The Lakers are targeting Dan Hurley to be their head coach, Adrian Wojnarowski reported this morning, preparing to offer the UConn icon a massive contract to lure him to podunk little Los Angeles, away from the glittering lights of Storrs. Wojnarowski reports that the Lakers value Hurley’s track record of player development, noting that LeBron James has spoken positively of UConn’s offensive schemes under the small, angry, bald man. He also points out (in more veiled terms than these) that a staff familiar with developing 19-year-olds might be Bronny James’s best hope at a competitive career. The implication there is that Hurley might bring Luke Murray and the rest of UConn’s vaunted assistant coach brigade with him to Murray’s birthright kingdom of Hollywood. Lastly, Wojnarowski writes, “Hurley has been at the forefront of the Lakers’ search from the beginning of the process,” in a big middle finger to Shams Charania, who has spent the last couple months hammering LeBron James and Rich Paul’s preferred narratives on multiple topics only to get caught with his pants down after reporting on Tuesday that the Lakers were “zeroing in” on JJ Redick.
To be fair to Shams, he left enough caveats in Tuesday’s report that if the Lakers do hire Hurley, he won’t have been technically wrong. He did not, however, mention Hurley a single time on Tuesday, which looks quite foolish with the benefit of hindsight. Given the reports elsewhere about Redick recruiting a potential assistant coaching staff*, there’s an appearance here that Redick was trying to push a big narrative, and with Redick and LeBron hosting a podcast together, it’s possible Shams took that bait in an attempt to be plugged into LeBron’s camp. Given Woj is a Northeast guy and once wrote a book about Hurley’s dad, it’s possible Woj is taking this more from Hurley’s camp than the Lakers. It’s hard to believe Woj wouldn’t have reliable Lakers sources, though. His Hurley reporting is probably accurate. Hurley might not take the job, but the Lakers are probably preparing to offer him a massive contract. Which makes the question, for those of us who guiltily love the Woj vs. Shams soap opera, whether 1) Shams doesn’t have the access to LeBron’s camp he pretends to have or 2) LeBron truly isn’t involved in this hiring process, through his own decision or that of the Lakers. As a certain governor once said: “What is truth?”
The more important question for our planet—more important than even Woj vs. Shams—is whether Dan Hurley would be a good reality television star. We wrote yesterday that JJ Redick was built for reality TV, back when we trusted Shams’s reporting on the hire even if we took the opportunity to make fun of the would-be NBA narrator. For better or worse, then, our criteria is reality TV. If a guy would be good at navigating a reality TV show, he’d be a good coach of the Lakers. I’m sorry, but we cornered ourselves on this. Those are the rules.
The answer?
Dan Hurley would do terribly at reality television.
The deal with Dan Hurley is that he used to be a pure nut. He was a kook, and he was nothing more than that. Dan Hurley was an unhinged man stalking the sideline looking for fellow Northeasterners to yell at while his eyes convulsed, trying to escape their sockets and take vengeance upon the world. This was great. If you aren’t self-aware, it’s easier to not care what people think about you. If you don’t care what people think about you, you can focus on more important matters, and you can make decisions with a clearer head. This is what Mick Cronin taught us in those early years at UCLA. You don’t have to be handsome to perform well amongst the beautiful.
Where things went wrong for Hurley was when he discovered he was liked. People got a kick out of him. People even started respecting him. New Jersey basketball’s most overshadowed little brother finally had people who cared what he did and watched what he said. Dan Hurley became sentient. One day, we will see that as his downfall.
The first red flag was the Creighton incident. Not the part where Hurley told a Creighton fan, “I will knock you out,” but afterwards, when Hurley tweeted out a Game of Thrones meme in reference to the loss and to the exchange. Hurley was pandering, and this seemed new. In the past, we would have expected a creature like Hurley to tell the Creighton fan, “I will knock you out,” and then move on with his life. Instead, Hurley needed to cater to the public.
