With a tumultuous year in the books, it’s time to pay the piper
Several days ago, we looked back on the not one, not two, but THREE head coaching changes the Bucks have experienced since May 2023 began and wanted to hear your verdicts on what ended up being quite messy. Not something we would have anticipated upon Griffin’s hiring around this time a year ago. First off, with former head coach Mike Budenholzer now back in the league with his home state team, how are fans feeling about his ouster a year later?
This is a bit of a whopper. Seemed like in the wake of the Bucks’ first-round, five-game defeat at the hands of the Heat last spring, most fans were done with Bud. The prevailing sentiment among both the usual loud voices on Twitter who had been beating the #FireBud drum even right after he won a championship and the fanbase as a whole was to move on. Well, it seems like a wide swath of fans, including likely many who wanted Bud gone a year ago have realized: the grass ain’t always greener. Maybe we were too quick to judge a guy whose two quick post-title playoff exits came in large part due to injuries to Khris Middleton and Giannis Antetokounmpo. Regardless, I think it’s safe to say that Bud was superior to the his two successors. Speaking of…
In spite of his 30-13 record and Doc Rivers’—whom it should be noted had a much more difficult schedule and dealt with injuries at the top of the roster—sub-.500 record that followed, most fans still think moving on from Adrian Griffin was the right move. Griff was dealt a tough hand with his job description changing significantly from a team ready to retool around a rookie head coach to one firmly going for it after acquiring Damian Lillard, but he didn’t handle much gracefully in his half-season. He quickly made a high-profile assistant quit, had his vets questioning his schemes and basketball knowledge within four games, then seemingly lost whatever respect he had from the team by the new year. Griffin was very much in over his head, and firing him in an attempt to salvage the season so as not to waste any more time made sense then, as it does now.
But what about what happened after? We put it this way: should the Bucks have finished out the year with an interim coach and engaged in a full search this summer?
This is pretty interesting. Back in late January, with the team near the top of the East and very much intending—as they should always be with Giannis in his prime—to compete for a title, hiring Doc Rivers made sense, despite all his warts. While it’s been reported that GM Jon Horst preferred Warriors assistant and former Nets head coach Kenny Atkinson, ownership wanted Rivers. With his experience and the franchise’s urgency to salvage a good campaign out of the Griffin debacle, I see the logic. But they didn’t have to pick Doc. They could have just let it ride with Joe Prunty, just like they did in 2018, and make a permanent hire around now.
The thing is, much like the last time this happened in 2018, the best candidate available this summer probably was Bud again. And let’s be real: they weren’t gonna go back, nor was Bud likely going to entertain a return. Atkinson could have been the guy, in that case. Seems like Giannis the franchise learned their lesson in trying out a rookie head coach during this window. Atkinson wouldn’t have been bad at all (and I would have preferred him myself) but there’s no guarantee he’d be superior to Doc. In any case, Doc Rivers is the head coach of the Bucks for the foreseeable future, and however crappy it looks in hindsight, that’s the reality we all must move forward with.
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