For the second time in less than two weeks, a Western Conference title hopeful has fired its head coach on the eve of the postseason, sending shockwaves across the NBA.
First, it was Taylor Jenkins in Memphis. On Tuesday, it was Michael Malone in Denver, as ownership jettisoned the winningest coach in Nuggets history — one who delivered the franchise’s first NBA championship less than two years ago — with just three games left in the 2024-25 regular season, the latest coaching change the league has seen in more than four decades. (The Nuggets also chose to let general manager Calvin Booth go, which is … kind of fascinating?)
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“This decision was not made lightly and was evaluated very carefully, and we do it only with the intention of giving our group the best chance at competing for the 2025 NBA Championship and delivering another title to Denver and our fans everywhere,” Nuggets governor Josh Kroenke said in a team statement announcing the firing. “… Championship-level standards and expectations remain in place for the current season, and as we look to the future, we look forward to building on the foundations laid by Coach Malone over his record-breaking 10-year career in Denver.”
In the short term, as the Grizzlies did in elevating assistant Tuomas Iisalo to take over for Jenkins, the Nuggets have given longtime assistant David Adelman the reins in Malone’s stead. Both have been tagged as interim coaches, though; whether they’ll get to continue holding the reins beyond the end of this season remains very much an open question.
One would suspect that winning the championship would help them keep their gigs. Then again, one would’ve suspected two coaches whose teams had won nearly 60% of their games this season and were vying for home-court advantage in the opening round of the playoffs would’ve gotten to keep theirs. In the modern NBA, though, life comes at you awfully fast.
In any event: As the NBA’s coaching carousel starts to spin, let’s take a look at the coaching vacancies we know to be on the board:
Denver Nuggets
Out: Michael Malone
In: David Adelman (interim)
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Just two seasons removed from winning it all, the Nuggets find themselves in a precarious position. On the plus side: They employ Nikola Jokić, a 30-year-old three-time MVP at or near the peak of his powers, and have him under contract for two more seasons after this one, with Jokić holding a $62.8 million player option for the 2027-28 season. As selling points for a job go, “You get the best basketball player in the world for at least the next couple of years” is a pretty good start.
On the minus side, though … there’s the rest of an increasingly thin roster, and an increasingly crowded balance sheet.
Denver has extended the rest of the core four from the 2023 title team — point guard Jamal Murray and forwards Michael Porter Jr. and Aaron Gordon — on multi-year deals totaling nearly $500 million in salary. Paying full freight in salary and luxury-tax bills to keep together a bona fide contender is one thing; ponying up for a team that looks like less than the sum of its parts is another.
When healthy and available, that quartet has remained excellent, outscoring opponents by 11.9 points per 100 possessions over 498 minutes this season. At issue: the 498 minutes, which is less than half of their shared floor time last season and 300 fewer minutes than in 2022-23.
With a shake-up in Denver, is Nikola Jokić’s future less clear? (Photo by AAron Ontiveroz/The Denver Post)
(AAron Ontiveroz via Getty Images)
Gordon has missed 31 games due to a persistent calf injury. After a stellar stretch midway through the season, Murray has missed the last five games and counting with a lingering hamstring issue that sounds ominous so close to the playoffs. Porter, who missed nearly two entire seasons with back issues, has been consistently available, trailing only Christian Braun for the Nuggets’ lead in games and minutes played; six years into his career, though, he’s still much more a dependent, contingent finisher than a source of offense himself, with 80% of his field goals coming off an assist from a teammate and just a 1.6-to-1 assist-to-turnover ratio.
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If those three aren’t giving Jokić star-level support, Denver’s lack of depth is laid bare. Braun has been sensational this season, providing a jolt of athleticism, toughness and electric play in transition as the team’s fifth starter in place of Kentavious Caldwell-Pope. Beyond Braun, though, lies uncertainty.
The next coach will need to coax more growth out of the likes of Peyton Watson, Julian Strawther, Jalen Pickett, Zeke Nnaji, Hunter Tyson and 2024 first-rounder DaRon Holmes, who has missed the entire season after tearing his Achilles tendon. If at least a few of those youngsters don’t develop into full-fledged playoff-caliber performers, the next general manager — already staring at a roster that’s projected to be over the first apron — will probably start having to make some calls to gauge the market on the likes of Gordon, Porter and Murray in pursuit of a pathway to build another version of a Nuggets roster that Jokić can lead back to contention. Fail on both accounts, and … well, Nuggets fans might find themselves forced to think about the unthinkable.
Memphis Grizzlies
Out: Taylor Jenkins
In: Tuomas Iisalo (interim)
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After taking over for Jenkins, Iisalo — a Finnish coach who’d won a slew of trophies in Germany and France before coming to Memphis this season — has started to put his fingerprints on his new club. He has tightened the Grizzlies’ rotation, giving heavier minutes to stars Ja Morant, Jaren Jackson Jr. and Desmond Bane and going to ninth and 10th men less frequently than his predecessor did. He inserted rookie center Zach Edey back into the starting lineup, giving the 7-foot-4 lottery pick more playing time and more runway. He’s also tilted the offense back a bit toward Morant operating in the pick-and-roll. The results have been mixed, with the Grizz going 2-3 since the coaching change, but playing postseason-caliber opponents like the Lakers, Celtics, Warriors, Heat and Pistons tough in the process.
It’s not yet clear whether Iisalo — whom Grizzlies general manager Zach Kleiman reportedly gave a seven-figure salary last summer to leave Europe for Memphis — is getting a proper audition for the full-time job. Asked whether that’s how he viewed the final stretch of the season at the time of Jenkins’ firing, Kleiman sidestepped the inquiry, saying merely that “we’re focused on the Lakers tonight.” (They lost.) And asked whether that’s how he viewed it, Iisalo also demurred.
