Report: Lakers want multiple head coaches on coaching staff; Sam Cassell, Scott Brooks among options

The Lakers will reportedly seek to build an experienced coaching staff around JJ Redick and hire multiple former head coaches.

The Lakers’ choice to hire JJ Redick is a risky one for obvious reasons. Without any experience, there are a ton of natural concerns that arise.

Most, if not all, of those concerns could be eased by making the right assistant coach hires. And the Lakers have put out all the signals that they intend to have an experienced coaching staff.

With Darvin Ham, the Lakers relinquished power to the first-time head coach to hire his staff, resulting in a whole lot of inexperience and no former head coaches. When they fired Ham, they cleaned house with that coaching staff as well.

Even before hiring Redick, the reports were that the Lakers were both going to be more involved in hiring assistant coaches and were going to invest more financially into it. If you just look at how much they were willing to give Dan Hurley — roughly $70 million — and the amount they gave Reddick — roughly $32 million — you can see that there’s a lot of money they could put toward a staff.

According to Dan Woike of the LA Times, the team is “expected to add multiple former head coaches” to the team’s staff. Both Woike and The Athletic reported the same names that the team is eyeing for the staff.

First, from The Athletic:

Assistant coaching candidates for Redick’s staff will include former head coach and recent Trail Blazers assistant Scott Brooks, former Lakers guard Rajon Rondo, ex-Laker and current Dallas Mavericks assistant Jared Dudley and Cassell, according to league sources.

And from the LA Times:

Former Oklahoma City Thunder and Washington Wizards coach Scott Brooks is a name that’s been linked to the Lakers. The Times previously reported that the Lakers had interest in former Laker Rajon Rondo and Dallas assistant (and former Laker) Jared Dudley for the staff. Dudley, though, is a valued member of Jason Kidd’s staff with the Mavericks, who are coming off a Finals appearance.

Those are a lot of familiar names in those reports. Scott Brooks was previously linked to the Lakers as part of Frank Vogel’s staff, but the Lakers were outbid by the Blazers.

Jared Dudley’s connections are also evident as he was part of the title-winning team and was very close to Anthony Davis and LeBron James. When they decided not to bring him back as a player or a coach, Dudley retired and left Los Angeles for Dallas to join Jason Kidd’s staff.

Then there’s Rajon Rondo. Again, he’s another for Laker who was part of that title-winning team and has the respect of AD and LeBron. However, he has not been part of any coaching staff before.

Rondo has had off-court issues as well that have to be mentioned. He was accused of brandishing a gun at his family in May of 2022 by the mother of his children, leading to an emergency protective order that was later dropped in June of the same year “after both parties ‘reached an agreement,’ according to court documents obtained by the Courier Journal.

There are other names that could be interesting options. Stan Van Gundy coached Redick at the beginning of his career and late and could be an option. Brett Brown has also been an assistant for a number of years after coaching Redick in Philadelphia.

The Lakers could go a number of ways with this staff, but it’s clear they need to surround Redick with experience and the options are out there. If they can get those hires right, it could set up both Redick and the Lakers for plenty of success.

You can follow Jacob on Twitter at @JacobRude.