One of the biggest moves the Los Angeles Lakers made this offseason was dismissing Byron Scott as head coach and replacing him with Luke Walton. Anticipation and excitement has already seemed to increase around the young Lakers as the players seem excited about Walton will bring to the team in its first year without Kobe Bryant.
Speaking of Kobe, he knows Walton very well as they were teammates, winning a pair of championships in 2009 and 2010, and he believes Walton will do a lot for this young roster.
In a recent interview with Mike Bresnahan of Time Warner Cable SportsNet, Kobe spoke about Walton bringing a championship foundation and a new offense to the team:
“He’s gonna have them play the game the right way. He’s gonna have the foundation of the team, it’s gonna be a championship foundation it’s not gonna be isolation ball. There’s gonna be a lot of ball movement, but ball movement with purpose so the players are gonna understand why they’re moving the ball in certain situations, which then makes you a very dangerous team because now you have players on the floor who can think on the fly and think together.”
That foundation is seemingly the most important thing to establish in this first season. Both Walton and rookie Brandon Ingram have spoken about establishing that foundation and that wins and losses aren’t important this year. If the Lakers are able to do that, it should only be a matter of time before the team returns to being a contender in the Western Conference.
As Kobe said, the Lakers have a ton of talent on this roster, and he clearly believes Walton is capable of bringing the group together and developing them. With the potential of both Walton and the entire roster, the Lakers will hope to turn some heads this season.