Pete was basically offered the choice - either leave the podcast or lose his job with the Lakers. They dodn't go into detail on Mike but I guess he was offered the same choice, he's off the show and didn't even get to have a goodbye episode.
I guess the Lakers don’t want their employees doing podcasts, being very petty. Aaron Larsuel hasn’t been on Irwin’s pod in a while either, Irwin said today it’s part free agency and trade season, and part this same issue.
Lakers organization are censoring a** hats. Imagine what Chick Hearn would have said to Jeanie if she stepped to Chick to tell him not to speak ill of the lakers when they played bad. He would have told her to go back to selling tennis on the corner. Real men work here.
Agree totally on Trudell. He’d often give pushback on their takes while singing the company line. He’s got to feed his family so I get it.
Yeah, Mike staying doesn't surprise me. He has a much bigger role and payday with the Lakers. His role with them is more in his wheelhouse than 3rd chair on a podcast. Pete made the right decision too and can focus on growing LFR again with more honest assessments and not having to play office politics. I will miss when all three were on. Mike had some insight gained from traveling with the team. Heard that. Was wondering where he was, because even during FA last year by this point in the summer he'd been on a few times. Real bummer, those were my favorite episodes of Irwin's pod. Don't like the stance by the Lakers here at all. It's a page from the Knicks playbook (worst media relations in the NBA). It's funny they didn't do this until they hired JJ. It's almost like someone in power :cough: Rambis :cough: didn't know what a podcast was until vetting JJ. And once he found out about them, didn't like there being a Lakers voice not personally controlled by the 5 at the top. You know a better way to fix that, get in front of the media and the camera and actually answer f***ing questions. Or I don't know...go to the time clock and punch in. Is payroll that tight? We can't afford to have anyone working during the off-season? Is that why we haven't made any moves?
Yeah, it’s incredibly lame, but not surprising, the Lakers would look better leaning into this stuff, but this is the same Jeanie who was also lame over Winning Time rather than leaning into it. The last couple LFR pods have been great though, Pete not having to hold back anymore is good, today he referred to Darvin without even using his name, called him the marathon man haha
So found this interesting. Listening to Kam Bro today, one is on vacation so they're having guest co-hosts throughout the week. Larsuel is his co-host tomorrow. Wonder how the Lakers gave that the green light but don't want him on Irwin's pod or him doing his own stuff on All Access Lakers. Very odd. Maybe we'll get some answers. Been waiting to hear Aaron explain this offseason.
If I remember right the last times he was on Irwin’s pod he wouldn’t talk about trades and free agents at all, pretty much just pointed to Rob’s “can’t buy a house that’s not for sale” thing, there’s not really much he can say. The Lakers also hate Irwin lol, so not surprised they wouldn’t want him on the show. I think the Kam Bros are a little more well known and very.. ESPN-like, much more likely to just play ball in an interview and not ask the wrong questions, they’re much more neutral in all things Lakers.
The difference playing out in real time lol. And I like Irwin, I enjoy his show, but that doesn’t meant I don’t know he can get whiny at times and probably go too far in his criticism.
Yeah, he can't say a whole lot this time of year but you can read a lot into which way he says "hennessy is delicious" and if he agrees with the current decision/direction. It's really the most front office info we get out of the team. He was able to keep us well abreast of the Wood and Biyombo status last summer.
Yeah. Good listen. The lack of staffing will frustrate me until the end of time. Easy thing to address and fix and there are ways to do it that wouldn’t cost much for an org like ours.
Same. They think the prestige of the Lakers brand makes that stuff unnecessary. In reality, if we showed a willingness to build out our organization and brought in people from outside the Lakers "family", I think we'd see the best and brightest want to come here because we're the Lakers. I think they misunderstand the value of the brand at this point in time.
i don't think it's misunderstanding the brand as much as your first point--they think their insular way is part of their success, but it's really not, imo. that died with dr. buss.
Our last 2 superstars came from no reason but because we are the Lakers, so don't agree with that statement. I think as long as we have Buss ownership it will be this way. It's just their MO. Their business IS the Lakers, so it's Run like that. They have a model they are happy with and won't change it. They make money and have a life where they have a say in the best basketball franchise in the world, one of the greatest in sports. Why would they change that?
Yeah. They limit their talent pool and the overall bad to mediocre results we’ve seen since Jeannie took over is the end result of it.
yeah, and i still think that they learned the wrong lesson from the magic johnson front office experience. the lesson they took was that you can't have too many cooks in the kitchen, but the real lesson is that personal association/trust can't trump talent and hard work. you need both, but going all-in on harmony/loyalty isn't a recipe for organizational success. and again, i think the uneasiness between rob and klutch re: trades is a good/healthy thing. i just wish they'd bring in some talented folks to add to that dynamic. magic was just dumb, man. no two ways about it. he had bad ideas, and we unfortunately green lit some of them. get another magic, but not dumb.
Some folks aren't exactly enamored with Rob either. https://sports.yahoo.com/tim-bontemps-feels-lakers-terribly-120017303.html
