5 potential replacements for Terry Stotts as Trail Blazers head coach

3. Mike D’Antoni

After being let go by the Houston Rockets, Mike D’Antoni joined the coaching staff of his former pupil Steve Nash in Brooklyn rather than take another head coaching job right away (the Indiana Pacers may regret not making him an offer he couldn’t refuse).

D’Antoni is the most accomplished head coach available, if only theoretically (maybe he’d rather stay down a chair on the bench in Brooklyn under Nash?). If the Nets make a deep playoff run, there may be no available job openings left for him to take anyway.

However, we can still imagine what D’Antoni, who was ahead of his time as an offensive genius when he was the Phoenix Suns’ head coach (making Nash into an MVP), could do with the backcourt duo of Lillard and CJ McCollum. He just recently led a Houston Rockets team to prominence as a historically gifted offense that made multiple, deep playoff runs.

Of the course, the primary issue Portland has had in recent years is its defense, and D’Antoni would be no help there. But the Trail Blazers are also in a win-now situation. Even if it means waiting to make the hiring official, it’s worth seeing if D’Antoni has interest in their job.