Below is a recent conversation with Lakers assistant coach Kurt Rambis, touching on his hire, relationship with Phil Jackson, past critiques of Mike D’Antoni and how to fix to the Lakers’ defense
How did your role as a Lakers assistant coach under Mike D’Antini materialize?
Rambis: “It started with a conversation several weeks ago initiated by Mike D’Antoni. We had breakfast and he said he was interested in me working as an assistant coach for him. It was that simple and that plain. I jumped at it right away. I thought it would be a really interesting situation.
Why were you surprised about it?
Rambis: Well, it wasn’t what I was expecting. That’s where the surprise came from. We’ve known each other in the past. I wasn’t sure what direction the conversation was going to go. I’m always fine with sitting down with people and talking basketball. I had other conversations with a lot of head coaches.
Is it accurate that your role is going to entail primarily overseeing the team’s defense?
Rambis: I don’t know if it’s been stated as such. But that’s how I view the sport. I look at what any team can do to get stops. It’s critical to win games in the NBA. It takes five guys to figure out how to stop a ball. When you’re playing against talented offensive players, a myriad of challenges come up in figuring out how to stop them. It takes all five guys being on the same page. That’s how I look at things. On the other end, you’re trying to utilize your offensive talents and seeing how the other team is playing defense. You look at how they play defense and what we can do to take advantage of that based on the talent on offense that we have.
What’s your vision on how the Lakers play defense next season
Rambis: We haven’t sat down and formulated anything. Mike and I have a similar concept in what we want to do. But we haven’t walked through all of the steps. Even if you take wing screen-and-roll, there’s a lot of things offensively that can happen. How to defend all those different options. A wing screen-and-roll involving Dwight Howard and a wing screen-and-roll involving Dirk Nowitzki makes you defend it differently. We have to go through that process to make sure we’re all on the same page to look at those situations and defend him. That’s a simplistic example, but it’s clear the difference between the two.
With your mention that it takes five guys, how does the Lakers offset the absences that Dwight Howard and Metta World Peace brought on defense? Whenever you have gifted players on either end of the floor, they can make up for a lot of mistakes. If you have a very gifted offensive player, your offense can be run really sloppy out there and the guy makes an incredible shot with two guys hanging on him. That wasn’t great offensive execution. That was just a great player making a great play. It’s the same way on the defensive end.
Rambis: When you have defensive oriented players, they can cover up a lot of mistakes. Even with that, you need five guys connected in knowing how you’re going to defend this action and know you need to be in this spot. When the guy’s on the strong side, this is what you need to do. When the guy’s on the weak side, this is what you need to do. Here’s what the offensive options are and these are the areas you have to cover when the ball moves. It’s just a matter of going through that, rehearsing it and making sure everybody understands it. Everybody has to communicate. Guys make mistakes. The offense changes and makes an adjustment. It’s always on the floor. Guys will have to read and react and communicate and cover up for each other.
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