Lakers head coach Byron Scott’s first year at the helm in Los Angeles has been nothing short of disastrous—the injury-racked team has lost the most games ever in franchise history, and the level of distrust between the coach and his players is higher than ever.
Scott, who’s never shied away from publicly trashing his squad, says he wouldn’t trust many Lakers in the proverbial foxhole.
Byron on critical comments on players: "It's called coaching."
— Mark Medina (@MarkG_Medina) April 8, 2015
One Laker responded positively to the putdown, saying that Scott said what needed to be verbalized.
Per the OC Register:
Following practice Monday, Scott used a war reference to describe his process of evaluating players over the final week of the season, saying he wanted “to see how many of these guys that I would love to be in a foxhole with.” […] “I got a sense,” he said. “I got a sense of a whole lot of them I wouldn’t want to be in a foxhole with. Think they’d end up shooting me in the back.”
Scott has done little to conceal which players he envisions as pieces of L.A.’s future, heaping praise on rookie Jordan Clarkson, while offering only the faintest praise for (Nick) Young, Jordan Hill and Jeremy Lin.
“He said what needed to be said,” Ed Davis said. […] “He meant it 100 percent,” Davis said. “I don’t think he’s saying it just to say it.” […] “All season long our guys have been putting in a hell of an effort,” Scott said. “No matter if we’ve been outmanned, or whatever the case may be. I thought the last two games we didn’t come close. So that frustration boiled over, and at that particular time there were a lot of guys I wouldn’t want to be in a foxhole with. And I want guys that I know I can go to battle with. That’s the bottom line.”