“My and my whole team’s timeline is one day at a time,” Iisalo said. “So there is no need to go into the future.”
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Whether it’s Iisalo or another candidate who gets the call, that future will still be built around Morant, Bane, Jackson — who’s eligible for an extension this summer that could wind up being enormous if he makes one of the three All-NBA teams — and Edey, with loads of space under the luxury tax line and aprons for Kleiman and Co. to maneuver. Reasonable people can differ on where that group stacks up against the top-tier talent of other teams across the NBA, and there will still be plenty of questions to answer — the status of restricted free agent Santi Aldama, whether to bring back unrestricted free agent guard Luke Kennard, etc. As starting points go, though, you could do worse than a couple of All-Stars, a near-All-Star and a giant.
Sacramento Kings
Out: Mike Brown
In: Doug Christie (interim)
After firing Mike Brown amid a disappointing 13-18 start — just 18 months after he’d been unanimously voted the league’s Coach of the Year after ending Sacramento’s historic playoff drought — general manager Monte McNair named longtime Kings player, former broadcaster and assistant coach Doug Christie the team’s interim coach.
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Christie has presided over a team that traded All-Star point guard De’Aaron Fox and Kevin Huerter, added All-Star shooting guard Zach LaVine, and brought in reserves Jonas Valančiūnas and Jake LaRavia. He’s had to try to figure out how to mesh the games of LaVine, DeMar DeRozan, Malik Monk and Domantas Sabonis — all offense-first, ball-dominant players whose styles don’t necessarily dovetail all that neatly — and find a way to build more balanced lineups that won’t always give away the store. (The answer, as ever: more Keon Ellis minutes.)
The results haven’t been overwhelming — 26-22 since Brown’s firing, 14-15 since the trade deadline, with a near-top-10 offense and bottom-third defense in both samples — but the’ve been good enough to keep the Kings in the play-in mix despite all the deck-chair-rearranging. Will that be good enough to get Vivek Ranadivé to remove the interim tag and make an honest head coach out of Christie? Given the Kings’ history of coaching and front-office hires — neatly summarized by recent chatter that Vlade Divac “has been around a lot more lately,” which, sure — it’d probably be unwise to bet against it, or against anything being at least possible when it comes to the Kings’ next head coach.
(With the possible exception of the newly available Malone heading there. That reunion doesn’t seem particularly likely.)
5 other situations to watch
Phoenix Suns: Part of you thinks that there’s no way Mat Ishbia could fire his head coach for a third straight year. And then you look at how things have unfolded in Phoenix this season — with a promising start to Mike Budenholzer’s tenure completely turning to ash in everyone’s mouths; with the Bradley Beal trade aging like milk; with months of breathless reporting about trying to trade him for Jimmy Butler ultimately leading to not only that going nowhere, but evolving into Kevin Durant trade chatter that pissed Durant off and put us on pace for yet another KD trade this summer; with a bottom-five defense and vanishingly little cohesiveness or pride consistently on display — and you think … how could he not?
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Who exactly would be able to get demonstrably more out of such a misshapen and malformed roster, though, is another question entirely. I wouldn’t bet against Ishbia trying, though. Fourth time’s the charm, and all that.
Milwaukee Bucks: There are plenty of reasons why the Bucks have slipped from contention down toward the middle of the Eastern Conference pack: injuries, trades, inconsistency, the unfortunate and ill-timed absence of Damian Lillard, overall improvements by the likes of the Celtics, Cavaliers, Knicks, Pacers and Pistons, etc. Given all of that, it’s possible — maybe even likely — that, despite employing the still-unbelievable Giannis Antetokounmpo, Milwaukee will again fail to make it out of the first round of the playoffs.
It might not be fair to lay the blame for all of that at the feet of Doc Rivers. If the Bucks suffer a third straight opening-round exit, though … would you bet against it landing there?
Philadelphia 76ers: A season from hell — just 19 games of Joel Embiid, a shaky-at-best half-season from Paul George, Tyrese Maxey overtaxed and overwhelmed, Jared McCain’s Rookie of the Year bid over by Christmas, etc. — has had Philly playing to protect ping-pong balls for months. This was not what Daryl Morey had in mind when he put his grand cap-space plan into motion last summer; it’s also probably not what Nick Nurse had in mind when he took the Philly job back in 2023.
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Maybe the chance to exhale after a long season, the possibility of getting a healthy rotation back in place for training camp, and the chance to finally get a look at what everyone hoped this Sixers roster might be reinvigorates all parties involved. It does seem at least possible, though, that after a frustrating season and a half in which hardly anybody in Philly has seemed particularly happy, one or more of those parties considers going another way.
New Orleans Pelicans: Willie Green has done yeoman’s work in New Orleans, producing two playoff appearances and two top-10 defensive finishes in four seasons. But after yet another injury-ravaged and underwhelming campaign for Zion Williamson and Co. — this one featuring a bottom-of-the-barrel record that will land the Pels near the top of the draft lottery — Green could find himself on the chopping block for a franchise that seems desperate for a breath of fresh air.
San Antonio Spurs: Until Gregg Popovich says he’s done coaching, the job is his. But after missing nearly the entire 2024-25 season recuperating from a stroke, leading to young assistant Mitch Johnson getting the keys and acquitting himself quite well before Victor Wembanyama’s season-ending blood clot, Pop’s future — and the future of the franchise he’s led to five NBA championships — at the very least bears watching.
