Luke Walton Is The Odds-On Favorite To Be The First NBA Head Coach To ‘Leave Their Post’ This Season

The Los Angeles Lakers are trying to pick up their first win of the season. While their opening three opponents have all been tough, especially for a squad looking to figure out its identity beyond “the team that has LeBron James on it,” the Lakers aren’t an organization that exists in nuance, so their 0-3 mark to start the year is a millstone hanging around the franchise’s neck.

Things can change easily for Los Angeles as they find their form and their roster learns the best way to play with one another, but it’s just as easy to see how their porous defense never really figures it out and they keep losing shootouts. Apparently, Las Vegas thinks that second scenario is a little more plausible, and as such, Luke Walton has the best odds to be the first coach to “leave their post” in 2018-19.

According to Bovada, Walton’s 7/4 odds to leave his post — which, let’s face it, is a fancy way of saying getting fired — edge out the 2/1 odds that Tom Thibodeau goes first. Here’s the full breakdown:

Walton is a weird case, because it certainly seems like the Lakers are happy to use the first year of the James era in Los Angeles finding its footing with the hopes of winning titles down the road. Of course, if the team struggles and James, Jeanie Buss, Magic Johnson, or Rob Pelinka wakes up one morning and decides the team has to make a change on the bench as soon as possible, that can change.

Going down the list, Thibodeau was on the hot seat before the Jimmy Butler trade saga, so he looks like a prime candidate to get the boot at some point this year barring the team making a run in the conference. Fred Hoiberg is a wise bet because his seat has seemed hot for a while, while the rest of the list is a bunch of dudes in charge of teams that either have postseason aspirations (Donovan, Brooks, Lue, Stotts) or are the Sacramento Kings (Joerger).