The second red flag—the moment we knew with certainty that Dan Hurley had thoughts and was interacting with his fellow humans—was when Hurley claimed he was trying to get the officials to not eject that St. John’s fan in the red jacket during the Big East Semifinals. We don’t know for sure, but it really, really looked like Hurley was trying to get him ejected, and then it really, really seemed like Hurley wanted his bros in the media to believe he wasn’t doing that at all, and that the maniacal yelling and cursing was all in good fun. Getting a fan ejected is always a sketchy move. Getting a fan ejected and then lying about it? If that’s what happened, that’s the bizarre kind of social maneuvering that only works on people with terrible understandings of social norms themselves. People like Jeff Goodman and his sidekick.
That kind of thing isn’t going to work in the NBA. It works in the Big East, but it will not work with the Los Angeles Lakers. Not because NBA fans are less willingly gullible than Big East fans (though that’s probably also true and especially true regarding the Lakers), but because the temptations will be too great for any person to handle. If you’re going to coach the Los Angeles Lakers or star on the Real World, you either have to be so deft at navigating drama that you can always make yourself king or you must not care what people think at all. Anywhere in between leaves you screwed. Dan Hurley is in between. Dan Hurley, from what we can tell, cares what people think, and he is not adept at navigating The Scene. There is a real chance that if Hurley accepts the job and coaches the Los Angeles Lakers, his own desire to be liked will consume him.
Luke Murray can design a hell of an offensive set. But can he keep his coach from spending three weeks considering LASIK because he noticed there weren’t a lot of people in glasses at Venice Beach?
*Those Redick assistants reports make Murray more relevant too, by the way. It’s possible the Lakers have been asking about assistants, which would probably be smart because there’s still a theory that Dan Hurley is a Dabo Swinney, a solid leader but one who needs geniuses around him to achieve substantial success.
Update: From JJ Redick, on the GoJo and Golic Show: “In terms of Shams, that will be addressed once the season is over…I don’t mean any job. I mean Shams.” See? The guy was built for reality TV.
Etc.
- Here’s something I definitely wouldn’t say: Are women bad friends? If I were to say it, I’d tell the story of how every time a different girl in my high school classes was sick, the rest of the girls in my classes would talk shit about her all day despite ostensibly being her friends. I’d then compare this to WNBA players’ welcome of Caitlin Clark, citing another straight white man—Geno Auriemma—in my discussion. Not saying that, though. Can you imagine if I said that? That would be an unforced error. Instead, I will say: The WNBA is in its altercation era!! Slay, queens!!!
- I do think one of the issues the WNBA is facing is that its new fans don’t know a lot about sports. For example! Usually, if you are upset with a player committing extracurricular violence, you don’t accost them at their hotel when they come to your town. That does not help anything, and it is a weird thing to do. Of course, it’s also possible that WNBA players aren’t used to people pointing cameras at them and misinterpreted the incident, but again, that might be heresy, so I am going to blame the weirdo in D.C. last night and accept the narrative that he tried to confront Chennedy Carter.
- NHL Utah is down to six possible names. In order from best to worst: Outlaws, Blizzard, Hockey Club, Mammoth, Yeti, Venom. Of the six, only Venom is really unacceptable, a youth baseball team coached by the biggest loser of all the dads. Mammoth and Yeti would be better if they were plural. Blizzard would probably also be better plural, but it works the same way Avalanche works. I love Outlaws. Outlaws keeps growing on me. I want a Utah Outlaws sweater. The existence of the Utah Outlaws is a legitimate threat to my Ottawa Senators fanhood, solely because of what a good name it is. (Update: You can vote for a name using this link. I am legitimately worried that Venom could win on a plurality. If all the losers vote for Venom and all the non-losers split their votes, Venom could win with as little as 17% of the vote. Hopefully they let the election go to a runoff.)
- Love the move by Wolverhampton to lose the VAR vote 19–1. Context here: VAR is annoying and neither as accurate nor as efficient as replay review should be. Wolverhampton asked the rest of the Premier League to get rid of it. We all hate, VAR, right guys?! …Guys?
- The NHL’s alternative ASL broadcasts for the Stanley Cup Finals are a cool idea. Great use of ESPN+.
- Lastly, Mike Tauchman. UP–NW Metra line forever. The least satisfying walk-off home run over a rival in the history of baseball, but a walk-off home run nonetheless.
