How coach JJ Redick, LeBron James and the Lakers got here - ESPN

TWO WEEKS BEFORE the start of training camp, JJ Redick sat in a workroom at the Los Angeles Lakers practice facility with his legs crossed, a team-issued quarter-zip up top and Nike Kobe sneakers down below. («I never wore them when I played,» Redick told ESPN, «but now that I'm here, [Lakers GM] Rob [Pelinka] has the hookup.») Redick had just finished running a sizable portion of the Lakers roster through a voluntary offseason practice, cognizant of what little time remained before the curtain opens on his first season as an NBA coach.

«Put 45 [minutes] on the clock, got right through it,» Redick said of his approach to practice that day. «Everything you do is, like, very thoughtful.»

Redick, 40, already looks the part, with his black, coiffed hair and put-together appearance drawing comparisons within the organization to former «Showtime» coach Pat Riley. And he sounds the part, too. As a clear and confident communicator, Redick navigates the interview with ease until the newly minted coach is asked a simple yet essential question:

Why did you take this job?

«Um,» Redick, after pausing a beat, responds. «That's probably the best question.»

Three years into retiring from a 15-season playing career, Redick detoured from burgeoning media stardom to shoot his shot with the Lakers. He has yet to coach a professional basketball game in any capacity. Not as a head coach. Not as an assistant. Not even roaming the sidelines for a summer league game.

But the self-described «basketball sicko,» despite the challenges ahead for a franchise seemingly in flux as it attempts to navigate the end of LeBron James' career, the beginning of Bronny's and keeping Laker Nation satisfied by competing in the present without forsaking the