New Coaches

[Thabo Sefolosha]

wot if pop joins OKC after timmy and manu retire. lool

[Machete]

lol, that would be funny

[OMG Whateva ETC]

How about a guy who hasn't coached in a while that Popovich admits he talks to very often about strategy? Jeff Van Gundy!!

[boomershadow]

How long has it been since jvg even coached. I vote Malone.

[ThunderScot]

Ettore Messina gets my vote. Two-time Euroleague coach of the year, four-time Euroleague winner as coach and an assistant coach of The Spurs. If he's good enough for Popovich, he's good enough for me. Marc Stein has tweeted he's very much on our short-list, whatever his word is worth.

As much as I respect Presti, I'd be slightly concerned if one of his buddies (Donovan) ends up getting the Thunder gig.

[Mamba4Goat]

You guys can have Byron Scott if you want... but if I had to make a list, I'd go with a known commodity and a solid assistant too. I.e. D'Antoni and a great defensive assistant, or swap it around and swoop Thibs up when the Bulls fire him and do everything possible to pry Gentry away.

[QPR]

D'Antoni being a known commodity isn't a positive.

[Kizz Fastfists]

D'Antoni as an assistant for Ron Adams could be interesting.

[Hobes]

I'm all in for JVG. I reckon he would be fantastic.

[spearsy23]

I'm all in for JVG. I reckon he would be fantastic.

I'm curious as to why? He was never a great coach to begin with, now he has been out of the league for a very long time, and he's way more outspoken than you typically want your coach to be.

[Hobes]

I'm all in for JVG. I reckon he would be fantastic.

I'm curious as to why? He was never a great coach to begin with, now he has been out of the league for a very long time, and he's way more outspoken than you typically want your coach to be.

Saying he's "out of the game" is a little unfair considering his level of involvement in the sport. Jeff, in my opinion, has one of the greatest analytical basketball minds I have ever seen and that has to translate somehow into coaching. His breakdown on games is always spot on and I feel he just knows teams/players weaknesses extremely well.

I also believe that his time away from coaching, spent critiquing the way teams play on a nightly basis, has also developed his understanding of the game. From the way he talks, I also feel that he has an extremely modern view of the game of basketball which is essential in today's game.

[Thunderhead]

JVG has been out of coaching for what, 6 to 8 years now ?

Why has no one hired him ?

And he's a defensive minded coach, if you listen to Brooks critics, Thunder need a more complex offense, not a defensive minded coach.

And JVG's coaching record is really not that impressive.

I think both JVG and SVG are over rated because they are personalities, the media like them, so they get a lot of positive things said about them by the media, which over values them as coaches.

[Thunderhead]

Also, in Presti's PC firing Brooks, he said several times the NBA is changing. He did not care to elaborate to educate us ignorant fans on how it is changing. But hiring a JVG would be going old school, rather than trying to capture whatever changes the NBA is going through.

And JVG's success with the Knicks as a defensive coach, was under the old defensive rules , prior to 2001 .... when defense was much simpler than what it is today.

[bondom34]

Yeah, I don't get JVG. I figured by "changing" he means toward analytics and toward a "Spursian" style, which would mesh w/ a Spurs assistant or someone similar.

[Hobes]

The Thunder have opened up conversations with Billy Donovan.

[bondom34]

Gonna lock this one up, seems done.