The Lakers lost game 4 to the Oklahoma City Thunder last night. Down 3-1 in their best of seven series, they are sunk. Next year Kobe will be a year older and the team will have to look to an as yet immature Andrew Bynum to carry more of the load.
What Lakers head man Jim Buss needs to understand is that head coach Mike Brown is a winner, but not a WINNER. Like Tom Hagen in The Godfather, Brown is a fantastic consigliere. He is second to no one in preparation, pre-game strategy, and delivering a winning record.
But he is not, as Michael Corleone points out to Tom, a wartime consigliere. When the playoffs get tough and it's winning time, his players do not respond to him. They make fundamental errors as if some confusion or lack of belief is hampering their ability to tap into their highest level of play.
Leadership is more than just knowledge and preparation, and Brown does not know how to inspire confidence in his team at the most crucial moments.
Magic Johnson addressed this when he talked about Brown being replaced if the Lakers lost to the Nuggets in round 1 of the playoffs. He understands that the other court families are getting stronger and that a coach who cannot get the job done when the crossfire is at its deafening height needs to be replaced.
Magic alluded to it first and I agree, the Lakers need a wartime consigliere.
In other notes:
Brown was brought in partly to emphasize defense. It seems other teams are putting up 100 points a game on the Lakers, either not knowing or heedless of what the coach was hired to do.
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