Los Angeles Lakers head coach Luke Walton has been at the center of a media firestorm in recent days due to LaVar Ball insinuating that he wasn’t the right coach to lead the team anymore and that he had ‘lost’ the locker room.
The Lakers don’t seem to be in any rush to move on from Walton, and they aren’t the only ones to feel as though he’s doing a good job. Lakers rookie Kyle Kuzma went to bat for his coach this week, as did Walton’s former boss, Golden State Warriors head coach Steve Kerr, as well as other coaches across the NBA.
And while normally a player agent wouldn’t be the go-to voice for an opinion on a head coach, in this case given that Aaron Mintz works for fomer Lakers guard D’Angelo Russell, current forward Julius Randle and hoped-for free agency target Paul George, his thoughts on Walton are worth paying attention to.
According to Tania Ganguli of the L.A. Times, Mintz believes Walton is doing a terrific all-around job as head coach of the Lakers:
“I’ve been really impressed with the job Luke’s done. He’s really connected with my guys and created a culture where I feel these guys are being developed really well as young players in the NBA. Any NBA coaching job is difficult and each has its own unique set of challenges. I feel Luke and his staff have been doing an excellent job from what I’ve seen representing Julius and D’Angelo. I think Luke is doing an incredible job and is definitely the right guy for this team.”
How much influence player agents actually have on a free agent’s decision has been a hot topic around the Lakers this season because of LeBron James and Kentavious Caldwell-Pope sharing agent Rich Paul. Some believe the connection has affected the way the team has treated the latter.
But no matter how much sway agents ultimately have on their clients’ decisions, it certainly can’t hurt the team to have their coach thought of highly by an influential agent like Mintz.
This is even truer when you consider that Mintz has seen Randle’s minutes fluctuate and Russell unceremoniously shipped out of town. So if he’s still speaking positively of Walton, the head coach must be doing something right.
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