Second Time Around

The Lakers are ahead of schedule as they prepare for Year 2 of the Phil Jackson era.

And yet the coach has the nagging concern that the franchise could be slipping behind in the changing landscape of the NBA.

Jackson’s body has trouble withstanding the long seasons, while at the same time more might be asked of NBA coaches than ever before. And yet those additional tasks seem to excite him more than anything else.

Jackson denies factoring into Jerry West’s decision to retire. And yet he points out how difficult it could be for any personnel man to work with Jackson’s system.

There are always multiple dimensions to any conversation with Jackson, and that was the case with a 30-minute interview at Laker headquarters Friday.

“It was a wonderful surprise to me last year that we won,” Jackson starts off.

The realistic expectations had the Lakers using their first season under Jackson to adjust to the triangle offense, and for him to learn the nuances, strengths and frailties of the team and break down the wall between Shaquille O’Neal and Kobe Bryant. Instead, they made a run at the magical 70-win plateau and finished the season showing off the championship trophy on a parade through the streets of downtown L.A.

“The players were ready,” Jackson says. “They made great adjustments. The impact that we had offensively with our system was a surprise to all of us. We had to make a couple of adjustments and growth during the year. The fact that we could defensively improve . . . . And then Shaq’s tremendous year that he had last year, his dedication to this. And the ability of Kobe to mature, rapidly. The combination is what got us over the hump.

“Defending [the championship], we feel like we’re still in a learning process at some level in what we’re doing. We can get better as a basketball team. We’ve changed personnel, so that’s a little bit different.

“We may be a team that can be stronger than we were last year. We hope so.”

When assessing the Lakers’ prospects this season, Jackson seems to spend a lot of time hoping and wondering. Even with the major personnel additions of Horace Grant, Isaiah Rider and Greg Foster, Jackson isn’t sure the Lakers have done enough to keep pace with the Portland Trail Blazers.

The Trail Blazers, who added Shawn Kemp and Dale Davis to an already deep roster this summer, will start the season as the favorites, not the defending champion Lakers.

“That’s interesting, isn’t it?” Jackson said. “But that is the way it’s working out. We’ll accept that as a challenge, and we think we can surmount that.”

Jackson said the other difficulties facing the Lakers are the fact that more Western Conference teams will be familiar with the triangle offense this season and that teams and opposing fans will be extra hyped to play the NBA champions, which will make winning on the road even more difficult this season.

But the long-term question is if the Lakers answer the threat posed by billionaire owners Paul Allen in Portland and Mark Cuban in Dallas.

They’re spending money at Internet start-up rates. Throughout most of the 1980s and the entire 1990s, the salary cap maintained some measure of equity throughout the league and helped teams in small markets (i.e., Portland and Utah) contend for championships.

Now the NBA is about to form two distinct groups: those who live in fear of the impending luxury tax, such as the Lakers, and those who scoff at it, such as the Trail Blazers, Mavericks and Cablevision-owned New York Knicks.

“We have ownership in our conference that’s going to go out and get the best talent money can buy in Cuban and Allen,” Jackson says.

Jackson said it isn’t frustrating to stand outside while other teams are in the store shopping.

“No, it’s not,” Jackson said. “I understand. We totally understand the letter of intent and what the league is after. I concur with intent with what should be the limitations.

“When the intent is to do it in such a way and when other teams don’t want to play the rules of the game, if they want to pay the penalties [a dollar-for-dollar payroll tax] to do it, fine. But we want to play according to how the game is played. I think that’s the way I work and operate.”

It looks like Jackson is getting with the company line, because that sure sounds a lot like owner Jerry Buss’ words during a June interview.

“My opinion is that the game will be ruined unless everybody plays by the rules,” Buss said. “I look at myself as one of the keepers of the game. I’ve enjoyed it as a fan for a quarter of a century, and as an owner for about quarter of a century. I don’t want to see it ruined. I don’t want to see it get into a situation where bidding is the name of the game.”

But Jackson has always fancied himself a defender of basketball purity, whether it’s maintaining a free-flowing passing attack in the era of back-down dribblers or avoiding the “ugly ball” tactics of Pat Riley’s Knicks and Miami Heat squads.

