Shout out to all of the lovely coaches in the NBA, but every year there can only be one that is the best.
This year, the award goes to ...
It’s hard to argue with that too much. Cleveland were good last year, but they were spectacular this past season. They started the season hot, had a brief lull, then once again returned to lofty heights toward the end of the season. The Cavaliers ended the season with 64 wins after broadly returning the same team as last year.
So what is to account for the difference? Well, they changed coaches. It must be the coach. Congratulations Kenny Atkinson.
I’m sure JB Bickerstaff is just as happy as I am
The strange thing is who they changed coaches from. JB Bickerstaff. You might recognize the name. He is the coach of the Pistons. To take an explanation from The Detroit Free Press:
“Bickerstaff received 305 total points, including 31 first-place votes. Cleveland Cavaliers coach Kenny Atkinson, who led them to an Eastern Conference-best 64 wins, won the award with 401 points and 59 first-place votes. Houston Rockets head coach Ike Udoka finished third with 133 total points and seven first-place votes.”
Congrats to Ime too, I suppose.
The thing is, we already kind of knew Cleveland was good. Them having year-to-year improvement after some more familiarity and development among their core makes perfect sense. There could have been an improvement with JB in charge as well.
The Pistons, on the other hand, were not supposed to be the sixth seed in the Eastern Conference. After last season, we weren’t even sure they would get above 30 wins if we hoped and prayed really hard. And we weren’t even sure JB was the right coach! He just got fired!
We know better now. I’m a little more impressed with Bickerstaff’s story than Atkinson’s. One might think the players on the Pistons feel the same way. Pro athletes have a tendency to take slights against themselves or one of their own as motivation. Can the Pistons push this team even higher next year now that they have this chip on their shoulder?