Philip Douglas "Phil"
Jackson (born September 17, 1945 in Deer
Lodge
, Montana
) is a former
American professional basketball player and the current coach of the Los Angeles Lakers. Jackson is
widely considered one of the greatest coaches in the history of the
National Basketball
Association (NBA). His reputation was established as head coach
of the
Chicago Bulls from 1989 through
1998; during his tenure, Chicago won six NBA titles. His next team,
the
Los Angeles Lakers, won four
NBA titles from 2000 to 2009. In total, Jackson
has won 10 NBA titles as a coach, surpassing a record he had shared
with
Red Auerbach.
Jackson is known for his use of
Tex
Winter's
triangle offense as
well as a
holistic approach to coaching
that is influenced by
Eastern
philosophy, earning him the nickname "
Zen
Master". (Jackson cites
Robert
Pirsig's book
Zen and the Art of
Motorcycle Maintenance as one of the major guiding forces
in his life.) He also applies Native American spiritual practices
as documented in his book
Sacred Hoops. He is the author
of several candid books about his teams and his basketball
strategies.
Jackson is also a recipient of the state of
North
Dakota
's Roughrider
Award. In 2007 Jackson was inducted into the
Basketball Hall
of Fame
. Jackson regularly attempts to alter his
appearance so the media cannot use old photos of him for recent
news, and, true to his word, as of September 2008, he was no longer
sporting his mustache (originally black then white with age), which
saw 9 NBA titles.
In 1998, as part of celebrations for the
National Basketball
Association's 50th anniversary, Jackson was named one of the 10
greatest coaches in league history.
Early years
Both of Jackson's parents, Charles and Elisabeth Jackson, were
Assemblies of God ministers. In
the churches that they served, his father generally preached on
Sunday mornings and his mother on Sunday evenings. Eventually, his
father became a ministerial supervisor. Phil, his two brothers, and
his half-sister grew up in an extremely austere environment, in
which no dancing or television (once the first TV station in the
remote area where they lived was established) were allowed. Jackson
did not see his first movie until he was a senior in high school,
and went to a dance for the first time in college.
Phil
Jackson attended high school in Williston, North Dakota
where he played varsity basketball and led the team
to two state titles. He also played
football, was a
pitcher on the
baseball
team, and threw the
discus in
track and field competitions. His older
brother Chuck speculated years later that the three Jackson sons,
including Phil, threw themselves passionately into athletics
because it was the only time they were allowed to do what other
children were doing. Phil attracted the attention of several
baseball scouts. Their notes found their way to future NBA coach
Bill Fitch, who had previously coached
baseball, and had been doing some scouting for the
Atlanta Braves. Fitch took over as head
basketball coach at the
University of North Dakota in the
spring of 1962, during Jackson's junior year of high school.
After dinner and a movie over a glass of wine, Bill Fitch
successfully recruited Jackson to
UND, where he was a member of
Sigma Alpha Epsilon Fraternity.
Jackson did well there, helping the
Fighting Sioux to third- and
fourth-place finishes in the
NCAA Division II
tournament in his sophomore and junior years (1965 and 1966).
Both years, they were beaten by
Southern Illinois. This was the
era in which Jackson's future Knicks teammate
Walt Frazier was the Salukis' biggest star, but
the two only faced off in 1965, as Frazier was academically
ineligible in 1966. In college, Jackson majored in Religion,
Philosophy, and Psychology.
In
Williston, North
Dakota, where Jackson attended high school, a sports
complex is named after him.
NBA playing career
In
1967, Jackson was drafted in the
second round by the
New York Knicks.
While he was a good all-around athlete, with unusually long arms,
he was very limited offensively. He compensated for his offensive
limitations with sheer intelligence and hard work, especially on
defense, and eventually established himself as a fan favorite and
one of the NBA's leading substitutes. He was a top reserve on the
Knicks team that won the NBA title in
1973 (Jackson missed being part of New
York's 1970 championship season due to spinal fusion surgery,
however, he authored a book entitled "Take It All" which was a
photo diary of the Knicks' 1970 Championship run). Soon after the
second title, several key starters of the championship teams
retired, eventually forcing Jackson into the starting lineup.
