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Gimme_the_rock
Franchise Player
Joined: 13 Apr 2001
Posts: 11882
Location: Looking outta the window, watching the asphalt grow ...
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 Posted: Thu Apr 17, 2014 6:44 am Post subject: |
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| Reflexx wrote: | Apparently some fans here believe that Forbes is a great place for basketball analysis.
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If it bashes the Lakers with Jim Buss as the bull's eye, then the vast majority is going to rejoice whether it comes from Forbes or Paula Dean. |
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postandpivot
Retired Number
Joined: 16 Sep 2003
Posts: 36822
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| Posted: Thu Apr 17, 2014 6:46 am Post subject: |
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| LarryCoon wrote: | The main fault of the article is that it confuses correlation with causation. Let's outline his points (these are what they boil down to):
1. Management has been neglecting an aging roster for some time.
2. You need to avoid entrenchment of big egos.
3. Buss leaving his kids in charge when he died was a mistake.
4. You need to keep bringing in top talent.
And the entire article is essentially using the team's current status as evidence to prove his point -- the Lakers are lousy, and here's how they got that way.
But as others have mentioned, the author seems to have little appreciation of how the league works. Teams rise & fall in cycles. The great teams rise to the top, sustain it as long as possible, and then minimize the down side of the cycle by rebuilding in a hurry. The teams with the means to do so time it so everything falls off the books at once so they can wield maximal spending power. It's how the Lakers were successful in years past, and it's how the Heat did it in this decade.
The Lakers are at that point in the cycle, and it appears they are poised to complete the rebuild in just a couple seasons -- with this season & next being the principal transition years. This just happened to closely follow the death of Dr. Buss, so the author naturally conflated the two. But the plan was in place even before Dr. Buss died, and has only had minor tweaks since then.
So let's go through his points one at a time:
1. They haven't been neglecting an aging roster for a long time. As recently as last season they continued to bring in top talent in order to stay on top -- refer back to the predictions for the team when the Lakers acquired Howard & Nash. And at the time, the decision to bring in MDA to coach Nash could be defended, especially since the author himself says he's agnostic about Phil, who was the only other high-caliber choice. At least the Lakers were reuniting Nash with MDA, and there's a logic to having him coach a team led by Nash, Howard and Kobe.
The other point here is my central point -- the Lakers' overall game plan isn't to try to keep acquiring small pieces to maintain the roster. It's to play it out for all it's worth, then blow it up & start over quickly. It takes advantage of the fact that LA is a free agent destination, the Lakers are a team with resources, and LA fans don't necessarily have the patience to watch the team develop young core players. They have an overarching plan, they stuck to it, and as funny as it is to say, the current season is actually a part of the plan -- it's not evidence that they're doing anything wrong, and it's certainly not evidence for the author's first point.
2. Easy to say for companies in general, but a lot tougher when you're talking about family-owned businesses, where people are NECESSARILY going to be entrenched. This point to me is the weakest one of all -- he's encouraging turnover where it's not practical, and he's also assuming there's a pool of talent out there from which to draw. There really isn't.
3. What alternative is the author suggesting? My only alternative would be to swap Jim & Mitch in the hierarchy, so Jim reports to Mitch, Mitch reports to Jeanie, and Jeanie reports to the family trust (which includes Jim & Jeanie). That said, I think his criticisms of Jeanie are misfounded, and he doesn't recognize the importance of and weight carried by people in the position Jeanie occupies. To me it's a rather naive take, and the author was swayed by the more visible position that Jim occupies. And again, he's confusing correlation with causation -- he implied directly that the arrangement has resulted in the team's current poor position. It hasn't.
4. Okay, so Phil wasn't the solution, according to the author. And neither was MDA. So -- who was? Adelman? Like I said, you can at least defend the MDA choice (if it wasn't going to be Phil), even though it didn't work out with Nash & Howard. The rest of his point is just a whine demonstrating that he's as fickle as some of the fans he writes about. The Showtime era about which he waxes nostalgic also came to an end. The team had some down years before they rebuilt that roster, too. And that 1991 roster ALSO consisted of a top star who burned-out (basketball-wise) in Magic, a second-fiddle (Worthy) who also aged & reached the end of his career, a miscellaneous assortment of role players, and a mediocre coach. So what's so different between his nostalgia for the Showtime era and the roster of today? Not much, really.
