’s very telling to me about her attitude and how she doesn’t get it. How she didn’t go out and go after David Griffin, Masai, or Meyers, or swallow pride and bring West back. We can be blind to these realities all we want because the Lakers fixed the roster up well after missing on Kawhi, but dysfunction and lack of stability and trust in the FO likely cost us Kawhi in the first place. They asked the question on the locked on podcast yesterday ‘what value does Rob bring?’, like that makes him so indispensable, and couldn’t come up with one, neither could I. I’m happy with our team going into the next 2 years, but AFTER that, things need to change or we will continue to fail to lure a top free agent star here again. Not sure how many times that needs to happen before the Lakers wake up and realize it’s time to put more money into making the FO the best it can be, not continuing to rehire Kurt Rambis and employ people with ties to former Lakers exclusively. The Clippers hiring the best people they could helped land them Kawhi, and connections to teams outside of their own helped land them George.
^^^^^^^^^^^THIS !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I have been thinking this since Magic quit and The Rambii have taken over.
It wasn’t, it used to be “Queen of Lakerland”. But things change, Jeanie has made some major mistakes leaning on the Lakers legacy, which clearly isn’t all that important to a lot of the 20-something stars in the league today.
To counter I would say that Rob's experience and savvy as an agent allowed him to figure out how to work with Rich Paul behind the scenes to get both Lebron and AD after signing the stiff known as KCP. We can't really have it both ways - if the Clippers folks get props for stealing away Paul George and thus landing Kawhi, then we have to give some credit to Rob for working the shared agency angle and getting Lebron and AD.
It really isn't in the age of social media. Rob and Magic were terrible hires. I know you guys feel like Rob is ok but I'm looking around at the overall landscape of the league and nobody around the league likes the guy. If other GMs wont take his calls because of his reputation... Nepotism is killing us. Who would rather have Rob over David Griffin? Nobody
I’m really not trying to be a downer today, I swear, but I don’t want to see this keep happening every time we go after a star free agent. Guys literally either don’t care to meet with Rob, or it’s like an “ok, he can be there”. That’s not how a GM of the Lakers should be viewed. I applaud Rob for getting AD, but Klutch put the ball on the tee for him, as in like little kids tee ball, not golf. And even in that trade he had to overpay a little because of inexperience compared to Griffin and seemingly because he’s disliked or something. With AD demanding to be traded to the Lakers exclusively we probably should not have had to throw in Hart, or maybe should have been able to keep Zo instead with the Pelicans having zero leverage. Again, not trying to be a downer here, but this stuff is starting to add up, every extra pick we give away, every extra asset, this is stuff we probably don’t have to do if we just went out and hired outside of the Laker bubble instead of doubling down on Rob because he was “loyal” to Jeanie and was Kobe’s agent. Other execs were reportedly pissed that he was hired based off that alone when it happened when they didn’t even get a chance to interview for this coveted job, and it continues to look like they are mad about it and it hurts us in negotiations, as we have overpaid in some small way in almost every trade we have made since Rob was brought on. If we win a title, of course we won’t be complaining about this stuff, but then when it comes time to reload or rebuild again, that’s when I will genuinely start to get worried again, and that shouldn’t be the case, as the Lakers should have someone in charge that is rock solid.
This is a post I can get behind. Thankfully we have some semblance of a team right now but we should definitely have more assets then we've been forced to give up with rob at the helm. This also has farther reaching consequences moving forward outside of team assets. We are damaging our ability to make impactful business decisions amongst our league peers because of our shoddy FO framework built off of nepotism. I just hope in the future when we decide to hire a new GM, that if someone qualified is available that they aren't gonna turn us down for all the reasons listed in this thread. Lakers FO track record since Dr Buss died is abysmal
