The complete lack of humility has been accepted, as if Phil Jackson is merely playing a role. The pretension by now almost seems to be an act, as if he is winking at us as he gives what is expected.

The idea that he is no more than the luckiest coach that ever lived also has been dismissed. If the nine NBA championships did not prove it, the details along the way have shown the guy can coach. He might have had Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippen in Chicago and Shaquille O'Neal and Kobe Bryant in Los Angeles, but he was not the first coach for any of them -- just the first to make them champions.

With a roster containing four future hall of famers in O'Neal, Bryant, Karl Malone and Gary Payton it is understandable that Jackson might be overlooked, but is he also underappreciated?  Jonathan Feigan of the Houston Chronicle suggests so, adding that the 50-50 possibility of coming back Jackson recently referred to sounded as if he was exaggerating the stay half.

"There's a chance I'll return next year," he said Friday. "There's a chance I might not. But I don't know right now."

"Usually I operate on seeing another place, a vision somewhere out there," Jackson told the Chicago Tribune. "I don't have one. This may be pretty much the perfect time for me to settle back and see what it's like to take a year off.

"I don't think of myself as an NBA lifer, but I've spent five years away from the NBA since I got out of college, so I guess I am a lifer. I have to think about it all and decide whether I still want to coach."