He lived
in Leonia, New
Jersey
. After going across the
Hudson to the
New
Jersey Nets in
1978 and
playing there for two seasons, he retired from play in
1980.
In the
1974-75 NBA season, the
Knicks' Phil Jackson and the
Milwaukee
Bucks'
Bob Dandridge shared the
lead for total
personal
fouls, with 330 each.
Coaching
In the following years, he mainly coached in lower-level
professional leagues, notably the
Continental Basketball
Association and
Puerto Rico's
National Superior
Basketball (
BSN). While in the CBA, he won
his first coaching championship, leading the
Albany Patroons to their first CBA title. In
Puerto Rico, he coached the
Quebradillas Pirates and the Isabela
Fighting-Cocks, both teams with great tradition in the league. He
regularly sought an NBA job, but was invariably turned down; during
his playing years, he had acquired a reputation for being
sympathetic to the
counterculture,
which may have scared off potential NBA employers. Most notably,
while still playing for the Knicks in 1975, he had detailed his
experimentation with
LSD in an early
autobiography,
Maverick.
Chicago Bulls
Jackson was hired as assistant coach for the Bulls in 1987, and
promoted to
head coach in 1989. It was
around this time that he met
Tex Winter
and became a devotee of Winter's
triangle offense. Over 9 seasons, Jackson
coached the Bulls to 6 championships in impressive fashion, twice
winning three straight championships over separate three year
periods. The "three-peat" was the first since the
Boston Celtics won eight titles in a row from
1959 through 1966.
Jackson and the Bulls made the playoffs every year, and failed to
win the title only three times. Jackson lost in his first season in
1990.
Michael Jordan's first
retirement after the 1993 season marked the end of the first
"three-peat," and although Jordan returned just before the
1995 playoffs, it was not enough to
prevent a playoff exit to the rising
Orlando Magic.
The chemistry developed between Jackson and the players was one of
the best in NBA history. The respect shared between the players and
the coach was the key factor in being able to build up a dynasty.
While Jordan was already long considered the most dominant player,
Jackson was also credited as one of the most important elements in
the Bulls' championships and his work earned him league-wide
recognition. His relationship with Michael Jordan is considered to
be one of the greatest player-coach relationship in NBA history,
with Jackson claiming multiple times that Jordan was the greatest
player he ever coached.
Regardless of the success Jackson shared with his team, the tension
between Jackson and Bulls general manager
Jerry Krause grew. Some believed that Krause
felt under-recognized for his work in building the Bulls up into a
championship team, being envious of the attention received by
Jordan and Jackson. In particular, Krause believed that Jackson was
indebted to him because Jackson received his first NBA coaching job
from Krause. Some examples of the tension include:
- During the summer of 1997, Krause's stepdaughter got married.
All of the Bulls assistant coaches and their wives were invited to
the wedding, as was Tim Floyd, then the
head coach at Iowa
State, whom Krause was openly courting as Jackson's successor
(and who would eventually succeed Jackson). Jackson and his wife at
the time, June, were not even told of the wedding, much less
invited, only finding out about the event when the wife of
assistant Bill Cartwright asked June
what she would be wearing to the reception.
- After contentious negotiations between Jackson and the Bulls in
that same period, Jackson was signed for the 1997-98 season only.
Krause announced the signing in what Chicago media widely
considered to be a mean-spirited manner, emphasizing that Jackson
would not be rehired even if the Bulls won the 1997-98 title. That
triggered an argument between Jackson and Krause in which Jackson
essentially told Krause that he seemed to be rooting for the other
side and not the Bulls. At that point, Krause told Jackson, "I
don't care if it's 82-and-0 this year, you're fucking gone."
