BigOlPass | LAL

214 | a day ago

Doesn’t seem like a crazy take. It always seemed like if Larry had a different personality he would have been an all time NBA coach

cl353 | MIA

76 | a day ago

ppl look over how much being a good coach is being able to actually coach players

reminds me of that pacers coach that everyone said was super smart basketball wise but he didnt last 2 months with the team

yeartwelve | CHI

20 | a day ago

yep, Mel Daniels

jdjdthrow

13 | 17 hours ago

Said about Dave Joerger as well.

aoifhasoifha | NYK

1 | 6 hours ago

It’s what made Phil Jackson great (along with having Tex Winters, one of the best basketball minds of all time) and why Doc Rivers keeps getting jobs.

HikmetLeGuin

94 | a day ago

The NBA 75 list had Larry Brown rated as one of the top 15 coaches. I’d say he did pretty well for himself.

TopHatTony11 | DET

22 | a day ago

He’s number 2 in my heart.

IronClu

2 | 13 hours ago

Out of curiosity who’s 1?

GoldenGateShark | GSW

-8 | 21 hours ago

#️⃣2️⃣💩

adammoon111 | HOU

4 | 20 hours ago

Mentioned in the same breath as Glenn Rivers

HikmetLeGuin

1 | 5 hours ago

Tbf, Doc has a very good resume, regardless of recent struggles.

jdjdthrow

0 | 17 hours ago

Wait, literally?

Drewicho | SEA

32 | a day ago

I would definitely say he’s the best NBA coach with only one ring.

vbsteez | NOP

19 | 21 hours ago

Rick Carlisle only has one ring as a coach, and hes had a pretty impressive time on the sidelines.

ForneauCosmique | SAS

27 | a day ago

Right? He’s definitely an all time coach

p_pio

4 | a day ago

Les Harrison, despite somehow not being HoFer.

He kept Royals as a team to beat in the early days despite them lacking true star and being kind of out of meta for that period: their by far best player was PG and they lacked star offensive player rather played team basketball.

He was mentor for Alex Hannum who later become the only coach to win against Russell Celtics. Which is fitting: Royals were the only team to win against Mikan Lakers dynasty when he was still healthy.

And most important: he actually won championships with Royals, now known as Kings. Which means he should be in talks about the GOAT.

PHX480 | PHX

1 | 6 hours ago

Still the only coach to win a ring in the NCAA and NBA. I think that helps a lot.

itwas20yearsago2day | LAL

27 | a day ago

I mean he IS an all time coach

lbutler1234 | United States

2 | a day ago

An all timeier coach

drtij_dzienz

1 | a day ago

Although, to be fair, if he were an all-time coach? Would definitely put him on the list of all time coach.

The_Big_Untalented

12 | a day ago

Brown IS an all-time great coach. Phil, Pop, Red, and Riley are ahead of him. And then you could put Kerr and Spoelstra ahead of him. Brown is a greater coach than everybody wise. Guy was an elite coach for 30 years and drastically improved teams everywhere he went.

Unfair-Specific7225

-15 | a day ago

Spoelstra 😂

Cosmic_Note | MIA

7 | 16 hours ago

Yes Spoelstra

jboggin

7 | a day ago

Agreed. Though, from what I’ve read it would have taken a VERY different personality. Brown seemed like such a conniving jerk

Pizzadontdie | POR

6 | a day ago

I think he was an all time nba coach.

CutLonzosHair2017 | LAL

142 | a day ago

I mean everyone says Larry Brown was a top tier coach that was just an ass. So not surprising. Which is why he’d be wildly successful early in his stints on different teams and then lose the team by being an ass.

Edit: He’s also Pop’s mentor. Pop’s coaching tree is Larry Brown’s coaching tree.

boringexplanation | SAC

58 | a day ago

Not to mention- Pop would’ve very likely been viewed the same way if not worse than Larry if Duncan didn’t back up his hard-ass approach.

ForneauCosmique | SAS

70 | a day ago

Which Pop has given tons of credit to Timmy for allowing him to be coached like that Which made everyone else follow

Runshooteat

79 | a day ago

Pop had David Robinson and then TD, possibly the two least demanding superstars of the past 40 years. He has admitted many times that they are the primary drivers for his success and ability to coach guys hard.

And realistically, who knows if TD would have been so stable if his first experience in the NBA wasn’t watching a near MVP caliber player in DRob set the tone. He witnessed a military man be professional, and then continued that legacy. D Rob is probably the greatest thing to ever happen to the Spurs, he set the tone for professionalism and it has continued ever since.

AirBamaInt

12 | 20 hours ago

Avery Johnson’s impact on the culture as well cannot be understated. If Robinson was Wade for that team, Johnson was like Haslem

CarlosMarcos1848 | CLE

1 | 6 hours ago

It always pisses me off how overlooked Robinson is when people talk about the Spurs dynasty.

