Who Should Be the Next Coach of the Brooklyn Nets?

Jerry Sloan

This afternoon, the Brooklyn Nets fired their head coach of 2+ years, Avery Johnson. After winning Coach of the Month in November, Avery had lost 10 of his last 13 games and management in Russia has not been happy with him this year. So who should replace Avery as head coach in Brooklyn? Let’s look at some options:

P.J. Carlesimo. 

P.J will be the interim head coach until the Nets find a replacement. He has been a coach at the NBA level before for the Trail Blazers, Warriors, Sonics, and Thunder. In his 8 seasons as a coach, he has a record of 204-296 and has never gotten out of the first round of the playoffs or won a division. If he can lead the Nets to a good record over the next couple of weeks, there is a tiny chance that they will keep him as a coach. But the team is probably looking for a more high profile name.

Phil Jackson. 

Phil Jackson would obviously be a very good big name to bring in. Jackson has only coached in two places, Chicago and Los Angeles, and he has coached two of the greatest players of all time, Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant. He has won 11 championships and has never had a losing season. In the regular season he has a winning percentage greater than 70% and he has only lost in the first round of the playoffs twice. The Nets would love to have him come coach the team. The question will be if he wants to come to Brooklyn. Earlier in the season when the Lakers fired Mike Brown there were rumors that Jackson wanted to replace him but the Lakers instead went with Mike D’Antoni. If Jackson still wants to coach in the NBA, the Nets seem like a good location for him.

Jerry Sloan. 

Jerry Sloan will make a lot of sense for this team as long as he still has a good relationship with Deron Williams. He was the head coach in Utah for over 20 years between 1988 and 2011 and only missed the playoffs 3 times while making the finals twice. He coached Deron Williams towards the end of his tenure but arguably resigned because of Deron. As long as Deron wants him and as long as he wants to still be an NBA coach, there is a good chance that he can be coming to Brooklyn.

Stan Van Gundy. 

SVG has been the coach of the Miami Heat and most recently the Orlando Magic. In his 7 seasons as a head coach he has never missed the playoffs and has won 64% of his regular season games. He went to the finals with Orlando in 2009. If Van Gundy were to come to Brooklyn, we can be sure that Dwight Howard will never, ever, ever be a Net.

Jerry Stackhouse. 

This is my personal favorite option. Stack can become the first player-coach in the NBA in who knows how long. He will go out on the court, hit 4 3’s in a row, have the opponents call a timeout and then draw up another play for him to get an open 3. Stack would be an amazing coach. (Of course this will never happen).

There are also some other options that have not been mentioned as possibilities. Expect the Nets to name a new head coach within the next week or two.