Dan Hurley had 70 million reasons to take the Lakers job. There are some things that money can’t buy though, and he decided to return to UConn to try for three national championships in a row rather than take Los Angeles up on its six-year offer.
ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski cited Hurley’s desire to pursue that third title, along with a significant contract extension that he is expected to receive as reasons Hurley stayed put. Left unsaid was another factor — that the Lakers job simply isn’t that appealing.
That statement might sound crazy given that the Lakers are a prestige franchise with 17 championships. They have a roster that made it to the Western Conference Finals in 2023 behind two All-NBA players in Anthony Davis and LeBron James.
While that all sounds good on paper, the reality is that the franchise has an uphill battle ahead of them until LeBron James retires. No Lakers head coach has lasted more than three years since Phil Jackson retired in 2011. Their next coach will likely continue that trend after a few miserable years at the helm.
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Why Lakers job is one of the worst in the league
This Lakers roster is setting a coach up for failure
The expectation for any new Lakers coach will be nothing short of winning a championship. And even if that lofty goal is met, 2020 championship coach Frank Vogel will tell you that your job security still might not last long.
For the Lakers to win it all, they are going to have to leapfrog a ton of teams in the Western Conference. They had to fight their way through the Play-In Tournament just for a chance to compete in the playoffs this past season, where they were eliminated in five games by the Nuggets.
Those with gold and purple-colored glasses will point to Darvin Ham as the reason for those shortcomings. But Ham had the team overachieving in 2023, and he wasn’t the one defending Nikola Jokic during either of the team’s past two playoff eliminations.
This Lakers roster is good, but they are working from a talent deficit compared to the elite teams in the league. LeBron and AD had unusually good health this year, and that still wasn’t enough for the team to finish better than eighth in a stacked Western Conference. Both players will be a year older next season and don’t have much time left at the top.
The Lakers do have some avenues to improve their team. They will have three future first-round picks available to move after the draft. It would be surprising if they used all three for a short term upgrade though — they passed on a similar chance to improve at this past trade deadline, realizing they were too far away from their goal to waste future assets.
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The Lakers job has too much drama around it
What makes the Lakers job even less appealing than the oversized expectations is the sideshow that comes with it. No job comes with a higher level of scrutiny. Ham could no longer bear it, begging fans to take the long view.
“I’m tired of people living and dying with every single game we play,” Ham said at the midway point of last season. “It’s ludicrous, actually. It’s like, ‘C’mon man, this is a marathon.'”
That attitude won’t get you very far in Los Angeles. The Lakers are in national headlines no matter what they do, or what time of the year it is. For the second straight year, talk of the franchise has taken over coverage at the start of the NBA Finals (remember LeBron’s supposed retirement contemplations from last year?).
That intense pressure is exacerbated even further from within the organization, where leaks to the press are the norm.
Ham had no less than six anonymous sources throwing him under the bus to The Athletic’s Shams Charania midway through the year. That is in addition to an active player, Christian Wood, publicly tweeting “lol” in a passive-aggressive response to a lack of playing time. None of that is even taking into account the biggest pressure point of all.
Coaching LeBron James in his final act is an unwinnable responsibility
LeBron’s greatness is undeniable, but he has not been an easy player to coach throughout his career. He will be on his 10th coach once the Lakers make a decision. He holds all of them to an extremely high standard, even trying to get Heat coach Erik Spoelstra fired early in their relationship together.
MORE: Looking at all nine of LeBron James’ previous NBA coaches
Getting along with LeBron is the most important part of the Lakers job. Once a coach loses him, they’re done. What makes it even harder is that James is still an All-NBA player but clearly in decline. The final stage of his career will have to be handled with extreme grace. And then there’s the Bronny issue.
Imagine if Bronny James gets drafted onto this team, which seems a likely possibility. That will create one of the strangest locker rooms that the NBA has seen. The next Lakers coach will have to develop Bronny to LeBron’s liking, keep LeBron’s legacy intact, take an eighth place roster to a championship, and maintain that level or risk being fired a few years later.
There will be better jobs for Hurley to choose from down the line, and he knows it. When looking at those challenges, winning three national championships in a row seems like a breeze.