- Krause publicly portrayed Jackson as a two-faced character who
had very little regard for his assistant coaches, a perception that
certain Krause associates in the Bulls organization had sought to
spread about Jackson. At the height of the hard feelings in the
spring of 1998, one of Krause's scouts went to press row in
Chicago's United
Center
to explain to a reporter the insidious nature of
Jackson's ego. (excerpt from the Phil Jackson biography
Mindgames)
After the Bulls' final title of the
Jordan era in 1998, Jackson left the team
vowing never to coach again. However, after taking a year off, he
decided to give it another chance with the
Los Angeles Lakers in 1999.
Los Angeles Lakers
Jackson took over a talented but troubled Lakers team and
immediately produced results. In his first year in L.A., the Lakers
went 67-15 during the regular season to top the league. Reaching
the conference finals, they dispatched the
Portland Trail Blazers in a tough
seven-game series and then won the
2000
NBA championship by beating the
Indiana Pacers.
With the talented superstar duo of
Kobe
Bryant and
Shaquille O'Neal,
the strong supporting cast of
Derek
Fisher,
Rick Fox,
Devean George,
Robert
Horry, and
Brian Shaw, and the
assistance of former Bulls
Horace
Grant,
Ron Harper, and
John Salley, Jackson would lead the Lakers to
two additional titles in
2001 and
2002, against the
Philadelphia 76ers and
New Jersey Nets, adding up to a
three-peat. The main serious challenge the Lakers
faced was from their conference rival, the
Sacramento Kings.
However, injuries, weak bench play, and
full-blown public tension between
Bryant and O'Neal eventually slowed the team down, and they were
beaten in the second round of the
2003 NBA Playoffs by the eventual
champion
San Antonio Spurs.
Afterward, Jackson clashed frequently with Bryant. While remarkably
efficient in Jackson's "
triangle
offense", Bryant had a personal distaste for Jackson's brand of
basketball and subsequently called it "boring." In games, Bryant
would often disregard the set offense completely to experiment with
his own one-on-one moves, incensing the normally calm Jackson.
Bryant managed to test Jackson's patience enough that the "Zen
Master" even demanded that Bryant be traded, although Laker
management rejected the request.
Prior to the
2003–04 season, the
Lakers signed NBA star veterans
Karl
Malone and
Gary Payton, who had been
franchise players for the
Utah Jazz and
the
Seattle SuperSonics,
respectively, leading to predictions by some that the team would
finish with the best record in NBA history. But from the first day
of training camp, the Lakers were beset by distractions. Bryant's
rape trial,
continued public sniping between O'Neal and Bryant, and repeated
disputes between Jackson and Bryant all affected the team during
the season. Despite these distractions, the Lakers beat the
defending champion Spurs en route to advancing to the NBA Final and
were heavy favorites to regain the title. However, they were
stunned by the
Detroit Pistons, who
utterly dominated the series and defeated the Lakers four games to
one.
On June 18, 2004, three days after Jackson had suffered his
first-ever loss in an
NBA Finals
series as a head coach, the Lakers announced that Jackson would
leave his position as Lakers coach. Many fans attributed Jackson's
departure directly to the wishes of Bryant, as Lakers owner
Dr. Jerry Buss reportedly sided with
Bryant. Jackson, Bryant and Buss all denied that Bryant had made
any explicit demand regarding Jackson. However, O'Neal, upon
hearing General Manager
Mitch
Kupchak's announcement of the team's willingness to trade
O'Neal and its intention to keep Bryant, indicated that he felt the
franchise was indeed pandering to Bryant's wishes with the
departure of Jackson. O'Neal's trade to the Miami Heat was the end
of the "Trifecta" that had led the Lakers to three championship
titles.
That fall, Jackson released
The Last
Season, a book which describes his point of view of the
tensions that surrounded the 2003–04 Lakers team. The book was
pointedly critical of
Kobe Bryant; at
one point, Jackson called Bryant "uncoachable."
