lipoli390 wrote:Among the candidates known or believed to want a NBA head coaching position who haven't been hired by any other team yet, here are my top candidates for the Wolves position in order of preference:
1. Fred Hoiberg
2. Billy Donovan
3. Bill Blatt
4. Mark Jackson
5. Scott Skiles
6. Lionel Hollins
7. George Karl
8. flip Saunders
I have zero interest in Byone not on this list.
I like your top three a lot, and also am partial to Hollins. Blatt has openly said he wants to coach in the NBA, but I thought I read that he prefers to be in the Northeast where his roots are. Hoiberg and Donavan have openly said that they are not leaving their college jobs, but of course things can always change. I haven't heard any public Hollins comments, but he's still a young man and almost certainly wants to coach in the NBA again...too bad his boy doesn't still play for the Gophers, because that could have been a selling point. I would not be happy with the other 4 guys on the list for various reasons.
The ugly unavoidable fact is that David Kahn's Love blunder really detracts from the attractiveness of our coaching position. I don't know, of course, but I suspect that it is a major reason that Freddy isn't interested yet. Better to wait 3-4 years to see if the pieces in the post-Love era are good enough to make a run, and let somebody else suffer through the lean years. Your point that NBA jobs are rare and will always be desirable is certainly true, but the top guys know that new opportunities come up every year, and since none of them are financially destitute, they can afford to wait for the right opportunity.