Denver Nuggets fired Michael Malun on Tuesday in the second stunning dismissal of the NBA coach for so many weeks.
The news fell from the seemingly out of nowhere to lunch in Denver, less than a week left in the regular season. There are three games in the schedule of the regular season on the nuggets, and now they will encounter a post -zone without their leader, who was in the team for 10 seasons and led the most successful era in the history of the franchise.
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This is an era that made six consistent performances in the play -off and the only franchise championship in 2023, just two seasons ago. But it was not good enough to get the safety of Malun.
While the surface is shocking, the dismissal of Malon is not without a precedent. In fact, this corresponds to the trends of the NBA. Of the last seven coaches who won the NBA championship, the teams quit five, which they led to the titles for less than five seasons.
Only Kerr, Mazulla remains
Joe Mazulla is still hired by Boston Celtics, who had just won his title last season. Steve Kerr is a device with the Golden Stait warriors after since 2015 leads to the franchise to four NBA championships. And that’s all.
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If you are not the leader of the dynasty, the message for the head coaches in the NBA is clear, even for those who have recent championships at their resume: it is best to consider themselves expendable.
It was a message for Tyronne Liu, Nick Nurse, Frank Vogel, T -shirt of Budenholzer and, now, Malone. Cavaliers released “six games” in the 2018 season, more than two seasons, remote from his coaching Cleveland, to their first NBA title. Predators fired the nurse in 2023, four seasons after he led Toronto to his only championship.
Fogel’s reason was even shorter. Lakers fired Vogel at the end of the 2021-22 season, just two seasons after he coached Los Angeles called. Budenholzer was also two seasons remote from the NBA championship from Miluoka when Bax fired him at the end of the 2022-23 season.
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Now Malone joins this list. And it is difficult to decipher how the solution helps nuggets in the nearest or distance. This, despite the declared goal of the team to compete for the championship this season.
This, according to the president of the team Josh Croenke, the son of the owner of Stan Croenke and the public person, Denver’s decision to dump Malone and CEO Kalvin Buta, who will not be extended.
“This decision was not taken frivolously and was evaluated very carefully, and we do this only with the intention of giving our group the best chance to compete for the 2025 NBA championship and deliver another title to Denver and our fans everywhere,” the crown said in a statement.
Michael Malone’s enjoying really improves the chances of Denver? (Dustin Bradford/Getty Images)
(Dustin Bradford via Getty images)
In fact, the dismissal of Malone makes nuggets better?
Nuggets amount to 47-32 and in the midst of a race at a hot playoff at a tightly packed Western conference, where six teams are in 1.5 games of others in others when they play in places 3-8 in the standings.
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Teams, sown No. 3 and 4 at the end of the season, will gain the advantage of the home court in the first round of playoffs. The teams sown No. 7 and 8 will be transferred to the game, and their places in the full field in the playoffs are not guaranteed.
During the dismissal of Malone on Tuesday, nuggets took fourth place in the West, the remaining three games remaining in the schedule. Assistant coach David Adelman will lead the team until the end of the season.
The nuggets have recently fluctuated and are in the midst of a losing strip of four games thanks to a number of factors. Denver’s defense was porous and takes 20th place in the league in defensive rating. The playing Jamal Murray was injured (pod -column tendon) and missed five games in a row. And the list built about three times MVP Nikola Jokiich remains without another All-Star, as it was throughout this race, including the season of the championship 2022-23.
Are these falls of Malone’s guilt? Murray’s injury, of course, is not.
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The defensive struggle, of course, can be partially fixed at coaching. But the more obvious culprit has been decisions since the name of 2023 allowed the defenders of the cornerstones of Bruce Brus Brown and Kentavius Koldwell Papa to go to a free agency. Nuggets did little to replace these parts from the point of view of protection, and the team of this season is fighting at this end of the floor.
Which returns the conversation to the construction of the list. This iteration of nuggets has always relied greatly on Yokich and even more this season, when Jokich puts forward historical numbers – partially from the need. Too much crime depends on Jokich, and there is little gas left in the tank on the defense for the list in which there are no protective stoppers.
This is all that you need to consider the possibility of dismissing your general director. As for the dismissal of your coach in three games from the postseson? It remains the head.
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