None of that shit happens without him building the foundation.

Runshooteat

1 | 6 hours ago

Not only was he a consummate professional, he was statistically one of the best players of all time, his advanced stats are as good, if not better, than anyone else from his era, besides MJ. The series against Hakeem just ruined his legacy to a degree and that was more Rodman and Pops fault than anything.

xixbia

13 | a day ago

Nah, Larry Brown was openly talking with the Cavs during the 2005 postseason.

If he had actually committed to the Pistons he could have won at least one if not a few more rings. That was entirely on Brown and his personality. He was done with the Pistons after a year and a half.

As a result he got a bag from the Knicks, but it was also the end of his chance at another ring.

Future_Tyrant | NYK

8 | 21 hours ago

Brown is also part of the original coaching tree. He played for and coached under Dean Smith, who played for and coached under Phog Allen.

Civil_Weakness6119

44 | a day ago

Larry was a great coach no doubt. First and only coach to win a ncaa championship and nba championship. But Larry was a hard ass who wore on players, and was tough to work with and for.

xixbia

18 | a day ago

He also quit on the Pistons during his second season. He was actively looking for a new job during the 04/05 postseason.

It’s not just that he wore on players and was hard to work for, he also lost interest himself.

BananaRepublic_BR | SAS

8 | 18 hours ago

That’s wild considering the Pistons were one win away from repeating as champions.

NickLidstrom | SAC

6 | 15 hours ago

Craziest part was that it leaked in March (iirc) that he was leaving for the Knicks, and yet the Pistons still were one quarter away from repeating despite all that noise.

Overall-Palpitation6 | MEM

2 | 19 hours ago

He always gave off the impression at a certain point like “I don’t need this, I’m out!”, with pretty much every team he coached.

lafromnyc

1 | a day ago

Was he just trying to have his players be too perfect all the time?

At least he wasn’t Thibs?!

13Tsunami

24 | a day ago

Pop would prob agree. He learned a lot from Brown

TheFuschiaBaron

14 | a day ago

Pop was once quoted as saying “Larry taught me a lot. A lot about how to coach this game. Basketball. The game of basketball.”

deemerritt | CHA

23 | a day ago

I have watched some truly horrible NBA teams in my years with charlotte bobcats/hornets season tickets, but i have never in my life seen anyone quit the way Boris Diaw did in Charlotte. I think I saw him pass up a fastbreak dunk seemingly just out of spite. He was obviously a good player, but Paul Silas did not reach him at all. Like Boris wanted out so badly that he was actively sabotaging games on a team that was pretty bad already.

so-cal_kid | LAL

13 | a day ago

Dude must have gained like 40 pounds over the course of his time there. Just didn’t care at all.

BatchFloss | PHI

6 | 19 hours ago

Silas had a toxic masculinity streak, I remember he was the first one I ever heard to call his players “soft like toilet paper” to the press on camera. I’m not saying he was a bad person or a bad coach, but that motivational tactic doesn’t work on all players.

wilderblueseas

2 | 14 hours ago

‘Pretty bad’ is an understatement. They were tanking sure and were likely thinking there wasn’t even going to be a season.

BUT That lockout record, equivalent to worst in the NBA has everything to do with the leader heading into the season rocking up at 300 pounds and quitting on the team while on the court.

Boris Diaw was cut. They got nothing for him.

The dagger was watching some of the most beautiful basketball I have ever seen when he joined the spurs and they won the championship.

Drewicho | SEA

16 | a day ago

Larry Brown got the Charlotte Bobcats to the playoffs twice. Might be more impressive than is NBA title win over the Shaq/Kobe Lakers.

Isguros | CHA

2 | 13 hours ago

once*

Picklesbedamned

14 | a day ago

His track record is insane. Reggie Miller Pacers during their first two ECF appearances. Allen Iverson Sixers when they went to the finals. 04-05 Pistons (Ben Wallace in part argued the team didn’t go to three finals because their defensive scheme changed under Saunders in 06). Throw in David Thompson’s Nuggets in the final ABA season where they reached the finals and David Robinson’s first few seasons. The only guy I can think of with that wide-ranging coaching success across teams is Rick Carlisle and now maybe Mike Brown.

Lacerda1

13 | a day ago

Oh, and throw in a national title at Kansas.

Key_Fox3289

9 | a day ago

Pat Riley

Picklesbedamned

4 | 19 hours ago

Yeah that was a big miss on my part.

NickLidstrom | SAC

3 | 15 hours ago

Mike Brown.

He really doesn’t compare at all, and honestly I wouldn’t even say he’s had wide-ranging success.

Brown has made it out of the second round 3 times in 13 seasons. His first Finals appearance was a LeBron carry job through an all-time weak east, and he struggled with the Cavs after it, even if it wasn’t necessarily his fault. That offence was stagnant though, and that was on him.

