Instant Reaction: Wizards Hire Brian Keefe As Head Coach

Instant Reaction: Wizards Hire Brian Keefe As Head Coach

[Music] the Washington Wizards have just announced that they have the 26th head coach in franchise history and will be the guy who was also number 25.5 if you will uh they of course fired Wes unel Jr in January replaced him on an interim basis with Brian Keefe and it is Brian Keefe who apparently will have the job moving forward this was just announced uh about 10 minutes ago from the Wizards uh it just today was I guess the day uh from general manager Will Dawkins we are excited for Brian to become our next head coach Brian is a proven motivator and connector of people as a leader in the organization he will continue to positively grow and invest in the development of our players his wealth of experience will help move our team forward as we build for long-term success uh Kei released this statement is part of the announcement as well I’m grateful to Michael Winger and will as in Dawkins for the opportunity to lead the Washington Wizards I look forward to continuing to work with our players and helping them grow and develop as a team we are committed to a collaborative approach to build an environment of accountability and hard work that allows us to improve every day uh Keef of course has a long uh career as an assistant he has been uh with Brooklyn Oklahoma City Los Angeles is in the Clippers where he was working under Winger there and he was also with the Knicks from 2014 and 2016 uh he’s worked with a number of MVP caliber players including Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook uh as an assistant coach Keef has been a part of teams that have earned uh playoff births on eight occasions in 16 years including five consecutive with the Thunder from 2019 or 2009 to 2014 that includes the 2012 NBA finals um this is not an a inspiring choice but by Michael Winger and Will Dawkins uh by Ted leanis by whoever else was involved in this process Winger and Dawkins certainly the two biggest folks but I’m fine with that um I think it would be arrogant of me to come on this radio station and pretend for as much as I know about the NBA for as as deeply as I followed it for as long as I followed it that I have some in-depth knowledge of assistant coaches around the league and who’s got it and who doesn’t I just don’t and I know that there are bigger names and those bigger names are not necessarily bigger names because they’re outstanding coaches a lot of them are bigger names because they played and then became assistant coaches and many of them probably will be good uh will be head coaches and maybe even good NBA head coaches one day I think of a name like Sam Cassell who’s seemingly been a lead assistant for a long time and I think of Sam casselle by the way on a day where tyo signs one of the biggest coaching contracts in sports history nevertheless NBA history as a guy who was seemingly on the sideline for a little bit as an assistant as a former player under Doc Rivers uh and then in Cleveland uh under David blat and then takes over when they fire blat and holy crap Ty L is an amazing head coach uh but so is Brian Daga the the head coach of the Thunder who or sorry Mark Daga the head coach of the Thunder who won NBA coach of the year um so is Nick nurse who’s now with the Sixers and it’s led the Toronto Raptors to a title guys that did not play at the NBA level that were good assistants for a long time in some cases and just eventually elevated to the top job because someone realized that they’re good enough to do it and I think this Situation’s a little bit different because Brian Keefe is a guy who led the r the the Wizards to an absolutely miserable record in the second half of the season now there are a lot of factors that went into that but they still were terrible record-wise they just didn’t win a lot of games but I think you have to look at how they played and this is a lot of what I think Will Dawkins and Michael Winger are doing and what they are great at and what they learned how to do in Oklahoma City under Sam presty which is look at the underlying data look at the trends and ask yourself two questions are we going in the right direction and do we think that this person can get us to where we want to go if the answer to that is both uh yes then that’s probably a pretty good hire because wins and losses are just one very ultimately important statistic when it’s time to really compete but how competitive you are uh over the courses of quarter of halves of of games over the course of weeks and then ultimately months matters and ultimately once you influx or you you inject Talent into an atmosphere an environment and a a schematic way of playing style of play and not to mention the individual plays themselves especially like a half court or which your defensive coverages are Etc once you inject Talent into that that’s going to affect the wins and losses more than anything how you play is different than who you’re playing how you play comes down to your identity and how you work every day and what your habits are and it seems like Brian Keefe is very good at those things now I think the question becomes Because by the way Wes unel was seen as very good as those things and many other assistant coaches who have taken that six inch yet Grand Canyon siiz leap down the bench into that main seat have often been great those things the question is then can you do the the management stuff can you do the things you need to do as the actual head lead of an organization to get everybody going in that