If the Philadelphia 76ers organization decides to part ways with Brett Brown, former Washington Wizards head coach Randy Wittman should be considered for the vacant position.
The Philadelphia 76ers future is very uncertain. Many of the players that were on the roster last year will not be returning next year, and the same could be said for a lot of the staff. Since former President and General Manager of the Sixers Sam Hinkie has stepped down and Bryan Colangelo has stepped in, we’ve talked and speculated a lot about the future. Head coach Brett Brown is another uncertain piece.
Brett Brown, the head coach of this team for the last three years, has not led the team to any obvious success. Really, he wasn’t supposed to. Hinkie brought Brown in because he was a good developmental coach, and he wanted him to work with potential diamonds in the rough and show the league what they could be.
All while that was happening, Hinkie was giving Brown rosters that were designed to lose games. Still, many have held Brown’s less than 50 wins in three seasons against him, which might not be completely fair.
Fair or not, the reality is that with a new president often comes a new coach. When you come into leading a team that has a lot of pieces acquired by the person before you, you may not see the same value as the person you are coming after. Bryan has spoken highly of Brown so far in numerous interviews, but he could be putting on a face for the media, in the same way Bryan’s father said good things about Hinkie before forcing him out.
Several outlets have reported that Brown’s job isn’t completely safe. Tom Moore of the Bucks County Courier Times reported that his future with the team is likely 50/50.
There’s no guarantee that the Sixers will fire him, but I think there’s reason to believe they might. If they do, a lot of the good coaches that didn’t have teams to lead already have been hired since the regular season ended.
Tom Thibodeau formerly of the Chicago Bulls is now leading the Minnesota Timberwolves, and Scott Brooks, formerly of the Oklahoma City Thunder, was hired by the Washington Wizards. Luke Walton got his first head coaching position with the Los Angeles Lakers recently as well.
So, if not Brown, then who? A college coach would be a gamble for a team in the rebuilding process. The Washington Wizards former coach Randy Wittman would be the best available prospect for the Sixers if they look to hire a new face.
Bringing up Wittman as a coach causes some fans to initially groan. His coaching resume up to this point has been less than impressive. Overall, he’s compiled a record of 278-406 and was fired from one of his coaching jobs midway through a season one year, which is not a good look.
When he was hired by the Wizards, though, he seemed to have learned a lot from his losing seasons, and put that knowledge to action. With the Wizards, he had an overall record of 178-199, a winning percentage that was 14.6 percent better than the rest of his coaching career.
A huge positive about Wittman is that he does have some playoff experience, and he has done fairly well in the playoffs. By his second season, he led the Wizards to the playoffs, and did the same the following year. They advanced each year, but fell in the Eastern Conference Semifinals both times. With the Wizards, he had a record of 12-9 in the playoffs over two seasons. Brett Brown has no playoff experience, and could choke just like players when the spotlight is on.
Part of the fallout and the reason the Wizards didn’t do so well this year was because the team failed to bring back players like Paul Pierce. Pierce was a huge addition to the team last season, and led the Wizards to big success in the playoffs. A 3-pointer that was just a half-second too late in their final game nearly kept them alive in the playoffs last year, and he had been clutch in other gAmes before that one.
That wasn’t all Wittman’s fault. The team not being able to bring back key pieces was far out of his control. Given assets, he’s been able to succeed, and with the Sixers, he woils have lots of assets to work with.
Wittman, much like Brown, is a player’s coach. He will stand up for players, especially to the media. Sometimes, he does that to a fault, as he’s known for having bad relationships with beat writers because of certain situations. How he reacted to a negative report about John Wall is a good example.
I’m torn with this instance. Wittman criticized a reporter for reporting what a source told him. The reporter was just doing his job, and Wittman may have been a bit over the line in coming out and yelling at the media. But at the same time, I admire that he would defend Wall like this, and I feel like Brown would do the same.
The tough part with Wittman is that he seems to be a player’s coach only when it’s convenient for him. I had the pleasure of speaking to Colby Giacubeno, who has covered the Wizards extensively, about Wittman, and he was critical of how Wittman handled his relationship with Marcin Gortat.
Gortat is a skilled player, but Wittman was over-critical of him at times, and he would often take his criticism with him to the media, rather than letting Gortat know what he thought behind closed doors. As Giacubeno told me, he feels like that is an easy way to lose players’ trust, and I agree.
If Bryan Colangelo is looking for a coaching hire that indicates a change of style, Wittman wouldn’t be the right option, because he is actually similar to Brown in a lot of ways. But if Bryan wants to show that this team is his moving forward, and not just remnants of what Sam Hinkie left behind, hiring Wittman could be a good move.
Next: The Colangelos Came in to Resuscitate the Philadelphia 76ers
Is it the right move to kick Brown out at this point in the rebuild? Not at all. But with new leadership, we never know.