He has been out of a job for over a year and he hasn’t taken a team to the playoffs in five years. That isn’t stopping Byron Scott from lobbying hard to get the Los Angeles Lakers head coaching job, who are keeping their cards close to the chest regarding the next man on the sidelines to be taking orders from Kobe Bryant.
When Scott said that Bryant was going to have and change his game if he would be hired as the head coach of a team he won three NBA championships with as a player, it seemed like his chances were shot dead in the water. Mitch Kupchak might have said that Bryant has no say in the identity of the next head coach, but that doesn’t mean anyone believed him.
Scott may or may not be in talks with the Lakers. Right now he’s talking to the media about what he wants, most recently to the “Max & Marcellus” show on ESPNLA 710 Radio, and slightly changing his tone and demands from the team and especially from Kobe Bryant.
Suddenly, he has a great relationship with Bryant. He’s talking about how well he knows this team. About how he has been watching them all season long. About how he is a great fit.
Scott has done a thing or two in the NBA, as a player and a head coach. He bgan coaching in 2000, shortly after retiring. He took Jason Kidd’s Nets to the NBA finals twice but was fired shortly after. He got to be the first head coach of Chris Paul as he entered the NBA and played for the New Orleans Hornets. The two reached the postseason twice, but more than once it has been mentioned that Scott was fired on Paul’s request, just Vinny Del Negro a few years later in Los Angeles.
The Lakers have interviewed only him and Mike Dunleavy for the job that was last occupied by Mike D’Antoni, who resigned after almost two full seasons in which the Lakers made the playoffs once and struggled with aging, lack of talent, injuries and zero ability to defend no matter who was on the floor, a trademark of D’Antoni basketball, only without the exciting and successful offense he was known for.
Scott got the lame duck job of coaching the post-LeBron Cleveland Cavaliers, but his best season was a 21-35 in 2011-2012, with Kyrie Irving bringing some hope with him that very quickly died off.