The whole article is an exercise in misapplied angst. |
i've been saying the bolded for some time now. but no one is listening. there is no real difference aside from this team being injured at a record pace. if that was not the case. we would be right on par wins and losses with that post magic era, pre eddie j, nick the quick and shaq.
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Voices
Star Player
Joined: 07 Jul 2006
Posts: 8287
Location: Oxnard, Ca.
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| Posted: Thu Apr 17, 2014 8:00 am Post subject: |
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| bandiger wrote: | | Voices wrote: | | Reflexx wrote: | | Voices wrote: | | Reflexx wrote: | | LAkers 4 Life wrote: | | kray28_ wrote: | The primary issue is that Jim Buss is involved in any form of basketball operations. In Jeanie's case, being involved on the business side, she comes with the requisite business management credentials. But what credentials or any level of measurable merit does Jim bring with him?
So this point is a pretty important one and very accurate in terms of describing a certain cause of dysfunction within the organization. |
Let's take a look at Jim Buss' career as per wikipedia:
1.) Small business with friend - Failed after friend dies
2.) LA Lazers soccer team - Failed after team folded
3.) Horse trainer - Failed after being unprofitable
4.) LA Lakers - Rudy T - fail, Mike Brown - fail, Mike D'Antoni - fail (and this is just coaching decisions)
I guess with that track record he's a natural for leading basketball operations... into the ground. After this debacle maybe he's humbled himself to run things his father did, by letting the basketball people do their jobs and just give insight on the major decisions. |
He's here to stay.
You, as a "fan", are free to leave though. It's the most sincere way to protest that his ownership is unacceptable to you. |
This current management team just set the record for worst record in Lakers history. Do you think this management team is doing a goof job? At what point and time would you want to replace this management team? |
It doesn't really matter if I'd want to replace the management team. I could hate the management team. However, my constantly complaining about it over and over and over again doesn't change anything.
But I guess it helps that I don't hate the management team. I'm willing to give them a fair shake. No team stays #1 forever. The job of this team is to get us back in contention in a respectable amount of time.
And looking at NBA history, 15 yrs would be mighty respectable.
However, if I kept thinking that they were making bad decisions that would result in them sucking forever then I'd stop being a fan of the team.
I used to ask Clippers fans how they could be fans of a team that was owned by such a horrible person. They didn't seem to care. They agreed he was horrible, but they stayed fans anyway. Never made sense to me. |
This management has been making decisions on it's own for about 2 years now, so if you think that is constantly complaining then so be it. During that time we fired MB, hired MDA over PJ, lost our own UFA Dwight Howard, and got exactly nothing for him, traded not 1 but 2 1st round picks for Nash who was an UFA. Not complaining about the money we paid Nash or the trade itself, it's about the TWO 1st round picks. And now there is some talk that we are looking to keep Gasol, please No.
We spent our 1st round draft picks like drunken sailors. This is they way I see it, we should of at least got 1 1st round pick for Dwight (after all 2 1rd. Picks for Nash) we should of used only 1 1st round pick for Nash and we should of traded Gasol and we should of received at least 1 1st Rd. picks for Gasol. If you add that up and I am being conservative we should have 5 1 Rd. picks between now and 2016.
Sure in a couple of the trades we might of had to of taken some bad contracts back but we would have the ability to rebuild with young players or trade the picks for pieces that fit. If you think that management has done a good job that's fine but I also have the right to complain hopeful without out bloggers complaining about my complaining 
Not to mention the Kobe extension. |
Actually it was 4 draft picks and 3-4 million to Suns for Nash. |
Yea, it was two second round picks as well as three mil in cash, however the two first round picks was over the top, I did not include the two second round picks because generally second round picks are not very valuable in the NBA there are exceptions of course. The bottom line is the Lakers gave up a lot for Nash, who was an UFA at the time.
