NBA Rumors: Mark Jackson to take over Pacers if Frank Vogel is fired
By Jack Crosby
The horrid second half of the NBA season ended on Friday night for the top-seeded Indiana Pacers at the hands of a blowout by the Miami Heat in Game 6 of the Eastern Conference Finals, leaving the future of head coach Frank Vogel in question.
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Yes, there are some that believe Vogel needed to, at the very least, get the Pacers past the Heat and into the NBA Finals, which he has now failed to do two years in a row to save his job.
Although he’s not fired just yet, the names will begin to pop up of possible replacements, and of course that means it’s time to look to a guy actually had his job taken away from him recently despite being successful, Mark Jackson.
According to ESPN’s Marc Stein, the ties to Larry Bird are one factor that could land him there.
"The whispers have already started in Indy about Bird turning to his old point guard, Mark Jackson, to take over. Jackson and Reggie Miller were the leaders when Bird was the Pacers’ coach … and Bird isn’t the only big fan in the organization of the man Golden State just ousted. Fellow Pacers exec Donnie Walsh is another huge admirer who has long maintained privately that he wouldn’t consider Jackson for the Indy job unless he had coached somewhere else first."
After turning the Golden State Warriors around and leading them to two consecutive playoff appearances, Jackson was fired after what many believe were multiple disputes with management.
With the report stating that both his former teammate Bird and Donnie Walsh are on board to bring him in, I don’t think there would be any management issues with Jackson in Indianapolis.