Can Anyone Trash Lakers After Their Big Land-Phil?

The next time Jerry Krause takes credit for another Phil Jackson championship, he’ll be right.

HOWARD COLE

La Jolla

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I forgive the Lakers for the past decade. The hiring of Phil Jackson is the smartest move since drafting Earvin Johnson.

MATT POYNEER

Claremont

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Previously successful coach signs with new team without his star players. Where have we heard this before?

Pro football: The great Jimmy Johnson couldn’t win without Aikman and Smith in Miami.

College basketball: The great Tark couldn’t win without L.J., Augmon and Anthony at Fresno State (or San Antonio).

Pro basketball: The great Pat Riley couldn’t win rings without Magic and Kareem in New York or Miami.

Baseball: The great Davey Johnson can’t motivate the underachieving Dodgers to over .500.

I hate to be the only Laker fan in Los Angeles not tittering and gleeful with excitement, but Jackson without Jordan is like Miller Huggins without Murderers’ Row.

HALE ANTICO

Pasadena

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Memo to all Laker fans and bandwagoners: Please don’t go out and size your finger for championship rings yet.

Let me see, Wayne Gretzky came, no rings; Darryl Strawberry and Eric Davis came, no rings; Dominique Wilkins came, no rings; Shaq came, no rings; Kobe came, no rings; Kevin Brown and Mo Vaughn came, no rings yet. Phil Jackson came, who knows?

WILLIS BARTON

Los Angeles

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OK, Phil Jackson as a Laker coach does have a nice ring to it, but does that mean that Shaquille O’Neal is going to miraculously start making his free throws? Does his signing mean that Kobe Bryant will no longer turn the ball over in crucial game situations and that Glen Rice will return to his pre-surgery form? Can Jackson play both power forward and point guard, where the Lakers lack quality starters? If Phil Jackson can do all that, he is not only the greatest coach in NBA history, he is a god to me.

J. SCOTT SCHEFFER

Adelanto

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For Phil Jackson to be as successful with the Lakers as he was with Chicago, he needs only one thing--Michael Jordan.

JERRY MAZENKO

Garden Grove

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There I was, all excited about Phil Jackson coming to the Lakers, when suddenly my enthusiasm was defeated quicker than the Lakers were against the Spurs. Because right in the middle of the action was Magic Johnson. I have discovered what the Laker problem has been over the past several years and it has not been people named Del, Nick, Dennis, Elden, Derek or Kurt. The problem has been, and apparently will continue to be, the former great, and current nuisance, Magic Johnson. He’s in the middle of all their problems, stirring things up, trying to impose the way things were on all of us.

Magic, go home, step aside and let the Lakers grow on their own without butting your nose into their success. You may have been able to run a fastbreak, but you certainly can’t run either a team or a talk show.

MICHAEL SCOTT

Glendora