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ALTHOUGH HE STANDS 6 FEET 2 INCHES, JIM BUSS ATTENDED JOCKEY SCHOOL WHEN HE WAS 20. |
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A Mad Chinaman
Star Player
Joined: 07 Apr 2005
Posts: 6142
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| Posted: Thu Apr 17, 2014 3:20 pm Post subject: |
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| kray28_ wrote: | | Nash Vegas wrote: | | Quote: | 3. Nepotism and cronyism can take a toll.
Lakers owner Jerry Buss, who died in 2013, was the most successful owner in pro sports history, with 10 NBA championship rings and another six appearances in the finals.
But he botched his most important move: the team’s succession plan. He gave effective control to his enigmatic and unproven son, Jim.
Elite organizations don’t do that; so the minute the elder Buss did this, the Lakers effectively renounced their status as an elite organization.
Today, the Lakers are an odd tangle of family dynamics. Jerry’s daughter Jeanie now claims to be the key leader for the Lakers. Yet her claim that “I’m the boss now” has lent about as much assurance to fans as Al Haig’s legendary assertion that “I am in control here.”
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A lot of fans didn't buy that either. |
I wish Jeanie were in control....but she's powerless to prevent Jim from nuking the franchise from orbit. |
If you don't believe Jeannie's directly spoken public words, obviously that you don't believe in Jeannie |
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ahaider
Star Player
Joined: 21 Feb 2012
Posts: 3501
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| Posted: Thu Apr 17, 2014 3:26 pm Post subject: |
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| LarryCoon wrote: | The main fault of the article is that it confuses correlation with causation. Let's outline his points (these are what they boil down to):
1. Management has been neglecting an aging roster for some time.
2. You need to avoid entrenchment of big egos.
3. Buss leaving his kids in charge when he died was a mistake.
4. You need to keep bringing in top talent.
And the entire article is essentially using the team's current status as evidence to prove his point -- the Lakers are lousy, and here's how they got that way.
But as others have mentioned, the author seems to have little appreciation of how the league works. Teams rise & fall in cycles. The great teams rise to the top, sustain it as long as possible, and then minimize the down side of the cycle by rebuilding in a hurry. The teams with the means to do so time it so everything falls off the books at once so they can wield maximal spending power. It's how the Lakers were successful in years past, and it's how the Heat did it in this decade.
The Lakers are at that point in the cycle, and it appears they are poised to complete the rebuild in just a couple seasons -- with this season & next being the principal transition years. This just happened to closely follow the death of Dr. Buss, so the author naturally conflated the two. But the plan was in place even before Dr. Buss died, and has only had minor tweaks since then.
So let's go through his points one at a time:
1. They haven't been neglecting an aging roster for a long time. As recently as last season they continued to bring in top talent in order to stay on top -- refer back to the predictions for the team when the Lakers acquired Howard & Nash. And at the time, the decision to bring in MDA to coach Nash could be defended, especially since the author himself says he's agnostic about Phil, who was the only other high-caliber choice. At least the Lakers were reuniting Nash with MDA, and there's a logic to having him coach a team led by Nash, Howard and Kobe.
The other point here is my central point -- the Lakers' overall game plan isn't to try to keep acquiring small pieces to maintain the roster. It's to play it out for all it's worth, then blow it up & start over quickly. It takes advantage of the fact that LA is a free agent destination, the Lakers are a team with resources, and LA fans don't necessarily have the patience to watch the team develop young core players. They have an overarching plan, they stuck to it, and as funny as it is to say, the current season is actually a part of the plan -- it's not evidence that they're doing anything wrong, and it's certainly not evidence for the author's first point.
2. Easy to say for companies in general, but a lot tougher when you're talking about family-owned businesses, where people are NECESSARILY going to be entrenched. This point to me is the weakest one of all -- he's encouraging turnover where it's not practical, and he's also assuming there's a pool of talent out there from which to draw. There really isn't.
