Philadelphia 76ers: Butterfly effect of Coach K taking role with Sixers

It’s interesting to consider what would have happened to the Philadelphia 76ers if they hired the greatest coach in college basketball history.

Mike Krzyzewski (Coach K) is easily the best college basketball coach of All-Time and arguably the best coach in basketball period. While Coach K has never coached in the NBA, there have been a few times where he was offered an NBA job, including once by the Philadelphia 76ers, reported by Shawn Krest of Sports Illustrated.

Krest transcribed several quotes Coach K had in an interview with WIP sports radio in Philadelphia. Coach K talked about how there were opportunities with the Boston Celtics in 1990 and the Los Angeles Lakers in 2005. However, he was offered the job by his former player Billy King, who was the Sixers general manager (GM) back when the offer came in 2003.

Coach K made it clear he wasn’t interested in the 76ers job but thought King was kind by making the offer. At the time, coaching legend Larry Brown had resigned from his coaching post in Philly after a six-season run with Sixers legend Allen Iverson, which included multiple playoff appearances and even a trip to the 2001 NBA Finals.

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Iverson was a tough personality and outside of the Hall of Famer, the Sixers didn’t have too much to work with entering the 2003-04 season. However, it’s fair to wonder what type of effect that Coach K would have had on the organization.

Coach K probably would have let King do what he wanted in the draft do to the nature of their relationship. To King’s credit in the 2003 NBA Draft, along with both the 2004 and 2005 drafts, the GM did a good job. He came away with players like Kyle Korver, Andre Iguodala, and Lou Williams.

The five-time NCAA championship would have brought stability to the coaching job as well. After Brown left, the Sixers had Randy Ayers, Chris Ford, and Jim O’Brien as head coaches until Maurice Cheeks was hired in the 2005-06 season and stabilized the coaching position for a few seasons.

Despite Coach K having won 1157 games in his illustrious career thus far, it’s doubtful that he could have led the 76ers to a playoff bid in his first season. Outside of Iverson and Kenny Thomas, Philly didn’t have too much on the roster.

Glenn Robinson Jr. missed essentially half of the season and both he and Derrick Colman were one year away from retirement. Eric Snow was in the final season of his prime. Marc Jackson and Aaron McKie each had one good season of production left after that year before they completely left their primes.

Young players like Kyle Korver, Willie Green, and John Salmons hadn’t become productive players. It was also Samuel Dalembert’s second season and his first as production member of the rotation. As good as Coach K is, it’s hard to imagine he’d bring that group of players to a playoff appearance in his first year as the Sixers head coach.

The biggest wildcard would have to have been how he would have meshed with Iverson. Iverson was a tough player to coach, just ask Brown. Regardless of Coach K’s resume, it hard not imagining those two clashing at some point.

Could Coach K have done a better job of getting Iverson to buy into how he did things than Brown or would Iverson had been traded away from Philly earlier than 2006? That’s easily the biggest what if in this whole hypothetical situation and I’m not going to pretend that I know the answer, however, its something to wonder about.

Coach K would have brought a culture change (which includes winning) to the Sixers if he had took the job. Whether that be with Iverson or without the superstar, Coach K would have instilled a new culture. Based on his longterm success at Duke and the USA’s Men’s Olympic team, it hard to say otherwise. Changes would have come to the 76ers, it might have just need a season or two for it to start happening.

Despite Coach K’s impressive resume, it’s hard to imagine that he would have a major initial impact on the Philadelphia 76ers if he had taken the job. However, there seems to little doubt he probably would have made a positive impact on the franchise as his tenure would have progressed.