There has been plenty of noise surrounding Los Angeles Lakers head coach Darvin Ham and his safety at the helm of the roster. Entering the 2023-24 season with championship expectations, the Lakers have floated around .500 despite having near full health from LeBron James and Anthony Davis.
Much of the criticism for this has fallen on Ham’s inconsistent rotations and lack of creative offensive and defensive schemes. Firing a head coach midway through the season, though, is usually not a means of improving the current situation.
The Milwaukee Bucks, at 30-13, fired head coach Adrian Griffin, but did so specifically with the idea of landing Doc Rivers as his immediate replacement, as he had already been around the team in an advisory role. The Lakers would not have options better than Ham to take over at this stage of the season.
It’s for that reason, and recent improved play from L.A., that Ham’s job security is seemingly safe through the remainder of the 2023-24 NBA campaign, according to Jovan Buha of The Athletic:
My understanding is that Ham will be safe through the rest of the season. There is always a chance things with the Lakers go haywire, as they nearly did at the beginning of January when the team lost four consecutive games with matchups with the LA Clippers, Phoenix Suns, Oklahoma City Thunder and Dallas Mavericks looming. But the Lakers responded well by winning four of their next six games, including victories over the Clippers, Thunder and Mavericks in impressive fashion. Those results quieted the noise around the performance of the coaching staff.
After the aforementioned four-game losing streak, the Lakers were 17-19 and falling out of the Play-In Tournament entirely. At that rate, firing Ham may not have fixed all of their problems, but it could have provided a new fire and motivation for the remainder of the season.
Ham, shortly after, made the switch to the season’s original starting lineup of James, Davis, D’Angelo Russell, Austin Reaves and Taurean Prince. The Lakers quickly became one of the league’s most efficient offenses in that time frame.
The Lakers seem confident that they have the tools to compete for a championship this season, and clearly believe that Ham is capable of leading that charge. If not, they’ll quickly reassess in the offseason.
LeBron James happy with Darvin Ham stabilizing rotations
Certain things seem to be clicking for the Lakers and LeBron James still feels they need more time to keep building on this, but he is happy that Ham’s lineups and rotations have been consistent as of late.
“Good thing Coach Ham did is just said, ‘Listen is the lineup that we sticking with and we’re gonna go with that.’ Rotation has been good,” James recently said.
“Our starting lineup has been consistent over the last few games. And we have a lot of playmaking and a lot of shot-making in that first unit, and then we got guys to come off the bench and know their roles and come in and play at a high level.”
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