Daily Knicks
Fansided

Jerry West Take Jabs at Phil Jackson

By William Lee

facebooktwitterreddit

The NBA logo, Jerry West picked Pat Riley over Phil Jackson when asked who would have an easier time attracting free agents on Sirius XM Bleacher Report Radio’s “NBA Sunday Tip”.

"“It’s a little easier for Pat,’’ “He’s had a lot more experience in both sides in coaching and now in the front office. With Phil, it’s going to be interesting to see what happens back there. They didn’t have the kind of year I’m sure they wanted to have.”“He wants to have a team that will have his identity on it,’’ “A lot of people want to be critical. I wouldn’t be so critical because they need a fresh infusion of talent there and also people that will be able to play the way they want to play.“Phil was fortunate. He’s made a lot of money in this league. Even though he’s making a lot of money today, he wants to win. He’s a competitor. It will remain to be seen whether they’ll be able to turn their fortunes around. They have a lot of money to spend on free agents, but a lot of times people don’t want to play certain places for different reasons.’’"

More from Knicks News

West took a little jab at Jackson too, not that it is a secret…Jackson botched a couple of trades, ending up on the losing end of both. We are all seeing J.R. Smith and Iman Shumpert on the grand stage of the NBA Finals after a mid-season trade sent the both of them to the Cleveland Cavaliers. We also can not forget the lopsided trade that basically ended up being essentially Tyson Chandler for Jose Calderon last summer.

"Everyone in the league feels like they made two trades that made helped Cleveland tremendously and one that helped Dallas this year.’’“What he’s done there would be easy to criticize,’’ “He understood that team would be pretty good, but not at the level he’s won. If you’re not successful in getting free agents it will set their progress back. It’s a completely different challenge for him. He’s had teams with enormous talent. He’s coached them brilliantly and won championships, but it’s a different challenge for him.’’"

West of all people should know this best and can have some fun poking at Jackson, after all it was West who assembled the dynastic team of Shaquille O’Neal and Kobe Bryant for Jackson.

We can only hope that West is wrong…and that Phil Jackson with $26 million in cap space to play with can be enough to bring the New York Knicks back to relevancy. Although Jackson’s short track record of transactions so far with New York would show otherwise…

More from Daily Knicks

Home/Knicks News