Tyronn Lue Will Meet With Luke Walton and Brian Shaw to Discuss Coaching LeBron James
Tyronn Lue told Tania Ganguli of The Los Angeles Times that he plans to tell Lakers coach Luke Walton and associate head coach Brian Shaw "LeBron's easy" when he meets with them for dinner in Las Vegas to discuss coaching the four-time MVP.
Over the last two-and-a-half seasons in Cleveland, Lue coached James with the Cavaliers. In 2016, the pair won Cleveland its lone NBA championship by overcoming a 3-1 deficit in the Finals to beat the Warriors, who Walton was an assistant coach for at the time.
"People get this whole thing built up like he's hard to coach, it's not," Lue told Ganguli. "LeBron's not the problem. It's the outside tension that's the problem. Just put added pressure immediately on the coaches, on his teammates. Now everything you do is under a microscope. … So it's going to be a totally different change for the Lakers. They'll be able to handle it. LeBron is easy to play with, very unselfish. LeBron can bring guys along, make sure they're doing the right thing. It's going to be good. The outside is what you've gotta be able to block out."
While Lue and James were together, fans frequently joked that although Lue was the coach in name, James actually held all the power in the relationship, especially since it was Lue's first gig as a head coach.
Walton could find himself in a similar predicament among spectators since he didn't become a head coach until the season after Lue got his job. Additionally, Walton, 38, is three years younger than Lue is, and Walton was taken 31 picks after James in the 2003 NBA draft.
Although that could create some outside drama, Lue said there are plenty of positives to get from working with James.
"Everybody he's touched is made better," Lue told Ganguli. "Family, friends, organizations, the city of Cleveland, his players, his coaches. He made everybody's life easier, everybody's better."
In two years as the Lakers coach, Walton has gone 61-103. During the 2015-16 season, he went 39-4 as the interim coach of the Warriors.
