For my money, the best coach next to Auerbach was Chuck Daly. The late Pistons' coach took his teams to the NBA Finals in 1988-90, winning the last two. But his weren't sensationally talented teams. He coached them into their Bad Boys persona and they took care of the rest. Those Pistons teams had one superstar, Isiah Thomas, and some nice complementary players such as Bill Laimbeer, Dennis Rodman, Vinnie Johnson and Joe Dumars. Yet coaching Thomas couldn't have been easy. The man has proven since his playing days that he is an Isiah-first kind of guy. If anyone not named Rodman could have sabotaged that team, it would have been Thomas.

Daly avoided that.

This year's Lakers had their two stars, but they also had versatile players such as Lamar Odom, Andrew Bynum and Trevor Ariza, plus Derek Fisher, whose role is apparently to hit game-winning 3-pointers. Meanwhile, they didn't even have to face the best team in the East. Boston wilted after Kevin Garnett was hurt and Cleveland seized up in the Eastern finals against Orlando.

Jackson might have kept his team organized, but he didn't ignite it. Bryant did. The same Bryant that Jackson once termed nearly uncoachable.

Jordan ran the Bulls, Bryant is running the Lakers. Give Jackson the Jazz, and he'd wind up where the Jazz are — a first-round playoff loser. Give Jerry Sloan or Rick Adelman the players Jackson has had, and they'd win titles, too.

In fact, give the Lakers to me.

Even I could tell them what time to show up then get out of their way.

E-MAIL: rock@desnews.com