This has been an emotional rollercoaster of a season for the Lakers, as they’ve struggled both on and off the court. The recent loss of owner Dr. Jerry Buss revealed just how deep his influence on the team ran, even in his last days.
As reported by CBS Sports Mitch Kupchak revealed on CBS Radio on Tuesday that the Lakers did indeed move hastily in the firing of Mike Brown just five games into the regular season. Kupchak went on about the ‘impatience’ of the Lakers front office
“The one thing that was a big factor is our lack of patience,”
“When we made the changes we made in the off-season, we really did it with a two- or maybe even a three-year window, probably a two-year window to do our best and win a championship. And clearly we knew Dr. Buss was not in great health, and we were hoping for the next year or two we could put something on the court that would result in being in the hunt at the end of the year for a championship.”
“And when we didn’t feel we could get there after a preseason and a small number of games, we didn’t feel we had the patience to wait and see if it was going to work out,”
“And that’s really why we made the change we made so early.”
Kupchak is just now admitting what many had speculated earlier on, that the Lakers were operating in a ‘knee jerk’ reaction because of the uncertainty surrounding Dr. Buss’ health.
The Lakers made a trigger happy move by disposing of Brown and getting D’antoni and have since been very inconsitent and have given themselves little wiggle room for mistakes, and have seen their destiny to make the playoffs slip from their hands.
Whatever window they had estimated in respect to Buss’ health was tossed out the window with his sudden passing. Maybe now that the dust has settled the Lakers front office can focus on starting on making the change to a new era in Lakers history post Dr. Buss.