DeMarcus Cousins pitches Rajon Rondo for Kentucky head coaching job
DeMarcus Cousins pitched former Kentucky star and long time NBA veteran Rajon Rondo for the Wildcats head coaching job.
This came on the heels of John Calipari reportedly leaving for Arkansas on a five-year deal. Rondo is an alum of the program and eventually won an NBA title with the Boston Celtics (2008) and Los Angeles Lakers (2020) during his 17 year career in the NBA.
Rondo, who played for Kentucky for three years until he was a first round pick in 2006, said before he wanted to get into coaching.
“I think the perfect hire for Kentucky at this point would be Rajon,” Cousins said on the Bully Ball podcast. “I honestly think Rajon would be the perfect guy for this situation. Obviously he’s a Kentucky kid. He played, he’s an alumni. But he understands both sides like probably better than anybody else ever will.
“And I think putting Rajon in that position, be’s gonna be a great energy moving forward. He’s great at creating the standard. He’s great at leading the ship. I don’t think there’s a better leader to lead Kentucky out of this spot than Rajon Rondo.”
Rajon Rondo debates John Calipari with Boogie Cousins
Ironically, Rondo and Cousins debated Calipari’s future near the end of March, well before the coach took the Arkansas gig.
“How many ‘chips Cal got?” Rondo said. “It’s been over a decade. It’s about, ‘what have you done for me lately?’ …It’s the University of Kentucky. It’s been one of the greatest colleges of all-time way before Cal got there. He didn’t just come there and set the standard that it’s winning basketball now. It’s been that. …I never said ‘fire Cal.’ All I’m saying is he has to get the guys to buy in.”
Getting the right players in the program and convincing them to buy in in paramount, and it begins with the head coach, in his opinion.
“These guys are looking at the damn draft boards every day,” Rondo said. “Mentally, it’s like, ‘OK, I want to best for the team but my agent’s calling me. I got the NIL money coming in.’ These are just different times that these kids are going through to buy in and understand that it’s about sacrificing every night on the floor. I don’t think they did that completely in understanding, ‘we need to focus on winning instead of looking at the draft board.’ That starts with Cal and the staff getting ready to buy into that system.”