Lakers Almost Traded for Now-Coach JJ Redick When He Was Still Playing

The first-year head coach almost played alongside LeBron James in LA.

Sep 25, 2024; El Segundo, CA, USA; Los Angeles Lakers coach JJ Redick at press conference at UCLA Health Training Center. Mandatory Credit: Kirby Lee-Imagn Images / Kirby Lee-Imagn Images

While he was still playing, first-year Los Angeles Lakers head coach JJ Redick almost suited up alongside 20-time All-Star LeBron James in L.A., sources inform Dave McMenamin of ESPN. McMenamin notes that Redick was on the New Orleans Pelicans at the time, meaning that this deal would have been discussed during 2019-20 or 2020-21 season.

Redick by that point was no longer the expert jump-shooter and off-ball cutter he was during his L.A. Clippers-era prime, but he was still a potent veteran offensive contributor. During his first season in New Orleans, he averaged a solid 15.3 points on .453/.453/.892 shooting splits, 2.5 rebounds and 2.0 assists across 60 games (36 starts). He could have slotted in as a less defensively-inclined iteration of championship Lakers Kentavious Caldwell-Pope or Danny Green.

As McMenamin notes, even though Redick and James' teams occasionally intersected in the postseason, Redick was rarely available. During the 2009 Eastern Conference Finals, Redick missed five of his Orlando Magic's six contests against James' Cleveland Cavaliers. Redick averaged a scant 17 minutes a night during his Milwaukee Bucks' 2013 first round meeting against James' Miami Heat.

McMenamin reports that Redick and James met up for a dinner to talk shop after L.A.'s In-Season Tournament Semifinals defeat of the New Orleans Pelicans on December 7, 2023. Los Angeles would go on to vanquish the Indiana Pacers during the In-Season Tournament finale.

Redick dined with James and his "Uninterrupted" production company co-founder Maverick Carter at Wynn Casino's Wing Lei restaurant.

"We discussed sort of the initial thoughts around some place for him to talk about basketball," Redick said. "It was really just like, 'Hey, this guy wants to do it. I want to do it. It's about basketball. It's the thing we love the most, so like, let's just put it out there.'"

That conversation quickly snowballed into James and Redick's short-lived-but-successful joint podcast, "Mind The Game."

"After the initial sit down, I sort of pushed," Redick said. "I said, 'We can't have this be anything else than what it is. This is as pure as it gets for this space. I don't want to water it down with anything else. This is really good.'"

As McMenamin notes, "Mind The Game" notched over 500,000 YouTube subscribers and logged1.5 million average viewers an episode. When Redick assumed the Lakers head coaching gig, he announced that both his podcasts, "Mind The Game" and "The Old Man And Three," would end. He also (obviously) stepped away from his obligations as an ESPN broadcaster.

"We had fun during our podcast," James told McMenamin. "It's very easy to talk to JJ. ... He's smart as hell, if anybody watched the podcast."

More Lakers: Anthony Davis Reveals What Went Wrong for Lakers Last Season