Phil Jackson said Steve Kerr told him he’d take the Knicks coaching job the day before the Warriors fired Mark Jackson, notes Chris Herring of The Wall Street Journal (Twitter links). Jackson acknowledged that he told Carmelo Anthony that Kerr would coach the team, Herring also tweets, so Kerr’s decision left the Zen Master in quite a spot. Anthony reportedly supports Mark Jackson as a would-be Knicks coach. However, the man Kerr replaced in Golden State wouldn’t fit Phil Jackson’s desire for a coach with whom he has a prior relationship, a quality which the Knicks president identified today as one he’ll look for, observes Frank Isola of the New York Daily News (on Twitter).
We passed along Jackson’s comments about Anthony’s contract situation earlier, and we’ll round up the rest from the Zen Master’s confab with reporters here:
- Jackson said he’d be interested in coaching the team himself, but he added that “unless the Lord heals me,” he wouldn’t be physically capable of doing so, as Herring and Ian Begley of ESPNNewYork.com pass along (Twitter links). Jackson added that the notion of coaching for just one season on a temporary basis “doesn’t sit right” with him, as Herring tweets.
- Some “unnamed people” have interviewed with Jackson for the coaching job, but none of them were Derek Fisher or Brian Shaw, the Zen Master said, as Newsday’s Al Iannazzone observes (Twitter link).
- Jackson isn’t interested in trying to pry Shaw from the Nuggets, Herring notes (on Twitter). “Denver has everything we’ve owned [already],” Jackson said.
- Jackson said he has yet to tell any players that they’ll be jettisoned this summer, contradicting a report that he’d informed Raymond Felton that he’s going to trade him, Herring tweets.