On July 28, the Nets announced that Mike D’Antoni would be stepping down from his role as assistant and consigliere to head coach Steve Nash. In the accompanying statement, Nash paid a fitting tribute to his mentor who revolutionized offensive basketball and helped walk him through his first-ever coaching assignment on the bench at any level last season.
General manager Sean Marks later told the media that he was going to leave the door open in case D’Antoni wanted to return, even in a lesser capacity, However, it was always assumed that D’Antoni, 70, was hoping to land another head coaching gig and would rather recharge his batteries this season than go through another grind as an assistant.
Fair enough—D’Antoni was reportedly in the mix for the Portland job this summer, but was beaten out in the end by Chauncey Billups. (Side note: The Blazers fit never made sense to me, considering they always fall short due to defensive deficiencies and D’Antoni doesn’t exactly have a resume that would suggest he could fix that). With 672 career coaching victories and a .682 winning percentage in his last stop in Houston, D’Antoni is still a hot name for any job opening.
However, news broke last week that D’Antoni wasn’t going to be inactive this season after all. Nope, New Orleans hired him as a “coaching advisor” to their rookie head coach Willie Green. Not to be outdone, the Nets, per a report from ESPN’s Malika Andrews on Wednesday, went out and will be bringing in former Orlando head coach Steve Clifford to be their own “coaching consultant.”
Anyone else find this curious? If D’Antoni was amenable to part-time work, why wouldn’t he want to just do it in Brooklyn, where he surely would have had better odds of winning that elusive NBA championship ring? Is it possible that D’Antoni’s departure was a mutual decision?
Whatever the reason, in the end, this is probably a good thing for the Nets. Remember, Marks has stated since the day Nash was hired that it was more to be a “connector” and a “facilitator” than a tactician. So many of the Nets’ on-court principles last season came straight out of the D’Antoni manual.
Though I wasn’t shy about my criticisms of Nash last season, I must say that as a rookie thrown into the fire of a win-now team, he deserved credit for dealing with unprecedented hurdles—little training or practice time due to a condensed schedule, a mid-season blockbuster trade for superstar James Harden that upended the rotation, and, most significantly, injuries and consequences from the COVID-19 pandemic that forced a team-record 27 different players to suit up for at least one game last season. In addition, in an inspired move to bring better defense to the court, Nash created a new position for poor shooting guard Bruce Brown as a screen-and-roller and the team never fractured, even after several ugly losses to the league’s bottomfeeders. By playoff time, most of my complaints were nitpicks, like how he stapled center Nic Claxton to the bench at the end of the Bucks series.
Though it is required for professional head coaches to have “The Buck Stops Here” signs on their desks, Nash was always supposed to rely on his well-paid staff to do the grunt work, and I got the sense that they weren’t always helpful in mitigating the bumps on the road. Assistants are in charge of preparing scouting reports, yet it was fairly common for the Nets to go down something like 18-5 before their talent usually allowed them to catch up. It was also expected that Nash was going to need support with game management, but things like timeout usage, where the Nets, by my unofficial estimate, led the league in unused timeouts and would bleed ungodly opponent runs before Nash decided to talk things over, were often too delayed.
Here’s where Clifford comes in. There’s a reason Andrews called him “he most sought-after assistant in the marketplace.” Even though he’s not expected to join Nash on the bench this season, he’s a highly-respected coach from the Jeff Van Gundy tree whose teams in Charlotte and Orlando had an annoying habit of overachieving. He can help Nash evolve—Clifford’s philosophies vary greatly with those of D’Antoni, giving Nash more food for thought. Like his friend Tom Thibodeau, Clifford’s specialty is defense, and he could suggest ways for Nash to bring more diversity to Brooklyn’s D than what we saw last season from D’Antoni’s. “We’ll just switch everything” foundation.
Maybe more importantly, unlike recent assistant coaching hires David Vanterpool and Brian Keefe, both of whom are reportedly close with Nets superstar Kevin Durant (with Keefe also overlapping with Marks for a couple of seasons in San Antonio), Clifford has no such connections with anyone other than Nash--the duo worked together in 2012-13 when Nash played for then assistant coach Clifford on the Lakers. It should also be noted that Kyle Korver, who will also be joining Brooklyn’s staff as a player development coach, according to Thursday’s report from The Athletic’s Shams Charania, won an NBA championship ring with another member of the Nets’ Big 3, Kyrie Irving.
You might not think such a thing matters, but if bringing in Clifford can help Nash develop into a more well-rounded head coach, that’s one less area where the Nets have to worry about a competitive disadvantage.
I knew this will be an article I'd have to make time to sit down and read. I am correct.
Steve! Here's my question regarding your quote: "...it was fairly common for the Nets to go down something like 18-5 before their talent usually allowed them to catch up."
Is Steve Nash's lack of a real offense the issue last season, which could be expected due to the trade, lack of practice time, etc, OR... poor defensive philosophy?