Bad News for Lakers and Knicks Fans: Rajon Rondo and Mavs Coach Getting Along Now

Bad News for Lakers and Knicks Fans: Rajon Rondo and Mavs Coach Getting Along Now
Rajon Rondo is clicking with Dallas Mavericks coach Rick Carlisle, so might end up staying in Dallas after all. Ronald Martinez/Getty Images
Zachary Stieber
Zachary Stieber
Senior Reporter
|Updated:

Rajon Rondo will be a highly sought free agent this offseason even though he’s declined from being one of the top point guards in the league, and the Lakers and Knicks are at the top of the list of suitors.

The two once-storied franchises are both preparing to make splashes in free agency to try to bolster two of the thinner rosters in the league, with Lakers star Kobe Bryant already personally recruiting Rondo. 

“I’m not done. I’m not stopping until he signs an extension,” Kobe told the Boston Herald earlier this season, a few weeks after he and Rondo got together for breakfast. 

“You don’t want Rondo? Send him my way. I love everything about him. Everything. I love his attitude, I love his chippiness, his edge, his intellect, his know-it-allness. All of it. That’s what makes championship players,” Kobe said in 2013 when trade rumors swirled around Rondo. Rondo was eventually traded to the Mavericks, but got into a yelling match with coach Rick Carlisle, prompting rumors that he’s not going to stick around Dallas after this season.

But that trajectory has changed, with Carlisle--considered one of the top coaches in the league--pushing through the initial clashing and connecting with the 29-year-old point guard. 

Rondo smiled as he told reporters after the Mavericks beat the Thunder that he gets quizzed by Carlisle about the Mavs offense. “It’s just coach and I in the room. He’s yelling at me a lot. I try not to crack under pressure and give him what he needs,” he told reporters, reported Mavs Outsider

Carlisle has also commented on Rondo’s improvement, praising him. 

(AP Photo/Brandon Wade)
AP Photo/Brandon Wade
Zachary Stieber
Zachary Stieber
Senior Reporter
Zachary Stieber is a senior reporter for The Epoch Times based in Maryland. He covers U.S. and world news. Contact Zachary at [email protected]
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