http://espn.go.com/los-angeles/nba/story/_/id/9660465/jim-buss-comes-los-angeles-lakers It's hard to say why we save the things we save when someone dies. Why a particular shirt feels meaningful or why it's hard to delete certain voicemails. The list of things a loved one leaves in a will might be long. It's often what they didn't have to include in the will that sticks with you.
Among other things, Jim Buss saved a voicemail from his father from Jan. 20, less than a month before the Lakers' Hall of Fame owner, Jerry Buss, died after an 18-month battle with cancer. He has replayed it so many times he knows it by heart.
" 'Hey Jim, it's your dad,' " Buss says, mimicking his father's squeaky voice. " 'What an incredible waste of talent. Oh well. The experiment didn't work.' "
Buss had missed the call. His dad had wanted to talk to him about the Los Angeles Lakers' disappointing season. Run though all the decisions they'd made together that hadn't turned out the way they'd hoped.
The offseason trades for Steve Nash and Dwight Howard that were supposed to make the $100 million Lakers title contenders, but ended up turning into an injury-riddled flop.
The early-season firing of coach Mike Brown and surprising hire of Mike D'Antoni (over Phil Jackson) that could have made them look like savvy geniuses but instead came off as misguided and hurried. They had discussed those things backward and forward a thousand times already, and all roads came back to the same place.