Charlotte Bobcats fire Mike Dunlap in imprudent, shocking move
What in the heck are the Charlotte Bobcats thinking? According to Rick Bonnell of the Charlotte Observer (and later confirmed by the Bobcats organization), the Charlotte Bobcats have fired head coach Mike Dunlap after just one season with the team. One season. The sad thing is that the Bobcats made strides from the 2011 season, and the even sadder thing is that the Bobcats think they can actually do better.
Dunlap didn’t even get a fair shot, and this might be the most surprising move you will hear this offseason. For the sake of other teams in the NBA, hopefully this is the dumbest move you hear this offseason. Listen, I’m not going to hide the fact that I am disappointed with the Bobcats decision here, because it just doesn’t make sense. How can you justify firing a head coach after he tripled the team’s wins? Yeah, I know that’s a little bit misleading, but you have to think that going from a 10.6% winning percentage to a 25.6% winning percentage is a marked improvement.
The Bobcats are going to continue to be one of the league’s bottom-feeders with awful, short-sighted decisions such as this one. I’m not going to sit here and only blame Michael Jordan for this firing, but you have to think that he wanted this to happen as the owner of the team. Rich Cho seems too prudent to make a move like this, but you never know these days.
Dunlap is pretty respected in league circles, and he did a decent job in his first season given the mess he had to work with. Charlotte has talent and depth at guard with Gerald Henderson and youngster Kemba Walker being the two standouts, but the Bobcats have absolutely nothing to work with in the frontcourt. I mean, the talent gap between the backcourt and frontcourt for the Bobcats is probably the biggest in the entire NBA. Hopefully, the Bobcats can actually have some luck in the lottery and find themselves in a position to land Kentucky Wildcats defensive standout Nerlens Noel- he’s the best fit for the Bobcats out of all the prospects in the 2013 NBA Draft.
Firing Mike Dunlap is a decision that the Bobcats will almost certainly regret, unless if they make me eat a heaping pile of crow by hiring a big name. But here’s the thing, I doubt any big name coach would want to go to Charlotte given the team they have and, more importantly, the way they have treated past coaches such as Dunlap. Maybe they already have a deal in place for a big name, and, for their sake, let us hope so. That’s the only way to justify this hire. As of right now, I guess I’ll have to stick with being a cynical Bobcats fan, stuck with ranting about imprudent front office decisions. My question to the Charlotte Bobcats is, do you guys really think you can do better at the head coaching spot? What is certain is that the Bobcats front office has a busy offseason ahead of them.
He should have received more than one year to work with, especially after getting this team above 20 wins and out of last place in the Southeast division.