Still, that didn’t keep him from asking management to trade for Scottie Pippen last year. Pippen’s contract was too much for the Lakers to take on, but not too much for Portland.

Jackson will have to bring his requests to a different man now that West is gone.

“He leaves a void, a vacant spot in this organization,” Jackson said. “Obviously the assistant, Mitch Kupchak, that he has tutored and has done a lot of the legwork in this organization for the last four or five years is ready to do it. Mitch is totally confident of what his abilities are, he’s a good enough communicator with people around the league that he’ll do a fine job. Jerry had that charismatic nature to him that brought another element to this organization. He was an identifying stamp of the NBA. So that’s going to be missed.”

Jackson denies reports that West was prompted to leave in part because he didn’t want to be involved in a power struggle with Jackson.

“There’s no truth to that,” Jackson says. “Jerry and I never had any clashes. We never had anything but civil conversations. We never had a disagreement. We were on the same page 99% of the time. There’s absolutely nothing to that.

“Now, I could see where the work that Jerry put together, getting his personnel together and having it come to a fruition last year in a championship and then seeing how I coach a team and how the system runs for the team, there’s a limitation in what his role would be. We have the players, we have talent, we know what we need in a system like this. It’s pretty cut and dried what kind of players fit in well and can work with us. Drafting, if we are as good as we can be, [will be at No.] 25 and below most of the time. That changes up a lot of what you can do to bring this team more players.

“But I think it was more than that entirely. It was what was underneath or beneath or beyond all that that let Jerry know that it was time to retire. That’s a person’s own decision. I had nothing to do with that. We had great rapport.”

For Jackson, retirement is still a few steps away. He’s a different coach here than he was in Chicago, primarily because he doesn’t have to acquire credibility now; he simply has to maintain it. And he knows simply resting on past accomplishments won’t be enough.

“It’s going to change,” Jackson says. “We’re going to have to recruit like colleges now for players. We’re going to have to go into high schools and scout players, and foreign markets. The game is ever-evolving, and that’s a challenge in itself.”

His energy level picks up when he starts talking about the challenges. He still likes this stuff.

“Yeah,” he says. “I’m interested in it. I’m anxious to get back and coach and have a relationship with these players that I found really enjoyable last year.”

That doesn’t mean that Jackson, 55, is in this for the long haul. He has four years remaining on his contract (including this one), and in all likelihood the Lakers will be his last head coaching job in the NBA.

“I think it’s really possible,” Jackson said. “I don’t see myself coaching too much longer. I feel the effects of each season more and more, the stress.

“I really think it will be the last place I coach.”

He has raised the possibility that he might not even stick around for the duration of his contract.

“I’m not one to say that I have to go through, I’m going to grind out, I’m going to do this because I made this commitment to make this, this is what’s been guaranteed me, I’m going to squeeze every dollar out of this organization,” Jackson says. “I’m certainly not at that level, where this is not a joy for me.

“I came back to coach for the joy of working. I didn’t come back because it was a financial opportunity. I came back because this is what I’ve had success at and that process invigorates me. It’s goal-oriented. If it doesn’t become a pleasurable situation for me, if either the pleasure of the work or the pain that goes along with it isn’t rewarding, I’m not beyond stepping away from it.”

The physical toll is harder for him to withstand. He had knee surgery this summer and has a bad hip and bad back. Continuing to coach means continuing to stand for hours at a time and even give demonstration during practice. It means long plane rides and short hotel beds. It means the pounding he put on his body during his 12-year playing career coming back with a vengeance.

Having already accomplished the mission of winning a championship in L.A., it would be easy for him to leave at any time.

“I have a relationship going with Kobe and Shaq and some of the guys on this team that are here for a while,” Jackson says. “It’s something I would have a difficult time just saying, ‘Oh, I’ve reached my goal.’ I won’t leave these guys hanging because I’ve done this a couple of times. It’s got to be more than that. It’s got to be something that means something or has a meaningful end to me.”

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J.A. Adande can be reached at his e-mail address: [email protected].