Luke Walton jokes he's 'still scarred' by treatment as a rookie

From nearly the second Luke Walton was named as the new head coach of the Los Angeles Lakers, there has been nearly endless raving about the positivity he's brought to the building. Player after player has waxed poetic about the new culture on the team, and from the sound of it, they have things a little easier than Walton himself did when he was "welcomed" to the league during his rookie year.

The Lakers did a hilarious bit of light hazing to their first-year players on Thursday night, forcing Brandon Ingram, Ivica Zubac, Zach Auguste, and Julian Jacobs to show off their pipes during a karaoke/talent show (Given how bad the singing was, it may have always been hazing for the students at the University of Santa Barbara that listened to it).

According to Walton, however, the experience of public singing was nothing compared to the type of treatment he had to deal with when he came into the NBA:

Walton could be kidding, but given the various stories about Shaq's locker room pranks, probably not. Although... Walton turned out okay, so maybe it's time to bring in Shaq as a special "How to treat rookies consultant." It couldn't go worse than the last head coach's strategy of dealing with them.

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