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Missed opportunity Sixers' Brown had a chance to hire Lakers' Jackson
LOS ANGELES (AP) -- Phil Jackson might not be the Zen Master if Larry Brown had given him a job 20 years ago. Jackson was an assistant coach with the New Jersey Nets when Brown took over as head coach in 1981. Brown interviewed Jackson, but told him he already offered one staff job to Mike Schuler and had hired Bill Blair for another. Jackson moved to an announcing position that year, went on to coach the Chicago Bulls to six NBA titles and goes for his second consecutive championship with the Lakers when Los Angeles opens the NBA Finals against Brown's Philadelphia 76ers on Wednesday night. "Well, obviously, I was dumb," Brown said Tuesday when asked to recall why he didn't hire Jackson. "I don't really remember, and that's not to slight him. But you know, I only had two years there. He probably would've been the head coach of New Jersey and had a terrible career." All joking aside, Brown has been critical of Jackson recently. He was angered when Jackson said Lakers center Shaquille O'Neal should consider it a "slap in the face" that he finished third in the MVP voting behind winner Allen Iverson, of the Sixers, and San Antonio's Tim Duncan. Brown said he would like to see how Jackson would've fared coaching the Los Angeles Clippers, instead of inheriting a Lakers team that featured O'Neal and Kobe Bryant. But Brown backed off those comments Tuesday. "I was joking about that," he said. "I was critical of the things he said about Allen, and I'll always be critical of that. We wouldn't be here if this kid didn't bring us along for the ride. "The season he had was remarkable, and I don't think you have to bring attention to your own player at the expense of somebody who has had such a remarkable year, and that bothered me. I think if he had it to do all over again, he wouldn't have said it. I truly believe he said it out of respect for his own player." Jackson's coaching success will always be linked to having Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippen in Chicago and Shaq and Kobe in Los Angeles. While Brown has a reputation for rebuilding teams from the bottom, Jackson's critics say he never faced those challenges. "The year I sat out in retirement, I talked to a number of clubs," Jackson said. "I had to think about what it would be like to take a team that is in a franchise situation where they are in the top of the draft, potentially can lose 60 games, and how it would feel to be coaching in a situation where you know you are going out night after night not being able to support what you have to do as a basketball club because you are short personnel. "That did not appeal to me at all. I felt like having been through so many of those games over the course of my career, that my expertise is probably taking teams to the next level that are good teams." Brown gave Jackson credit for leading the Lakers to a championship when anything less would've been considered a failure. "We don't realize if you coach a team that's a great team, that's a lot more difficult I think in a lot of circumstances to get them to play to their potential," Brown said. "I think that's an amazing thing in itself. When the expectations are so high, not every coach is capable of bringing that out, bringing that potential out."
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