Is Stan Van Genius hating? Just remember Stan, 11 rings and counting.
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Hoops World: Phil Jackson has been known to play mind games with his opponents. On Tuesday, he did just that in an interview with ESPN 1000 regarding a potential coaching situation in Miami.
“The scenario that sits kind of behind the scene is that eventually these guys that were recruited — Bosh and James — by Pat Riley and Micky Arison, the owner, are going to come in and say, `We feel you [Riley] can do a better job coaching the team,’” Jackson said. “‘We came here on the hopes that this would work,’ and whatever, I don’t know. That’s kind of my take on it, is that eventually if things don’t straighten out here soon, it could be the [Stan] Van Gundy thing all over again.”
While Erik Spoelstra wouldn’t get into Jackson’s comments during morning shootaround, aside from saying he laughed about them with his assistant coaches, Stan Van Gundy had some strong words for the Los Angeles Lakers head coach after being called out.
Van Gundy hadn’t heard the comments prior to speaking with reporters but after being told what was said, he shook his head and laughed.
“Well first of all, obviously Phil has no idea what the ‘Van Gundy situation’ was. Even though he coaches in our league, he certainly had no inside knowledge of that so any analogy he would make to my situation would be totally useless because he doesn’t have any clue what the situation was in that case,” Van Gundy said.
He was also taken aback that another head coach would make those comments.
“First of all, to second guess another coach and to comment on a situation he knew nothing about is inappropriate and it’s also ignorant. I don’t mean that commenting on Phil’s intelligence; he’s obviously a very smart guy. I mean that as ignorant because he doesn’t know what that situation was and he doesn’t know what the situation in Miami is now. I don’t think, unless their relationship has changed drastically, that he and Pat talk on a regular basis so I doubt he would have any information whatsoever on what’s going on in Miami,” Van Gundy said.
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