Head Coach Discussion: Canned Ham, Who Is Our New Coach?

Scott wasn’t a leader? He was coaching p****** who had never even been in a fist fight. How would we really know?

 

LOL.

 

Like Vogel’s first year.

 

Lakers better give him the tools or talking is all it will be.

 

i may be wrong, but to me the difference between byron and darvin is the latter understands the concept of giving respect to get respect.

again, we'll see.

 

To me there is some self awareness with Ham about where this team went wrong last season. I mean he has already called out Lebron and Russ that were the two most destructive facets of last year.

You can’t win with either of those guys playing like they did last season.

 

I think it's awful because that "message" had no purpose. A bunch of empty promises with little real substance. For a supposed "no-nonsense" coach, that was a nonsense message.

There are two options here, both bad:

1. he thought it was a good idea to do that useless "address the nation" piece
2. he was forced by the "front office" to do that

Bottom line -- this is going to be a s*** year either way.

P.S.

Also... he looks like a dork.

 

Proof is in what transpires on the floor in practices, the process, and the results.

We'll see.

 

Again, what level of substance are you expecting out of a coach from a 30 second clip in June before he even has a roster?

It seems like it was an innocent promo video, probably requested by the media department. The Lakers website or YouTube account asking a new coach to give a quick 30 second video is not a big deal.

Criticizing his appearance is lame.

 

Innocent promo? Why? Who is this targeted at?

It was a useless PR b******* and him participating in it undermines the whole "no-nonsense".

That's OK. We'll revisit this, just like we did with Russ.

Also "he looks like a dork" is a callout to Mike Brown. I am guessing you were excited for his DVDs...

 

Tough crowd

i’ll probably let him coach first before ripping him a new one

 

yeah you know in your hearts of hearts, how this will go, we don’t have a hungry C bag roster to accommodate a rookie coach. We have a primary star who will ignore his coach after a slump and a beta running mate who think 1 championship is enough for him and now is FAT. Then there’s Brickowski

 

yup. assistant at memphis at age 81

first HC gig was in the ABA 50 years ago. crazy

 

lol, this thread took a dark turn.

who's the coach you wanted, zen?

 

This is what I took out of it also. Instead of saying Lebron and Russ were superstar vets that deserved to be treated special he comes right out and says they will have to sacrifice for the betterment of the team. To me this is better than a bunch of platitudes granted he had plenty of those as well. He has spelled out the things we did wrong last year, which I know were obvious, but at least he addressed them and how to fix them. He said the ball has to move and so do players. That sounds simple enough but we didn't do that last season. Shooters shoot better, defenders defend better, everything is better when players are moving and in a flow. I think we made the best hire out there. I was wanting Sam Cassell but I'm glad we signed Ham. I do agree with Sirron that letting him coach a few games to see if he does what he says is a good idea before he is lit up. My read is that he is a confident coach with a vision of what he wants and how to get there. I also believe that taking training camp and preseason seriously to prepare for the season will lead to fewer injuries. AD's injuries seemed to me to be a combination of bad luck and not being prepared. I have no way of knowing how he trains but he didn't look prepared to start the season.

 

LOL.

 

You haven't seen anything

I'll straight go nuclear if the coaching staff subpar.

Everybody will put me on ignore.

 

@abeer3 asked the question pages back the day of Darvin's presser if anyone else was concerned with Russ's body language and expressions during part of it such as when a question was asked about the possibility of WB coming off the bench. Yeah EVERYONE that saw it had to be concerned.


https://theathletic.com/3352294/202...westbrook/?source=weeklyemail&campaign=602288


Oram: Lakers’ Darvin Ham can lead but will Russell Westbrook follow?

By Bill Oram
Jun 7, 2022
83

EL SEGUNDO, Calif. — Russell Westbrook had to have liked what he heard. The Los Angeles Lakers better just hope he doesn’t actually believe it.

Standing to the side as new head coach Darvin Ham was introduced, Westbrook swayed back and forth as he listened to Frank Vogel’s replacement outline a vision for him finding the kind of success that eluded him his first season in L.A.

“Don’t get it messed up,” Ham said on Monday afternoon. “Russell is one of the best players our league has ever seen. And there is still a ton left in that tank. I don’t know why people continue to try to write him off.”

Lakers vice president of basketball operations and general manager Rob Pelinka sat at Ham’s side throughout the news conference and nodded enthusiastically when Ham responded to a question about Westbrook returning next season with an unequivocal, “Absolutely.”

That doesn’t mean the Lakers won’t trade Westbrook.

And it certainly doesn’t mean they don’t wish they could.

But for now, Westbrook is here, and there are increasing signs it’s going to stay that way — at least until his team-high $47 million salary comes off the books next season.

