What Can Brown Do For You?

Today's news that the Los Angeles Lakers hired former Cleveland Cavaliers coach Mike Brown to succeed Phil Jackson came as a surprise to some.  But for those of us that follow the game and understand the needs of the various teams in the Association, the Lakers could not have found a more appropriate replacement for the Zen Master. While Phil Jackson is undoubtedly the greatest coach in professional basketball - if not professional sports - he was understandably tired of coaching, and given the Lakers' collapse down the stretch in the playoffs, he was being tuned out by his players. As such, the hope seems to be that Mike Brown can infuse the veteran Lakers with new energy.


It is no secret that what Mike Brown does well is defense. Over five seasons in Cleveland, Brown won 272 games and lost 138, and much of this was due to the fact that the Cavaliers were consistently in the top-7 in defensive efficiency. He helped develop LeBron James from a rather poor defender in to one of the premier wing stoppers in the NBA.  Additionally, he made lemonade out of lemons. Aside from James, one can argue that Brown's second best player over the five years in Cleveland was Mo Williams or Anderson Varejao.

With that in mind, it is certainly going to be interesting to see how he fares at the helm of a Lakers roster that boasts four bona fide studs (Kobe, Pau, Lamar and Bynum) who can either create their own offense or finish strong inside.  I expect to see him maximize their defensive abilities - particularly pushing Gasol to "get at it" on that end - and help them shore up the weaknesses that were exposed against the New Orleans Hornets and even more so against the Dallas Mavericks.  Specifically, look for Brown to change up the defensive schemes that Jackson had put in place. Under Jackson the Lakers were fantastic at defending the 3-point line - at least in the regular season - and terrible at defending against long two-pointers and the pick-and-roll.

The big knock on Brown has always been that he does not seem to have much of a knack for coaching on the offensive end. Nevertheless, his teams in Cleveland the past few years were actually marginally more efficient on the offensive end than those teams in Los Angeles (never mind the fact that he did not end the season sporting gaudy jewelery as the Lakers did.) Still, offense is something that a strong assistant can bring to the table. Defense is a state of mind, and the backbone behind a team remodel. We saw that in 2008 when Kevin Garnett teamed up with the Celtics and bought in to the Tom Thibodeau defensive scheme, and this year we have seen it both in Chicago under now head coach Thibodeau and in Miami under Erik Spoelstra. 

At the end of the day, the Lakers got the best coach out there. There were some unproven coaches (Brian Shaw and Chuck Person to name a few) who might have made sense from a continuity perspective. And then there were some veteran managers (Larry Brown and Rick Adelman) who likely would have been more about signing a big name rather than signing the right name. The Lakers landed a young coach (Brown is 41) and a proven coach (he was the 2009 NBA Coach of the Year and led the Cavaliers to the 2007 NBA Finals). But most importantly, the Lakers snared a coach who is successful enough to not be overwhelmed by the man he is replacing, and humble enough to understand his place in it all.