Sam Amick

USA TODAY Sports

So the Golden State Warriors hired a former TV analyst with no coaching experience and a decorated playing career to lead their up-and-coming team.

Stop us if you've heard this before.

One week after firing Mark Jackson despite a second consecutive playoff appearance and inviting so many inquiries about what in the name of Joe Barry Carroll was going on behind their walls, the Warriors gave Steve Kerr a five-year, $25 million deal that naturally led to all sorts of fair questions how this all made sense. Kerr is a widely-respected and darn-near revered member of the NBA community, to be sure. And the fact that the Warriors, having failed in their pursuit of new Detroit Pistons team president and coach Stan Van Gundy, were able to seal this deal before Phil Jackson could convince his former player to come to the New York Knicks was impressive.

But in the here and the now, Kerr's coaching résumé' looks exactly the same as Jackson's did when Warriors owner Joe Lacob gave him his first chance back in 2011. And that is why, as Lacob sees it, this all makes perfect sense in the weirdest of ways.

"Look, we did pretty well with Mark Jackson," Lacob told USA TODAY Sports by phone, his statement thick with irony but strangely logical. "In the end, it wasn't working out, which only we can probably totally appreciate on the inside. No one is ever going to understand it. I get that (people) see the win total, and they think that's all that matters. But we have an organization that's 200 people, and everyone has to get along and work together and that's just the way it worked out. …We went out and we wanted to find the best guy to lead this team to the next level.

"Yes, it's true, (Kerr) has not coached before. But this is what management is all about. You have to be able to pick people, and he is incredibly prepared…Every detail you can imagine. He knew our roster in and out. He had assistant coaches he wanted to go after. It was like a tour de force. Look, at the end of the day I know he knows a lot about basketball. We're taking a little bit of a risk on his coaching ability, but we did that with Mark and it worked. So it's just about finding the right fit for the organization and a guy who has extremely high potential, is a hard worker and is very prepared. That's what we have got."

They had to work to get it.

According to Lacob, he, general manager Bob Myers, assistant general manager Travis Schlenk and assistant general manager and Lacob's son, Kirk Lacob, were visiting with Van Gundy in Orlando, Fla. on Monday night when their fluid situation changed yet again. Van Gundy already had an offer from the Pistons, and his desire to have roster control was clearly not something that the Warriors group was willing to yield.

"We did not make (Van Gundy) an offer; he already had a big offer," Lacob said. "But we met him, and it was theoretically still open. And then we got wind when we were there that maybe there was an opening on the Kerr front, and so — you know — we fired up the jet, used the jet fuel and got him."

So they headed off on Tuesday night to Oklahoma City, where Kerr was in town to call the Oklahoma City Thunder-Los Angeles Clippers Game 5 and the group walked away, Lacob said, extremely impressed. Jackson and the Knicks, meanwhile, added a fourth guaranteed year onto their offer for Kerr on Tuesday and the Golden State group knew they'd have to go bigger or go home without Kerr on their side.

Lacob insists that franchise centerpiece Stephen Curry is in support of this move. It's the most relevant question of this situation, of course, because he was so widely known to be close with Jackson and was extremely upset when he was fired. Kerr, the five-time champion as a player who was the Phoenix Suns general manager from 2007 to 2010, reportedly wanted to draft Curry when he entered the professional ranks out of Davidson University in 2009. (The Warriors took him with the seventh pick while Kerr took Earl Clark with the 14th pick.)

"(Curry) is extremely supportive," Lacob said "That's all I can tell you. We got Steve Kerr because of our players. We have great players, great character individuals. They all want to win, and I can just tell you that they're very supportive."

This notion of Lacob finally landing Kerr is not a new one. Not long after he led the ownership group that bought the team in 2010, Kerr was believed to be considered for the general manager position that ultimately went to Myers.

"I knew him through friends — and through golf, quite frankly," Lacob said of Kerr. "I've been on golf trips with Steve before, so I know him socially for many years. He's best friends with one of my best friends and some other people, so I've known him, but not necessarily that close or that professionally as has been portrayed.

"He is certainly somebody who we have always liked, sort of a great, intelligent guy. So he was on our list, and when we decided to make a change he was on our short list of people who we wanted to talk to."

Jackson, of course, would argue that this change wasn't necessary in the first place. The Warriors reached the second round of the playoffs in his second season, and had the franchise's best regular season record since 1991-92 this season (51-31) before falling to the Los Angeles Clippers in seven games in the first round while playing without injured center Andrew Bogut (fractured rib).

But the internal drama was simply too much for all involved to continue. Two assistant coaches (Brian Scalabrine and Darren Erman) were shown the door, the former for Jackson-perceived insubordination and the latter for recording his coaching colleagues illegally as the level of widespread distrust rose. Fair or not, change came.

It was immediately unclear where this leaves Jackson's Knicks. For weeks and weeks, Kerr was known to be the apple of his former coach's eye and it did not appear that there was a close second when it came to candidates. Some have suggested that Derek Fisher, the Oklahoma City Thunder guard who will retire after this season, might come his way and be the latest Jason Kidd of the NBA. Or perhaps Jackson erases the list he had going and starts all over. Either way, the Warriors got their man with Kerr and insist this tumultuous last few months will wind up being worth it.

"Look, when we decide we're going to do something…we get it done, whether it's a new arena or whether it's a coach or whether it's a key free agent," Lacob said. "I think we've proven that. We keep getting doubters but we seem to always get it done."