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Scotto: I spoke to Mike Brown recently when he was in town. He felt Jordi Fernandez would get a head coaching job, and he expected to lose him this summer for the Kings. It seemed like he was on that path after his work with the Canadian National Team. In the annual NBA GM survey, he was voted the best assistant coach in the league.
Lewis: The search started a while ago, over a month ago, and probably closer to six or seven weeks ago. It was pretty exhaustive, which is something I think they needed to do after Kevin Ollie, Jacque Vaughn, and Steve Nash. I think they needed to go back to searching far and wide and not just for lack of a better term settling.
The guy who had been the most successful of the lot was Kenny Atkinson, which was the last exhaustive search they had. I think Jordi has a lot of Atkinson traits. He’s a guy who, for lack of a better term, is a gym rat of a coach. All that talk we used to hear about Nets culture – it was like a drinking game – Nets culture this and that. A lot of that culture went out the door when they fired Atkinson. I think Jordi is the kind of guy who can bring some of that same culture back.
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It was a wide search. Mike Budenholzer was part of that, but from what I’m led to believe, his contract demands were rather high. A lot of money for a lot of years. The numbers I’ve heard that I can’t share are probably beyond even my wildest expectations.
Scotto: If I give you a number, can you say over or under?
Lewis: Sure.
Scotto: $8 million?
Lewis: Over.
Scotto: $15 million?
Lewis: No. I hadn’t heard that. You’re talking a lot of money and a whole lot of years. I can understand why when you’re not a team that’s going to win a title next year where you might want to say all the general managers voted him (Fernandez) the best assistant coach in the league, he’s fast-rising, he’s hard-working and has an ability to connect with the players while being hard-driving but not abrasive, which was something Budenholzer was accused of being.
Scotto: Mike Budenholzer was the best-known name for his accolades. I heard Joe Tsai liked Budenholzer as a potential candidate because of his championship pedigree. Sources close to Budenholzer told me he’s open to coaching in a big market, and Brooklyn was within a big market, so it fit that and made sense from that perspective, even though the Nets are not ready to be a championship contender immediately.
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While Budenholzer may have been in the finalist grouping, I don’t think he was as high, to my understanding, as Fernandez and Kevin Young, who was an associate head coach with Phoenix. Young coached Mikal Bridges and Cam Johnson in Phoenix.
At the end of the season media availability, Mikal talked about the success he had in Brooklyn after the trade was based on them running stuff for him, similar to Phoenix, where Young was the offensive coordinator. Neither Mikal nor Johnson publicly wanted to comment on the coaching search, but I’m told both players had good things to say about Young during their time with the Suns behind the scenes. I certainly think he would’ve gotten a vote of confidence from those guys had he gotten the job.
For Young, it was the quality of life, being closer to home, the money, and years at BYU.
I think the guy who was a little underplayed here in terms of where he was as a potential finalist is James Borrego, who’s with New Orleans right now. I heard Sean Marks, and he chatted when the Pelicans were in town, according to league sources. He’s been instrumental behind the scenes helping Willie Green on the Pelicans this season. I see Borrego inching his way back to becoming a head coach again.
Some people have asked me if this is a signal that they’re going to rebuild and what this hire means. You made a great point about the Atkinson comparison. For Fernandez, they have young guys on this roster they have to develop, whether it’s Cam Thomas, if Nic Claxton comes back, you’ve got Noah Clowney, etc. They think he can do that. Defensively, where this team underwhelmed, given the talent that it had and switchability, he’s supposed to help in that department.
Lewis: Kings players call him their defensive coordinator, so that’s his specialty. I’d second your comments that the Nets underachieved on that end of the court. It’s incomprehensible to me – and I know Ben Simmons didn’t play, and he’s their most accomplished defensive player – but when you have this many guys that are supposed to be above-average to good defenders with these kinds of wingspans, and you can’t stop anybody, it’s a concern. I think he’ll help on that end of the court.
I’d caution against saying hiring an assistant equals a rebuild. I’m not sure that all assistants are created equal. I think when you have someone like Fernandez, there’s probably a happy medium. I don’t think when you have a guy like him it necessarily signals a tear-down rebuild. I think it signals probably a slow burn.
