Recently, ESPN’s Brian Windhorst published an article examining the recent coaching carousel in the NBA since 2013. Remarkably, since the end of 2013, 13 of the 15 West teams have made a coaching change and in total 21 teams have made a coaching change.
It could be attributed to many things, for one reason or another. Differences in philosophies like what happened in Chicago, Oklahoma City, Memphis, Cleveland, Golden State or both Los Angeles teams or just a lack of winning as the case in Orlando, Charlotte, Utah or Houston. Then again, unforseen circumstances, like that in Minnesota or Sacramento could also be means for a coaching change.
Whatever it is, you would think the recent flux of changes would have teams not think about changes. Well, think again.
ESPN’s Zach Lowe had Brian Windhorst on as a guest for his ‘Lowe Post’ podcast and right from the start, the pot got stirred for the NBA coaching free agency this upcoming summer. They just rip off teams and a bunch of them could be looking for some new coaches.
Lowe: Let’s look ahead for a second to this summer. It’s gonna happen again. A front office guy told me a couple of days ago coaching free agency this year is going to be more exciting than player free agency. Let’s go through it.
Washington, Wittman, I’m not feeling good about Wittman.
Windhorst: He also has a team option, they can just walk away like (Jeff) Hornacek, like Dwane Casey.
Lowe: Brooklyn, Hollins is almost certainly out.
Windhorst: I’m going to waive a yellow flag on Derrick Fisher as well. Just hearing some rumblings that its not all rainbows and lollipops there. Just a yellow flag, not a red flag.
Lowe: Memphis, (Dave) Joeger is in trouble. Houston is interim, we don’t know. … Hornacek obviously is in trouble and Byron Scott needs to go yesterday.
You look at who’s available, it’s like a murderer’s row in Thibodeau and D’antoni and Brooks and who else. There’s so many names out there it’s incredible.
Windhorst and Lowe bring up the possibility of Vinny Del Negro getting a shot and how Mark Jackson might not be able to get a coaching job in the NBA again.
“I think he’s going to have a hard time getting hired again in the NBA,” said Lowe on his podcast. “The craziness of how his last year went in Golden State and some of the stuff that has come out since… I think it would take a superstar player going into ownership (saying) ‘my time here depends on you hiring Mark Jackson.'”
“I just know this: that if a team does background research on Mark with his old employers, it’s going to be a hard hurdle for him to clear,” said Brian Windhorst. “That’s not me. That’s people who might be hiring him have told me.”
Hang on folks, we might be seeing some changes coming when the season is over.