3. What alternative is the author suggesting? My only alternative would be to swap Jim & Mitch in the hierarchy, so Jim reports to Mitch, Mitch reports to Jeanie, and Jeanie reports to the family trust (which includes Jim & Jeanie). That said, I think his criticisms of Jeanie are misfounded, and he doesn't recognize the importance of and weight carried by people in the position Jeanie occupies. To me it's a rather naive take, and the author was swayed by the more visible position that Jim occupies. And again, he's confusing correlation with causation -- he implied directly that the arrangement has resulted in the team's current poor position. It hasn't.
4. Okay, so Phil wasn't the solution, according to the author. And neither was MDA. So -- who was? Adelman? Like I said, you can at least defend the MDA choice (if it wasn't going to be Phil), even though it didn't work out with Nash & Howard. The rest of his point is just a whine demonstrating that he's as fickle as some of the fans he writes about. The Showtime era about which he waxes nostalgic also came to an end. The team had some down years before they rebuilt that roster, too. And that 1991 roster ALSO consisted of a top star who burned-out (basketball-wise) in Magic, a second-fiddle (Worthy) who also aged & reached the end of his career, a miscellaneous assortment of role players, and a mediocre coach. So what's so different between his nostalgia for the Showtime era and the roster of today? Not much, really.
The whole article is an exercise in misapplied angst. |
Awesome post 
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"The key to good decision making is not knowledge. It is understanding. We are swimming in the former. We are desperately lacking in the latter." - Malcom Gladwell |
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K28
Franchise Player
Joined: 29 Nov 2012
Posts: 10038
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| Posted: Thu Apr 17, 2014 3:36 pm Post subject: |
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| A Mad Chinaman wrote: | | kray28_ wrote: | | Nash Vegas wrote: | | Quote: | 3. Nepotism and cronyism can take a toll.
Lakers owner Jerry Buss, who died in 2013, was the most successful owner in pro sports history, with 10 NBA championship rings and another six appearances in the finals.
But he botched his most important move: the team’s succession plan. He gave effective control to his enigmatic and unproven son, Jim.
Elite organizations don’t do that; so the minute the elder Buss did this, the Lakers effectively renounced their status as an elite organization.
Today, the Lakers are an odd tangle of family dynamics. Jerry’s daughter Jeanie now claims to be the key leader for the Lakers. Yet her claim that “I’m the boss now” has lent about as much assurance to fans as Al Haig’s legendary assertion that “I am in control here.”
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A lot of fans didn't buy that either. |
I wish Jeanie were in control....but she's powerless to prevent Jim from nuking the franchise from orbit. |
If you don't believe Jeannie's directly spoken public words, obviously that you don't believe in Jeannie |
Actions speak louder than words. I'd love to believe that Jeanie was in complete control, but if that were true, she could rid us of Jim.
Last I checked, Jim Buss was still Executive VP of Player Personnel.
So prove to me you're in "complete control"., |
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A Mad Chinaman
Star Player
Joined: 07 Apr 2005
Posts: 6142
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| Posted: Thu Apr 17, 2014 3:43 pm Post subject: |
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| Voices wrote: | | bandiger wrote: | | Voices wrote: | | Reflexx wrote: | | Voices wrote: | | Reflexx wrote: | | LAkers 4 Life wrote: | | kray28_ wrote: | The primary issue is that Jim Buss is involved in any form of basketball operations. In Jeanie's case, being involved on the business side, she comes with the requisite business management credentials. But what credentials or any level of measurable merit does Jim bring with him?
So this point is a pretty important one and very accurate in terms of describing a certain cause of dysfunction within the organization. |
Let's take a look at Jim Buss' career as per wikipedia:
1.) Small business with friend - Failed after friend dies
2.) LA Lazers soccer team - Failed after team folded
3.) Horse trainer - Failed after being unprofitable
4.) LA Lakers - Rudy T - fail, Mike Brown - fail, Mike D'Antoni - fail (and this is just coaching decisions)
I guess with that track record he's a natural for leading basketball operations... into the ground. After this debacle maybe he's humbled himself to run things his father did, by letting the basketball people do their jobs and just give insight on the major decisions. |
He's here to stay.