So, step right up Darvin Ham. You’re the latest coach that gets to thread the needle of massaging Westbrook’s ego while also risking his ire in trying to hold him accountable.

With Westbrook lurking to the side, Monday’s affair had the feeling of Tom Sawyer’s funeral. As Westbrook soaked up the praise delivered by his new head coach, one had to wonder: Did he understand what was happening?

Because interspersed with the hype was the structure of what would actually allow Westbrook to thrive next to LeBron James and Anthony Davis.

He’ll need to defend. To set screens and cut.

“I’m going to expect him to be the same tenacious, high-energy player that he’s been all his entire career,” Ham said. “A lot of it now may happen without the ball in his hand. Most of it may happen it on the defensive end.”

Sound familiar?

These are the same demands that led to Westbrook tuning out Vogel so early last season and no doubt contributed to the ignominious departure of a championship coach.

How did Westbrook respond to Vogel’s overtures of sacrifice? By ignoring Vogel’s pleas to sacrifice and throwing him under the bus within hours of him officially being fired.

Integrating Westbrook — if he stays on the Lakers roster beyond July — is one issue Ham faces in his first season with the Lakers. On Monday, he said L.A. would make its biggest jump on defense, something not even defensive specialist Vogel could do in his third and final year.

But Westbrook remains the greatest elephant in the room. And until we see what kind of supporting pieces Pelinka can find to build out a roster with limited means, the franchise’s most important riddle.

What does Pelinka do with Russ? If nothing, then what are Ham’s options?

It’s possible Westbrook will jive better with the new coach than he did with Vogel – it wouldn’t be hard – and that he’ll be more receptive to his style on the sideline. But when Ham was asked whether he had discussed a potential role change with Westbrook, including the possibility of him coming off the bench, Westbrook, who had been expressionless through most of the proceedings, couldn’t keep himself from frowning, then laughing. He turned and started jabbering with Austin Reaves and Wenyen Gabriel, seated nearby, eliciting chuckles from the two younger players.

It sure didn’t seem Westbrook believed such a move would be necessarily, and why would he when the man brought in to lead him is questioning why people would challenge his ability?

No doubt the Lakers hope that Ham can be the right messenger for Westbrook, and the mere presence of the former MVP certainly suggests he is giving Ham the early benefit of the doubt.

In the end, the onus is not on Ham to get through to Westbrook. Instead, it is incumbent on Westbrook to evolve.

As Ham spoke about his presumptive point guard, it was impossible to wonder how much of this all was posturing versus accepting an inevitable outcome. Because those are the only two options.

All signs continue to point to this being an unhappy marriage. Are the Lakers really that enamored with repeating the experience they just endured with Westbrook? Certainly not.

But trading him remains a logistical challenge, especially if the Lakers are reluctant to part with their scant remaining assets.

So, it would seem they are embracing Westbrook’s presence of necessity, rather than choice.

He was the lone member of the Lakers big three on hand for the news conference, and he also received a lion’s share of the attention.

If the Lakers truly believe Westbrook can change, then it would reveal that they are the ones least capable of it.

But Ham’s arrival does seem to be ushering in a new era. In his first appearance since agreeing to a four-year contract with the Lakers 10 days earlier, Ham spoke like a coach who will demand accountability and is up to the task of pushing the team forward.

There was nothing not to like about his message, his attitude and his commitment.

Ham has long been one of the best stories in the NBA.

“I was shot in the face by accident, April 5, 1988,” Ham said Monday. “You go through something like that, it’s going to be one of two things. It’s going to make you fearful or fearless. It made me fearless. I don’t feel no pressure. It’s basketball.”

Coaching LeBron and the Lakers, he said, isn’t pressure.

“This here is a challenge,” Ham said.

Fans will feel a connection with Ham, who worked for the Lakers organization under Mike Brown and built a bond with Kobe Bryant before spending a decade alongside Mike Budenholzer. Ham choked up when speaking about the Milwaukee Bucks head coach, but said he told his former boss, “Well, at least you dropped me off where you picked me up at.”

A perennial runner-up for other head coaching jobs, Ham is now being thrown into perhaps the most difficult position in the league.

“I just want to take this time to thank all those teams that passed on me,” he said, “so I could get back with Rob and the Buss family.”

Ham is excited to be here. That much came through loud and clear.

“I talked to LeBron my first day in the gym and I wanted to start training camp the next day,” Ham said enthusiastically.

Ham has come full circle back to L.A., and the man is surely good for a quote. Hopefully, that means he’ll be good for getting a message across.

On Monday, Russell Westbrook was listening. It’s anybody’s guess whether he heard it.

(Photo: Harry How / Getty Images)