JJ Redick had always fought.
He fought the jeers ACC crowds poured onto him while he became one of the best — and most hated — players in college basketball history.
He fought the idea that his game wouldn’t translate to the pros, that the early-season struggles weren’t going to be indicative of who he could become. He fought to become one of the best role players in the league, and then fought against time and an aging body to stay there.
In retirement from the sport, he fought against complacency. He stayed busy as a podcaster, an entrepreneur and a broadcaster.
But early last spring, Redick decided it was time to stop fighting. It was time to give in.
“At some point, you just kinda have to listen to your soul and not be afraid of the consequences of whatever happens afterwards,” Redick told the Times. “You just got to go for it I guess.”
And so, Redick made up his mind. He was going to listen to his soul. He didn’t just want to coach in the NBA.
He needed to.
Tuesday night after the Lakers beat the Timberwolves 110-103, Redick stood in the hallway with his hair still wet from the celebratory bath his players gave him in the locker room. There was no doubt. This was where he was supposed to be.
But, to be fair, that would’ve been the case regardless.
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“I’d say every day has reinforced that,” Redick said. “That’s the honest truth. From the first day of actual work to now, every day has been awesome. That’s the fact.”
Before the Lakers’ opener Tuesday, a game they won with precision and execution more than they did with shot-making, Redick recommitted to separating the work from the results.
“Yeah, I’m not going to get caught up in the result. It’s a long season. We have talked since day one about being about the process,” Redick said pregame. “And there were things that we emphasized this morning that we know we have to do to compete with Minnesota. And if we do those things, we can get better and learn and grow. We would all like to win. I’d like to go 82-0. But I fundamentally just I can’t get caught up in, in wins and losses. It’s going to drive me crazy if we lose. I will tell you that.
“But this will be a great growth opportunity for us against this team if we can execute the things we’ve emphasized over the last three days.”
Tuesday, they did.
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While the emphasis on three-point shooting dominated discussions around the team in the preseason, they made just 5 of 30 on opening night. However the threat of shooting, combined with organized cutting and spacing, got the Lakers multiple easy baskets.
“The game plan, the schemes that he had on both ends of the floor, he trusts us,” Anthony Davis said. “We trust him, as far as what he teaches us, what he wants us to do on the floor on both ends and it’s our job to go execute it. I think we were very prepared tonight.”
Davis benefited more than anyone Tuesday, leading the Lakers in minutes, field goal attempts, points, rebounds and blocks.
“AD was phenomenal tonight,” Redick said. “Felt like he attacked the game the right way.”
The new Lakers coach also navigated the most anticipated substitution of the year, putting LeBron and Bronny James into the game together in the second quarter for a short, three-minute shift.
“In the battle of competition, I was wondering during a deadball why everybody started cheering so loud and then I realized what was happening and I was like, ‘Oh, that’s cool. That’s cool,’” Redick said. “We felt like in terms of the feel of the game being able to play those last few minutes with those two guys together — [Austin Reaves] was on the floor, AD was on the floor, obviously LeBron was on the floor – it presented an opportunity for Bronny.
“He’s played well, he’s competed throughout preseason, just to give him a chance to get it going in a regular season game.”
In Redick’s eyes, Tuesday was about the players — about Davis’ dominance and Rui Hachimura’s force and Austin Reaves’ hustle and D’Angelo Russell’s timely playmaking. And not about him.
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He said as much pregame.
“I think whatever I envisioned in my previous life, that’s gone. This is who I am now. I’m a coach. And so I don’t feel like tonight is at all about me. It’s about our team,” he said.
But as his usually styled hair started to dry out late Tuesday night, Redick remembered when his identity flipped. It was before he last season had even ended, before the Lakers had a vacancy, before his work as a broadcaster had finished. His conversations with his performance coach, they know all centered on one thing.
“Every session, we talked about it,” Redick told the Times. “At that point, I just said, ‘This is what I’m supposed to be doing right now. This is who I am.’”
His soul was talking to him. And it didn’t take a win Tuesday for Redick to be glad that he decided to listen.
But it sure didn’t hurt, either.
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This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
