Central Division neighbor is roughly three degrees removed from actually knocking on Milwaukee’s door
In what will be the first bit of scuttlebutt to glom onto the Milwaukee Bucks before the offseason even begins, rumor has it that our friends across Lake Michigan are considering maybe possibly seeing if Bucks GM Jon Horst wants to become their President of Basketball Operations:
The Pistons are believed to have interest in exploring the prospect of hiring Bucks GM Jon Horst as they search for a new head of basketball ops. Horst is a Mich. native, worked in Detroit and won Executive of the Year en route to Milwaukee’s 2021 title.https://t.co/A6ycVmnrjq https://t.co/x0YhjLJtUG
— Marc Stein (@TheSteinLine) April 15, 2024
A couple of things off the top:
- This is about as thin as it gets when it comes to rumor and hearsay. Stein just linked to his Substack which, as of writing, has no story or further reporting on this. He’s still somewhat linked in with the Dallas Mavericks and other league sources; whether he has the same in Detroit is TBD
- We don’t quite know how much time is left on Horst’s contract with the team. He last signed a contract extension in October 2021 to add years onto a deal that was, at that time, set to expire after the 2022-2023. That extension was described as “long-term” when it was signed so you’d assume it will last him through at least the 2024-2025 season
- The verbiage Stein uses is meant to give as many outs as possible: “[Detroit]…is believed to have interest in exploring the prospect of hiring [Horst].” In short, this is nothing like a sure thing and Horst is probably a name among many that Detroit’s questionable braintrust is contemplating
As far as it goes for the Bucks, Horst is the GM until he isn’t the GM. It has been a busy calendar year for him between the Jrue Holiday-Damian Lillard trade, Giannis Antetokounmpo’s extension, hiring and then firing head coach Adrian Griffin, and orchestrating Doc Rivers’s gradual succession to the sidelines. He, of course, has the 2021 NBA title to his name and an Executive of the Year award from the 2018-2019 season. Going back to Michigan to try and turn around a flailing Pistons organization (and, crucially, resetting the clock on how much leeway he’d get over a given time period with a new team) may be of interest to Horst, but again, any thoughts on this track are pure speculation.
It may be worth noting that Doc Rivers previously served a stint as dual head coach and President of Basketball Operations when he was with the Los Angeles Clippers. Given the fact that he was booted out of the front office by Jerry West and Lawrence Frank without accomplishing much of note, I wouldn’t exactly call him spectacularly qualified to take on the same fusion here. Things could get interesting in any possible scenario where ownership decides to hire someone from outside the organization while restricting that individual’s ability to make their own decisions about the coaching staff due to the two outstanding contracts the team is already paying to ex-coaches. Again, though, this is all speculation before the facts reveal themselves.
Will it lead to something? Will it lead to nothing? Who knows! But it could be another interesting fold in a season chock full of them.
The Bucks, meanwhile, begin their postseason run this Sunday when they host the Indiana Pacers.