The Los Angeles Lakers are reportedly closing in on a deal to hire Tyronn Lue as its next head coach to replace the seat left by Luke Walton, according to Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN.
The Lakers are proceeding toward an offer to Ty Lue in the coming days, and have no plans to introduce new candidates into the head coaching search process, league sources tell @ramonashelburne and me.
— Adrian Wojnarowski (@wojespn) May 3, 2019
The Lakers also looked into other candidates and particularly pushed hard to acquire the services of Philadelphia 76ers assistant coach Monty Williams. But Williams opted to head to the Phoenix Suns instead.
Now this leaves the Purple and Gold with an obvious choice in Tyronn Lue. With the inevitable hiring of the former Laker, is this the right coaching choice for Los Angeles?
At this point, yes. Sure, there could be more superior coaching candidates out there than Lue. But there is no better choice for the Lakers in their situation right now.
This organization now revolves around one man: LeBron James. Whether Lakers fans like it or not, their beloved franchise is now in the LeBron era, for the next three seasons at least.
With Magic Johnson out of the picture, James is calling the shots. Of course, he or anyone from his camp won't say anything about it. But it's pretty obvious at this point.
Nevertheless, James and Lue have a pretty good history and relationship with each other. They won a championship together for the Cleveland Cavaliers in 2016 and led them to two more Finals appearances in 2017 and 2018, where they lost to the Golden State Warriors.
Moreover, with Lue “calling the shots” on the sidelines, James is playing for someone he actually likes. James is loyal to his guys, and Lue is a LeBron guy. No matter how bad the situation could potentially get in the future, it's almost certain that Lue, who the Cavaliers fired earlier this season after they started off their post-LeBron era 0-6, won't eventually be the fall back like Luke Walton was recently.
As much as LeBron is loyal to his guys, Lue is loyal to LeBron as well. Lue lets James do his thing, and that is to run the offense to his liking and his style of play.
James works best being the primary ball handler and having a bunch of shooters surrounding him on the wings. The Cavs gave James that tailor-made supporting crew and Lue designed his system to cater to his superstar forward.
However, this Lakers roster is not constructed the same way the Cleveland teams were from 2016 to 2018. More importantly, two of the Lakers' young stars, Brandon Ingram and Lonzo Ball, who work better as ball handlers, struggled to become secondary play-makers and spot-up shooters last season.
This coming summer will give the Lakers a fresh restart. They obviously need a roster revamp since the 2018-19 iteration failed miserably.
With LeBron and Lue reconnecting in Lakerland, one has to think that the Lakers system will cater to what LeBron's playing style demands. Ingram and Ball don't seem to fit that picture too well, and the two will have to adjust and make sacrifices if the Lakers continue to see them as franchise pieces moving forward.
This is just the era that this storied franchise is in right now. This inevitable hiring of Tyronn Lue indicates that they are going all in on what they signed up for when they inked the 34-year old aging superstar to a 4-year, $153-million deal last summer.
Making The King happy is priority number one for the Lakers, and having a galvanized and driven LeBron historically leads to good results.
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