You, as a "fan", are free to leave though. It's the most sincere way to protest that his ownership is unacceptable to you. |
This current management team just set the record for worst record in Lakers history. Do you think this management team is doing a goof job? At what point and time would you want to replace this management team? |
It doesn't really matter if I'd want to replace the management team. I could hate the management team. However, my constantly complaining about it over and over and over again doesn't change anything.
But I guess it helps that I don't hate the management team. I'm willing to give them a fair shake. No team stays #1 forever. The job of this team is to get us back in contention in a respectable amount of time.
And looking at NBA history, 15 yrs would be mighty respectable.
However, if I kept thinking that they were making bad decisions that would result in them sucking forever then I'd stop being a fan of the team.
I used to ask Clippers fans how they could be fans of a team that was owned by such a horrible person. They didn't seem to care. They agreed he was horrible, but they stayed fans anyway. Never made sense to me |
This management has been making decisions on it's own for about 2 years now, so if you think that is constantly complaining then so be it. During that time we fired MB, hired MDA over PJ, lost our own UFA Dwight Howard, and got exactly nothing for him, traded not 1 but 2 1st round picks for Nash who was an UFA. Not complaining about the money we paid Nash or the trade itself, it's about the TWO 1st round picks. And now there is some talk that we are looking to keep Gasol, please No.
We spent our 1st round draft picks like drunken sailors. This is they way I see it, we should of at least got 1 1st round pick for Dwight (after all 2 1rd. Picks for Nash) we should of used only 1 1st round pick for Nash and we should of traded Gasol and we should of received at least 1 1st Rd. picks for Gasol. If you add that up and I am being conservative we should have 5 1 Rd. picks between now and 2016.
Sure in a couple of the trades we might of had to of taken some bad contracts back but we would have the ability to rebuild with young players or trade the picks for pieces that fit. If you think that management has done a good job that's fine but I also have the right to complain hopeful without out bloggers complaining about my complaining
Not to mention the Kobe extension. |
Actually it was 4 draft picks and 3-4 million to Suns for Nash. |
Yea, it was two second round picks as well as three mil in cash, however the two first round picks was over the top, I did not include the two second round picks because generally second round picks are not very valuable in the NBA there are exceptions of course. The bottom line is the Lakers gave up a lot for Nash, who was an UFA at the time. |
Some additional info to consider
* They had a great trade that would have brought CP3 and others to the Lakers
* After an unprecedented move by Stern to cancel this trade, they managed to have a starting lineup that everybody had penciled into the Finals (Howard, Pau, World Peace, Kobe and Nash
* They traded draft choices that they anticipated would be very bad since they expected to win rings
* Jimmy was trained/mentored by the best in the business for many years.
* Nobody would have given a 1st round draft choice for Howard since he was a UFA.
* Knowing that Howard completely rejected utilizing his greatest offensive strength (P&R), his ISO stats have proven that he would not have thrived (or even learn) The Triangle and would have bolted anyway.
* Article is ignorant of Laker history where they have never "rebuild" - they just play to win championships.
* Injuries have been a HUGE factor. For those who say that the system is causing the injuries, it is saying that other systems (Coach T's Bulls, Pacers, Heat, Warriors, Grizzlies, Clippers) are less taxing
*
Lakers will return quickly.
Not sure if MDA, Pau and others will be part of the future -- but it will be a fascinating summer. |
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Omar Little
Moderator
Joined: 02 May 2005
Posts: 90306
Location: Formerly Known As 24
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| Posted: Thu Apr 17, 2014 9:28 pm Post subject: |
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Still ignoring Larry's post I see...
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“We must always take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented.” ― Elie Wiesel |
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TooMuchMajicBuss
Franchise Player
Joined: 17 Sep 2008
Posts: 21075
Location: In a white room, with black curtains near the station
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| Posted: Thu Apr 17, 2014 9:42 pm Post subject: |
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| 24 wrote: | | Still ignoring Larry's post I see... |
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