The Lakers have officially hired general manager Rob Pelinka, a press release on Lakers.com confirms. The two parties came to terms on an agreement on February 21 but the former sports agent could not be formally hired until he was officially divested from his sports agency.
“Rob’s knowledge of the NBA landscape and the CBA, as well as his relationships with GMs around the league, are invaluable,” said Magic Johnson, Lakers President of Basketball Operations. “After running a successful sports agency and as someone who truly understands the inner workings of salary caps and player negotiations, he will bring the additional skills and experience needed in the Lakers executive office.”
Pelinka had previously been the agent of a number of current NBA players including the likes of James Harden and Buddy Hield but that case load has been split up and reassigned to fellow members of the Landmark Sports agency.
Pelinka’s most notable client, of course, is recently retired Kobe Bryant. That inherent familiarity with the Lakers and how the organization does business should allow him to hit the ground running with his new team.
I gotta, say thats a solid pick. And I’m saying that as a Celtics fan.
If he can get us out of the Mozgov or Deng contracts or both of them, he will be worth whatever their paying him!
“Solid pick” or just another way to placate Kobe Bryant. The Lakers continue to base their decisions on the whims and suggestions of former players from eras gone by.
The team needs to bring in someone who knows basketball talent and potential rather than someone who’s most recent responsibility was to scream “Show me the money” at the top of his lungs to whoever would listen.
There’s Magic for talent Rob to negotiate shut the front door
A sports agent’s job is to get his client the most amount of money. Period.
Running a “sports agency” doesn’t make anyone even remotely qualified to be a GM of a professional basketball team.
It’s like saying a pharmaceutical sales rep is qualified to be the GM of a hospital. Two completely different jobs tasks — who just happen to be in the medical field.
This reeks of cronyism, and Magic just putting a puppet in place so that he won’t challenge his new-found (and beloved) authority.
Except this hire was along about the “book keeping” side and not actually running a team. Every GM has a different role and different levels of authority.
Then he should change the title. Magic is the real GM, and this guy is just his bookkeeper and contract advisor.
This guy’s position sounds more like a Financial Director.
A GM is a position that is all encompassing, not just cherry picking a few things and still calling yourself a “General Manager.”
You’re not a real GM if you’re just keeping the books and handling CBA contracts.
Magic said he needed someone who was an expert with the new CBA. Guess who’s job it was to do that in order to get their clients the most amount of money?
It also doesn’t hurt that he has relationships with players and GM’s already.
Any future FA’s will be meeting with Rob and Magic in tandem, so I don’t see how this is remotely a bad thing.
Wow so much negativity common give him a chance. Having knowledge and relationships with players as well as knowing the cap are strong assets, if he succeeds then what he was lucky, don’t be so quick to judge. He has enough folks there that know talent. Mitch and Jim got Moz/Deng and it didn’t work. So let him do his job negotiations..