Monday, Jacque Vaughn was relieved of his duties as head coach of the Brooklyn Nets which, though not earth-shattering news, was a bit surprising considering he had just signed an extension with the franchise less than a year prior.
In his place, the front office has announced that they've promoted assistant Kevin Ollie to serve as their interim headman, a shakeup that has some fans and media pundits rather excited.
As things currently stand, there have now been five separate individuals who have held the position of head coach during the eight seasons Sean Marks has served as General Manager of the Nets, a number that NBA Insider Shams Charania recently pointed out to be rather staggering.
Ranking each Brooklyn Nets head coach during the Sean Marks era
When looking at how each of these individuals faired throughout their tenures in the borough, it's rather apparent that there's a clear hierarchy among them.
With this in mind, we at NBN have gone about and ranked each of the four Nets head coaches that have come before Kevin Ollie from worst to first.
4. Tony Brown
To be fair, when Tony Brown held the position of head coach for the Nets back in 2015-16, he was in charge of quite a repugnant group, one that would make this 2023-24 iteration look like a dangerous playoff threat.
Just over a month after taking over for the dismissed Lionel Hollins on January 10, 2016, a major overhaul came underway for the franchise as they waived their former All-Star Joe Johnson that February and relied on a highly questionable frontcourt pairing of Brook Lopez and Thaddeus Young to lead the charge while having the game's most important position of point guard be manned by an injury-plagued and aging Jarrett Jack and an underachieving Shane Larkin.
Nets' Tony Brown love tinged with shots at Lionel Hollins https://t.co/dkf7WSVsri
— New York Post Sports (@nypostsports) January 15, 2016
Despite the high praise he received from players upon his promotion, Brown came across a putrid record of 11-34 during his 45 games at the helm while the Nets ranked sixth-worst in points per game and ranked dead-last in defensive rating during this period.
That summer, he would ultimately be relieved of his position to make way for another individual who also be included on this list.