Luke Walton (Photo : Doug Pensinger | Getty Images Sport)
While veteran coaches are getting fired or on the hot seat on losing teams, one coach who is not even an official head coach is perched atop the NBA.
Luke Walton was named the interim coach of the Golden State Warriors when Steve Kerr needed to recover from back surgery.
Now, the Golden State Warriors will face a dilemma. With Walton's outstanding performance, will they even want Steve Kerr back? And if Kerr returns, a horde of teams will want Walton as their head coach since 15-0 looks pretty good on anyone's resume.
If fans had their way, foremost of those suitors would be the Walton's team as a player, the Los Angeles Lakers. In this Reddit thread, there was a call for "We need Luke" chants.
Not to say that the decision was unanimous. Some fans have their own misgivings, or at least the idea that Walton's record was not entirely because of his genius. That's fair, considering he's handling the defending champions with the reigning MVP playing like a man possessed. Walton will have nothing like that with the Lakers.
The pressure of "saving" the storied franchise might be too much for the young, neophyte coach. However, he has an endorsement from no less than Kobe Bryant who has anointed him as the next Phil Jackson.
Kobe laughing said he used to tease Luke Walton: "Told him he was the next Phil (Jackson) b/c he was an average player w/ a messed up back."
— Serena Winters (@SerenaWinters) November 23, 2015
But Kobe did note his potential:
Kobe on Luke Walton: "He always had a really brilliant mind & understanding flow & tempo & spacing & how to manage a team the right way." — Serena Winters (@SerenaWinters) November 23, 2015
While Kobe did explain that this was way back when Walton was still playing and they were teammates, but with Walton's current status, the parallels with the Zen Master have reached a whole new level.
With the protégé follow the footsteps of his mentor and bring the Lakers back to the promised land?
The Warriors will host the Lakers on Tuesday night aiming for the best start in NBA history. They are already tied with the record at 15-0. As Lakers Nation reported, Bryant will tease Walton on the Phil Jackson joke again, and he probably would want nothing less than to play the spoilers' role on his old teammate.
