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The NBA coaching carousel never stops spinning, and despite the New York Knicks, Cleveland Cavaliers and Brooklyn Nets all hiring new head coaches recently, there are still five current vacancies in the league after the Oklahoma City Thunder amicably parted ways with Billy Donovan Tuesday night.
From small-market playoff teams to big-market rebuilds, those five vacancies couldn’t be more different. Each has its own appeal beyond simply being one of 30 such jobs in the entire world, but with so many open gigs right now, it’s worth taking a look at each one’s merit.
Bearing that in mind, let’s power rank the five current NBA head coaching vacancies from least desirable to most enticing.
5. Oklahoma City Thunder
The Thunder have become one of the most recognizable franchises in the league and a routine playoff contender thanks to superstars like Kevin Durant, Russell Westbrook, James Harden and Paul George, but the times are a-changin’ in OKC. The Thunder could look drastically different in just a few months’ time, and once that’s the case, they’ll be committing to a full-scale youth movement for the first time since they were raising up three future MVPs in KD, Russ and Harden.
That’s not to say the Thunder gig is unattractive; Shai Gilgeous-Alexander is a clear star in the making, Luguentz Dort is already one of the league’s premier defenders and Darius Bazley came to life in the bubble. But letting Donovan go signals an imminent rebuild, most likely in the form of a Chris Paul trade, letting Danilo Gallinari walk in free agency and being open to a future without Steven Adams and Dennis Schroder, who only have one year left on their contracts.
This is a full-on rebuild waiting to happen, in a small market, where very little of the star power that has made this franchise relevant year in and year out will soon remain.
4. Chicago Bulls
Unlike the Thunder, the Chicago Bulls have no earthly idea who their franchise star is. It’s not Lauri Markkanen, it probably won’t be Coby White or Wendell Carter, and it probably shouldn’t be Zach LaVine. Still, Chicago houses a decent collection of young talent that was expected to contend for a lower-rung playoff spot in the East before, well, Jim Boylen did Jim Boylen things.
The Bulls are clearly flawed and will need to upgrade at the “designated superstar” spot, but both Boylen and GarPax are out. New general manager Arturas Karnisovas is in, and he has several intriguing head coaching candidates to choose from, the No. 4 overall pick in this year’s draft to bolster the core with and, hopefully, a more competent front office to work with.
The Thunder have historically been a more trustworthy and stable organization, but the lure of living in Chicago, restoring the Bulls to their former glory and not having to go through 1-2 years of a transition period before fully diving into the youth movement makes this a more attractive job.
3. Indiana Pacers
Look, I’m not going to try and convince anyone that living in Indianapolis is better than Chicago, but the appeal of the Windy City can only get you so far on this list when your organization has been a train wreck for the last decade. The Indiana Pacers don’t fit that same category as the Bulls, and from a basketball perspective, inheriting a 45-win team is much more attractive.
The biggest thing holding this vacancy back on our list is the uncertainty surrounding Victor Oladipo’s future. Will he be fully healthy before the start of next season? Will he be … you know, actually good again next season? And either way, does he have a future in Indiana as he plays out the final year of his contract?
Indiana has plenty of young but established players to work with between Domantas Sabonis, Malcolm Brogdon, T.J. Warren and Myles Turner, but Oladipo’s health/path back to greatness is the biggest determining factor here — both for the Pacers’ viability as a legitimate Eastern Conference dark horse and their appeal as a head coaching vacancy.
2. Philadelphia 76ers
Every head coaching job in the NBA comes with an inordinate amount of pressure to win, but the Philadelphia 76ers gig easily tops that list among the current vacancies.
This is ironic, considering the guy who was just fired from this job was originally brought in with a ton of job security because expectations were so low. Brown did an excellent job instilling a positive culture amidst all the losing, but his successor will have none of the job security he enjoyed and all of the pressure he never faced until the past two seasons.
The unfortunate bind between Brown and that successor (and the biggest reason the Sixers job isn’t No. 1 on the list) is they’ll both have suffered through a horribly mismanaged roster. Brown’s “Trust the Process” teams were much worse, obviously, but whoever takes the helm in Philly will be charged with magically transforming a flawed supporting cast into a system that allows both Joel Embiid and Ben Simmons to thrive together on a championship-caliber team.
Most coaches could only dream of inheriting two talented superstars like that from day one, but said coaches also have zero control over the albatross contracts of Tobias Harris, Al Horford and even Josh Richardson, which are clogging up the books and preventing this team from properly complementing its flawed superstars. As such, even if the 76ers are the best team on this list, the job will be sink-or-swim from the start … with very little leeway for significant roster changes if a new head coach can’t cure all that ails this playoff squad.
1. New Orleans Pelicans
We could talk about how the New Orleans Pelicans won 30 games despite all the injuries, how they have this year’s Most Improved Player in Brandon Ingram, how useful respected veterans like Jrue Holiday and J.J. Redick are for a new coach or how exciting youngsters like Lonzo Ball and Jaxson Hayes can become, but we’ll keep it simple:
You get to coach Zion Williamson.
Throw in the slightly padded job security of needing to raise these youngsters in a playoff environment but not necessarily contend for titles right away, and it’s no wonder the Pels get the No. 1 spot on the list.
#OtherContent
Speaking of Donovan, now that he’s out, who are the five best candidates for the Thunder job?
In case you’re already firing up the ol’ Trade Machine to figure out how your favorite team can get its hands on Giannis Antetokounmpo … you might want to read what the reigning MVP told Yahoo! Sports’ Chris Haynes about his future with the Milwaukee Bucks first.
On a related note, though, was the Bucks’ second-round defeat at the hands of the 5-seeded Miami Heat the greatest upset in NBA playoff history? (Spoiler alert: It wasn’t, but it definitely cracked The Ringer’s top 10.)
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