Los Angeles Lakers fans did not plan on having a comedy hour this week, but Marc Stein accidentally delivered one anyway. In his latest newsletter, he dropped the line that set off an avalanche of chuckles across Laker land. “Bucks assistant coach Darvin Ham, I'm told, is a name to watch in the Pelicans’ search.”
That is right… a name to watch. For New Orleans. Darvin Ham. You could practically hear Lakers fans spit out their morning coffee. Ham’s exit from Los Angeles was not a mystery. It was not even a debate.
Lakers fans know exactly how Darvin Ham as head coach ends
His two-year run was defined by constant confusion, rotations that shifted without logic, game plans that unravelled at the worst moments, and a team that openly admitted it often had no idea what it was supposed to be doing. Anthony Davis said it plainly during the 2024 playoffs: the Lakers looked lost on both ends of the floor.
The frustration was built piece by piece. There were nights when Ham held timeouts like they were rare collectibles. Nights when he stuck to lineups that clearly were not working. Nights when Lakers fans sat on their couches, asking questions the broadcast could not answer.
And through all of it, Ham looked overwhelmed, a coach trying to solve elite-level problems with tools he did not have yet. The defining moment came when LeBron James was shouting for a challenge on an obvious out-of-bounds play, while Ham stood frozen with his hands in his pockets. Fifteen seconds. No reaction. No sign that he recognized the urgency of the moment.
In a league where details decide seasons, this one moment summed up everything Lakers fans had been trying to explain. Yes, Ham had surface-level success: 90 regular-season wins, an unexpected run to the 2023 Western Conference Finals, and the NBA’s first In-Season Tournament title. However, none of that cancelled out the underlying issues: poor in-game management, mismatched schemes, a lack of identity, and an inability to respond when opponents struck first.
So when Stein linked Ham to the Pelicans, Lakers fans were not mocking New Orleans. They were genuinely puzzled. They had watched Ham struggle with a veteran roster, featuring two top-10 players, including one of the highest basketball IQs ever to play the game in LeBron James, and still look completely lost.
Ham is respected. He is hardworking. But Lakers fans saw enough to know how steep that head-coaching climb still is for him. And hearing his name now tied to another job? They are shaking their heads because they have lived the version of that story that does not get written in stat lines. And they know exactly how it ends.