Without Jackson and O'Neal the Lakers were forced to become a
faster paced team on the court. Though they achieved some success
in the first half of the season, injuries to several players
including stars Kobe Bryant and Lamar Odom forced the team out of
contention, going 34-48 in
2004–05 and missing the playoffs for the
first time in eleven years. Jackson's successor as coach,
Rudy Tomjanovich, resigned midway through
the season, citing health issues, immediately leading to
speculation that the Lakers might bring Jackson back.
On June 15, 2005, the Lakers rehired Phil Jackson. Jackson took a
Laker squad that was mediocre, aside from superstar Kobe Bryant,
and led them to a seventh-seed playoff berth. Once again promoting
the notion of selfless team play embodied by the
triangle offense, the team achieved
substantial results, especially in the last month of the season.
Jackson also worked seamlessly with Bryant, who had earlier shown
his willingness to bring back Jackson to the bench. Bryant's
regular-season performance won him the league scoring title and
made him a finalist in MVP voting. However, the Lakers faced a
tough 2006 first-round matchup against the second-seeded
Phoenix Suns, who were led by eventual MVP
winner
Steve Nash. It was the first time
that Jackson's team had failed to reach the second round of the
playoffs. The Lakers jumped out to a 3-1 lead following a dramatic
last second shot by Bryant in overtime to win game four, but the
Suns recovered to win the last three and take the series. Many
consider the seven game contest to be among the greatest
first-round series in NBA history.
Jackson's main tactical contribution, both with the Bulls and the
Lakers, was the modernization of the
triangle offense. He is also noted as a
gifted handler of difficult players, such as
Dennis Rodman. Jackson currently makes
$10,000,000 a year, making him the highest paid coach in NBA
history.
On January 7, 2007, Jackson won his 900th game, currently placing
him 9th on the all-time win list for NBA coaches. With this win,
Jackson became the fastest to reach 900 career wins, doing so in
only 1,264 games and beating Pat Riley's previous record of 900 in
1,278 games.
On December 12, 2007, after announcing he would return to his
position as coach just a few days prior, Phil Jackson inked a
2-year contract extension to continue his tenure with the
Los Angeles Lakers through the end of the
2009-2010 season.
He coached the Lakers in the
2008 NBA
Finals against the
Boston
Celtics. Boston won the series in game 6 of the NBA finals,
beating the Lakers in the final game in Boston.
On
Christmas Day of 2008, Jackson
became the 6th coach to win 1000 games, with the Lakers defeating
the Celtics in their first match up of the 2008-2009 season after
losing to them in the 2008 NBA Finals. He was the fastest to win
1000 games surpassing
Pat Riley who had
taken 11 more games than Jackson.
The Lakers defeated the Orlando Magic in the
2009 NBA Finals 4-1 clinching his 10th NBA
championship as a coach. Jackson is also 5 wins away from becoming
the coach with the most playoffs wins in the Lakers
franchise.
Jackson has a total of 12 NBA championship rings: two as a player
with the
New York Knicks, six as
coach of the Bulls, and four as coach of the Lakers. Ten NBA
championships as a head coach lets him stand alone as the all-time
leader in that category. Phil Jackson also holds the best playoff
winning percentage of all-time. As of the end of the
2008–09 NBA season, Jackson's
regular season record stands at 1041-435. After the 2009 NBA
Postseason, Jackson's teams are now 44-0 in series where they win
Game 1.
Motivational techniques
Along with being called the "Zen Master," Jackson is known as the
master of mind games.
In addition, in the
2001 NBA Finals
against the
Philadelphia 76ers,
Jackson had
Tyronn Lue, a player on the
Lakers team who was comparable in size and height to Sixers star
Allen Iverson, wear a sock on his arm
during Lakers practice to simulate Iverson's use of a compression
arm sleeve as part of his regular gametime attire. Philadelphia
media considered this to be a mind game tactic of Jackson's, but
the main idea was to simulate what a game against Iverson is like,
right down to the tattoos and cornrows (which Lue also had).
Coaching record
Jackson has had a winning season every year as a head coach. Along
with his NBA-record ten championships, he is the first and only
coach to win ten championships in any of North America's major
sports.
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