Good guys will finish down in this year’s NBA coaching carousel

Round and round the carousel goes in
the NBA, so fast it sometimes feels like a
blur. With only 30 horses on the carousel,
coaches are lucky to have a saddle. Along
the ride, though, each horse makes its
ups and downs. This offseason is likely to
conclude with the wrong coaches riding
high.

We learned, this past week, that Isiah
Thomas will not return to the sidelines for
the New York Knicks next season. That
decision came about two years late, except
in the minds of James Dolan and other
higher-ups at Madison Square Garden.

What’s puzzling about Thomas’ departure
is the timing. The Knicks would’ve
suffered severe pains if they dared to
crane their necks at the Eastern Conference
standings early in the season, and
Thomas wasn’t fired then. That led you to
think nothing could get him fired-even
a sexual-harassment scandal. Now, suddenly,
43 games out of first place isn’t good
enough. What was the problem before?
Didn’t want to disrupt that “chemistry”
in New York? Thomas shouldn’t have
trouble using his charisma and success as
a player to land a job elsewhere.

Larry Brown, Thomas’ predecessor
with the Knicks and the man who set
the turbulence in motion, just filled
the coaching vacancy of the Charlotte
Bobcats. Brown is like the modern-day
traveling salesman. He goes from town
to town pocketing undeserved cash under
the pretense that he’ll deliver a reliable
product. However, he ultimately leaves
the customer feeling conned.

The Bobcats are Brown’s ninth victim.
He has accomplished plenty in his coaching
career but is now more of a team
killer than curer. He alienates superstars
and turns them against the team-most
notably, Allen Iverson in Philadelphia.
This story is bound to end with the Bobcats
buying out Brown from his contract with
the promise that he won’t destroy any
more of their team.

How does Brown plan to unite with
Michael Jordan – someone whose expansive
talents don’t reach front-office
management – to turn around a team in its
infancy with no winning tradition? (And
no winning season, for that matter.)

Well, coaches you don’t want coaching
your team usually come in threes. Pat
Riley completes the trifecta. Riley, another
coach with a winning legacy, cannot bear
to rebuild a team or to be responsible for
losing. Riley hired Stan Van Gundy to
bring the Miami Heat to prominence, then
forced him out so he himself could claim
the championship as coach. Now that the
Heat is the worst team in the NBA, Riley
bails back to the front office. It’s likely the
next coach either will be fired for losing
too much or will be forced out for winning
too much so Riley can take over.

Then there are guys, such as Avery
Johnson with the Dallas Mavericks, at the
other end of the spectrum. Johnson was
the fastest ever to reach 100 wins as an
NBA coach. He had the Mavericks two
wins away from an NBA championship
just two years ago. Last season, they were
the Western Conference’s top seed and
have been among the class of the West
throughout Johnson’s tenure.

Now, despite his team winning 51
regular-season games, Johnson got the
boot because of another first-round
playoff exit. A word to the wise in Dallas:
The West, in case you haven’t realized,
is ultracompetitive-not everyone can
dominate. Johnson is the kind of coach
with the tools to win, and the team
shouldn’t want to see him go.