SAN ANTONIO – LeBron James thinks the Nets hit a home run by hiring Jason Kidd.
“I think it’s amazing, honestly,” James said before Game 4 of the NBA Finals Thursday night. “J-Kidd is unbelievable. He’s one of the best teammates I’ve ever played with, on the ’08 Olympic team. He’s one of the best friends I’ve had on and off the floor. He’s a student of the game.
“His basketball IQ is crazy, and I think it’s going to make an easy transition for him to be a coach. I think it’s a great thing for him.”
Kidd has long been one of the most respected players in the league, drawing near unanimous praise from stars across the NBA throughout his 19-year, first ballot Hall of Fame career.
Kidd also got support from Dwyane Wade who, like James and Nets point guard Deron Williams, were teammates with Kidd on the 2008 Olympic team in Beijing.
“Obviously, he’s a great basketball mind, and New Jersey thought enough to make him a coach right away, and didn’t want to snag him up,” said Wade, who clearly forgot the Nets moved across the Hudson last summer. “It will be a little different seeing him on a sideline in a suit, but I’m sure he’ll bring a lot to that organization, that city, and that great franchise that they’re building there.
“So big congratulations to him. Being a USA Basketball teammate, you love to see guys continue to succeed and continue to be around the game when they have so much to offer.”
The thing that Kidd has gotten more credit for than anything else during his long NBA career is his tremendous basketball IQ, which has rivaled that of any player in the history of the game. Now the question is whether or not he can find a way to take that inherent knowledge of the game and apply it while standing on the sidelines in a suit, as opposed to doing it with a tank top on and the ball in his hands.
“It’s gonna be a transition, but he doesn’t know,” James said. “I don’t know. It’s the first time for him … It was the same with Mark Jackson. He had never patrolled the sidelines before, either, but you see the great work he’s done with Golden State.”
James said the fact that Kidd is being handed a roster that already produced a 49-win season this year won’t hurt, either.
“If you play the game and you’re smart, it can make the transition that much easier for you, and then the people you have around you. And he’s not inheriting a bad team, he’s inheriting a good team, so that makes the job easier, too.”
Wade also said that while he wasn’t sure, like everyone else, how the transition from player to coach will go for Kidd, he thinks that Kidd has all of the attributes necessary to get the job done.
“You don’t know,” Wade said. “You never know. “But he has the tools. He has everything you need. He has the demeanor, he has the knowledge, so you’ll see.
“It all depends, obviously, on who’s around him, what assistants he puts around him, and what kind of team he has, and what kind of players that really want to listen to him and respect him as a coach and not look at him as a player anymore.
“I’m sure he’s thought about all of that, and I’m sure it will be a great challenge for us when we have to go against his team, and we’re looking forward to it.”