Sports Americana

Happy 81st birthday to Phil Jackson.

Before “load management,” analytics and every NBA coach having a carefully curated sideline wardrobe, there was Phil Jackson sitting calmly on the bench, occasionally looking like he had just wandered in from a meditation retreat.

Jackson wasn’t the most conventional coach. That may have been the point.

He won 11 NBA championships as a head coach — six with Michael Jordan and the Chicago Bulls, followed by five with Kobe Bryant, Shaquille O’Neal and the Los Angeles Lakers.

But the championships only tell part of the story.

Jackson believed in letting stars be stars while finding ways to make them function as something bigger than themselves. His famous use of the triangle offense, his emphasis on mindfulness and his unconventional approach to managing personalities helped define two of the NBA’s greatest dynasties.

And somehow, the man who once played for the New York Knicks eventually returned to New York decades later as the team’s president.

That chapter didn’t exactly have the same ending.

Still, when you look back at the NBA of the 1990s and 2000s, Jackson is impossible to separate from it.

Jordan.
Pippen.
Rodman.
Shaq.
Kobe.
The Bulls.
The Lakers.

And the Zen Master sitting quietly in the middle of it all.

Happy birthday, Phil Jackson — 11 rings and a whole lot of incense later, the NBA still hasn’t quite produced another one like him.

Sports Americana — where sports history still matters.