I Feel Nothing About JJ Redick

AU can't bring himself to care much in any direction about the Lakers' former future head coach.

There's an old Chuck Klosterman column where he refers to Van Halen's "And the Cradle Will Rock..." as the midpoint of all music from recorded history for him. In other words, if you stacked every song ever written in a pile ranked by quality it would come at the exact halfway point; every song higher than "Cradle" would be a song he'd consider good, and every song lower, bad. It's a concept I've returned to often in my life of ranking things. (And btw, I dunno if I would've come up with it on my own but "Cradle" really was an inspired pick -- it's 5% good, 5% bad and 90% are you really asking me to form an opinion on this fucking song.)

Anyway, "And the Cradle Will Rock..." is me with JJ Redick. As a Sixer, as a media personality, as an adult human male who I theoretically could run into on the streets of Brooklyn whenever I'm down there. He's right in the middle. I have a handful of lightly positive memories associated with him, and another few decently negative ones, but mostly he's are you really asking me to form an opinion on this fucking guy. Despite all the takes flying about him this week as he zoomed into the frontrunner spot for the Lakers' head coaching job (and then was yanked back even quicker), I really don't have much to say about any of it. I don't wish him that well and I don't particularly rejoice in his suffering. I don't anything JJ Redick.

If you stacked every Sixer who ever played for or otherwise participated on the team during the Process years -- everyone on The Shirt, basically -- Redick would indeed be in the exact middle for me. He played here for two years and was paid a combined $35.25 million to do so; I'd say that is exactly as much as those two years of Redick was worth. He helped bring experience, professionalism and coherence -- and, y'know, shooting -- to the team as it tried (successfully, and then unsuccessfully) to take the next step towards seriousness at the outset of the Embiid + Simmons era, but he never really transcended being a helpful role player. He added all the stuff he was paid to add, and not a cent's worth more. He was both a little bit better in the playoffs than expected (he mostly held up on defense) and a little bit worse (he hit zero big shots). When it was time for him to go afterwards, he left. The Sixers' JJ Redick experience happened, and then it was over. Nothing much to say about it, really. 

When I scan my memory for the most memorable JJ Redick moments during his two years as a Sixer -- on or off the court -- it's like trying to search for something on the web in between subway stops. I wanna say he hit a big shot in Orlando at the end of regulation once during the regular season, but maybe it was just to tie the game and they lost in OT anyway? Could be wrong. And I think he missed a big shot late in Game Five against the Celtics in 2018 -- but was "late" on the Sixers' final half-court possession to put the Sixers ahead, or was it with 1:45 to go when he could've cut the lead from four to one? Couldn't recall. Otherwise, it's just an ocean of dribble handoffs with Joel, a loop of wing threes shot with his body going the other direction, a whole lot of 18 points on 7-16 shooting stat lines. It was all solid enough, I guess. 

As just a guy on the team? Whatever. Joel seemed to like him, which I appreciated. It's possible he had some funny post-game comments once, though I couldn't tell you what or when. A little smug maybe. Hair bothered me a very marginal amount. Definitely still a whiff of Duke to him -- I'm not really a Duke hater or a Duke much-of-anything, but I've certainly never liked a player more for their strong Blue Devils ties. He rounded out the team but mostly he was just kinda there; in an average group of friends, he'd be a guy who you'd be glad came to your party because he helps stabilize the attendance numbers, but who you'd hope you didn't have to spend much or any one-on-one conversation time with. 

Much of the JJ Redick hate of late obviously stems from his post-playing career, and I get that. He is definitely in our lives more than he should be; I have far more memories at this point of Redick saying stuff while making consternated facial expressions than I do of anything he ever did with a basketball in his hands. He had some dumb and largely avoidable controversies early in his podcasting days, and then got gratingly sanctimonious the last few years in his largely self-appointed role as The One Smart Guy on ESPN's most purposefully brain-dead talk shows. Personally, none of this moved me a ton; he was annoying, but so was everyone else on these shows. Aside from needlessly freaking out Mo Bamba and (hopefully accidentally) offending the world's most populous country, he was mostly just playing his part. 

And as an analyst... he's fine. He understands the game pretty well from a few different perspectives, and he seems to have the respect of most of his peers. He's not a captivating presence on the mic but he's not distractingly clumsy either. He has his agenda, but it's not as transparent or as intrusive as a lot of former players or coaches who've been in his role. He and LeBron certainly bring out the worst in each other as wine-sipping, chess-moving podcasters, and I won't listen to a second of Mind the Game that I don't absolutely have to. But that makes it no different than 99% of other player podcasts, which are usually just pointless and/or out of touch where Mind the Game seems to be self-important and insufferable. There are players whose attempts to insert themselves into the media space I find actively detrimental to my enjoyment of the NBA product; JJ Redick is not one of them. 

Redick coaching the Lakers and LeBron would've been objectively funny. (Him agreeing to coach the Lakers before LeBron left the team in free agency would've been objectively even funnier.) I'm sorry we probably won't get to see that, but I'm also kinda not. Yes he likely would've failed in short order -- every Lakers coach since Phil Jackson has, even the one who actually won a championship -- and I agree with Spike tha t he would've had real issues dealing with the media from the other side. There likely would've been a handful of viral moments in there, maybe even one or two actually humorous ones. But would I have actually cared about any of it, enough to actively want to invite That Much JJ Redick into my life for the next 2-3 years? Probably not. None of it would've inspired me to have a real opinion about Redick. And that sounds like a whole lotta nothinging for me in the meantime. 

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Andrew Unterberger writes for The Rights To Ricky Sanchez, as part of the 'If Not, Pick Will Convey as Two Second-Rounders' section of the site. You can follow Andrew on Twitter @AUGetoffmygold and can also read him at Billboard. 

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