direction can you take your hands off of you know if your hands are on the wheel now of the entire vcle if you were responsible for another part you typically don’t uh fix cars while they’re moving so this is not exactly the world’s greatest analogy but if if you can let go of the things that you were doing as an assistant and Empower and entrust other people to do them and steer the ship in the right direction and by the way now those assistants are doing the things you did at at basically the same level and there’s multiple of them well you become a Force multiplier for doing the things that got you the job in the first place but those things and that skill set of being that Force multiplier being that leader being someone that instills big picture ideals nevertheless uh more micro level schemes and you know details into the organization are very different skill sets in terms of being a Visionary being the big picture versus someone who is executing the details of a plan that was given to them by someone else right it’s one thing to be a salesman it’s one thing to be a sales manager it’s one thing to be uh the head the CEO of the company it’s another to work on the factory floor you need both to be ultimately successful right you need someone with a good strategic vision and an understanding of how the pieces fit together to run the actual company but if you’re running a gigantic Factory and the people working in the factory aren’t incredibly skilled at the very specific thing that they’re doing your company is is screwed and so ultimately what the Wizards have said here is we think that Brian Keefe’s experience of someone who has worked at all the different levels of the factory underneath the person running it if you will he’s been uh the guy fixing the machines he’s been the janitor then he got to work on the factory floor you know putting together the pieces then he was kind of a a manager and advisor uh to the the the big wigs upstairs they think that’s prepared him to be upstairs and considering who hired him that’s actually completely unsurprising because Will Dawkins is the same person just on the management side Will Dawkins has spent time picking guys up from the airport as basically a glorified gopher when he first started in Seattle then he was a behind thebench coach then he worked his way into scouting and he was a lowlevel scout and then he got uh up and then he got up again and he got promoted within Oklahoma City system and until he was their assistant GM and then ultimately Michael Winger was like I remember you from when I was there in Oklahoma City and by the way Oklahoma City continues to be one of the best front offices in the league and by the way uh Will Dawkins scouting Acumen was well known uh but he had this this larger Vision that when he and Michael talked and they interviewed for that job after Winger had been hired by leonis that Dawkins was like yeah I’m ready for this moment because I’ve seen it up and down from every angle from the front office from the bench he was a a you know albe a college player at Emerson like he was a player like that understanding of every piece of an organization helps you be a good leader and so while Brian Keefe because he has no name value like almost negative name value because the Wizards record was God awful the second half of the Season what they’re banking on is that was a reflection of the team that they put on the floor the guys wearing the jerseys it wasn’t and by the way the hole that they were digging out of that West unel Jr primarily is going to be responsible for uh or held responsible for and was responsible for because he was the head coach who was digging it and what they’re what they’re telling us is that when we replace the other pieces around when we upgrade the talent when we let Brian Keefe set the standard from go when we allow him to be someone who sets the standard and is a force multiplier versus the person he was previously working for that that will change the fortune of the organization and I don’t know that they’re going to be wrong about that again uninspiring sure effective TBD and if we want to look back and say hey it’s been about a year since uh Winger got here in many ways that’s the that’s the theme of it all not much of what they’ve done has been super inspiring not much of what they’ve done has brought a whole lot of Joy but as a as someone who has been around this sport for a long time someone who’s covered it for a long time I will just tell you my opinion I think they’re doing the right things I think these guys are really smart I understand it’s going to take time they understand it’s going to take time Ted understands it’s going to take time and while they don’t have forever they absolutely understand that there is no use in chasing instant gratification and thus they should do the thing they think is best and I think is what they’re doing here and all we can do is trust them for now and if in 3 years they haven’t gotten anywhere then we say hey time to time to let someone else make these decisions but for right now I wish I could tell you this is a A+ home run slam dunk higher pick your analogy uh pick your your metaphor um but I just don’t know and I also understand it and I get it and uh we’ll see how uh how effective it is this is the Hoffman show on the team 980 in The Odyssey app

The Washington Wizards hired Brian Keefe as their head coach on Wednesday and Craig reacted to the breaking news live on The Team 980 !

#wizards #dcsports #washingtondc #breakingnews #nba

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