The less said about the Lakers stint the better.

His first year with the Kings was amazing and I’ll always love him for that, but having watched almost every game he coached them for, I can attest to the fact that he had basically no adaptability. Once Keegan and Huerter’s shots stopped falling his entire offence fell apart. He then proceeded to lose the entire locker room which, while again not entirely his fault (Fox, also Lavine and DeMar), is perhaps his most Larry Brown-like trait.

He has also missed the playoffs 5 times.

His reputation has bounced around more than almost any other coach, I’ll give you that.

DrGoatLives

10 | a day ago

Makes sense. Larry Brown was a great coach.

414wtk

9 | a day ago

I remember when he was at the end of his career coaching SMU.

The players said it was almost impossible to practice because he would stop the play dozens of times and make little corrections and explanations. Too much ball knowledge for his own good

MindfulInquirer

8 | a day ago

Underrated. Not talked about enough. No disrespect to the player but taking Allen Iverson and the style he played of jacking up two hundred shots per night and making about 40% of them, and making a team work around that to reach the Finals was a highly impressive coaching job.

RequirementLeading12 | LAL

10 | a day ago

I mean that was the style of every star… I hate how Gen Z talks about past generations. The game was played differently.

Veserius | NBA

1 | 10 hours ago

It wasn’t though. Iverson took the most shots in the league by a wide margin in some seasons. In the 01-02 season Iverson averaged more than 5 FG attempted per game than the next highest player. The difference between #2 and #20 was smaller than the difference between Iverson and #2.

EGarrett28

7 | a day ago

I remember reading that Larry Brown’s teams would usually struggle in the first half then dominate the second half after Brown watched what the other team did then made his adjustments.

FWIW as annoying as he could be, he also had one of my favorite ever quotes about basketball on Sportscentury. “This is the best team game ever designed if you play it the right way.”

goodshotbiga | NBA

6 | a day ago

I remeber on Raja Bell’s podcast - maybe from like 6 years ago, he had a story of Boris Diaw giving Terry Porter zero respect and beginning to shoot halfcourts at practice rather than do the stations Porter was running at practice.

And then a few years later Bell had Boris Diaw on his podcast and Diaw talked about refusing to shoot just to mock Porter lol

jimmylamstudio

10 | a day ago

Boris Diaw held LeBron to 0FG%, don’t fact check that. It’s true.

GotMoFans | MEM

5 | a day ago

Coach Pop is an acolyte of Larry Brown…

22dias

6 | a day ago

Never forget Diaw had non-performance bonuses of hitting a target weight during the season.

I’m 99% sure he didn’t hit them.

ContinuingAnyway

3 | a day ago

Spurs Legend Larry Brown

lafromnyc

3 | a day ago

Man I wish this was in English. I really respected Boris Diaw as a player, pure team player and a perfect Spurs player on that team.

BigStrongPolarGuy

1 | a day ago

He remembers Brown basically seeing everything on every possession and not even needing to spend the first part of timeouts talking things over with his assistants.

This is such a weird skill some people have. I remember reading an article about how Rex Ryan could do the same thing. He’d be able to watch a play once and see everything that happened with every guy, which is not a thing most coaches can do.

yeropinionman | DET

1 | 9 hours ago

Pound for pound

Akumetsu33 | TOR

1 | 7 hours ago

As much I like Larry Brown I hated his stance on never playing rookies and his poor management of the 2004 bronze team, everybody blamed the team but nobody realized he barely played Lebron and some other really good players like Wade and Melo because they were rookies or “too young” and kept the older players on no matter how much they struggled.

Imagine a coach not playing you for your skill but simply because of your age. I would be pissed off.

That part of his coaching I never would get behind but he is a legend.

foogeyzi69 | LAL

1 | 5 hours ago

Larry Brown? The guy who benched him and tyson in Charlotte? Lmao.

_Jetto_ | NBA

1 | a day ago

While brown was such an insane X’s a dos guy especially defensively. His issue aside from handling players is the game passed him by fucking hard. Like we were on patch 12.1 and he was still on patch 7.1 hard…

RequirementLeading12 | LAL

1 | a day ago

I have no idea how Mike D made the hall of fame. Guy underperformed everywhere he went and his offenses were always all sizzle no steak. The moment they got to the playoffs they were exposed

theuniversehasspoken

1 | 17 hours ago

Tactical?

Which firearm, multitool and LED flashlight does he daily carry?

ihave2eggs

1 | 12 hours ago

Betty White’s combined tools.

AkronIBM | DET

1 | 7 hours ago

The word isn’t specific to technology, lol

[deleted]

3 | a day ago

[removed]

Boris Diaw says Larry Brown was the best tactical coach he ever played for, ahead of Popovich and D’Antoni