(PHOTO CREDIT: David Richard/USA Today.)
Aaaaaand another coach gets canned. Ramona Shelburne, Ian Begley, and Brian Windhorst from ESPN had this report:
The New York Knicks fired coach Derek Fisher on Monday after the team lost its fifth straight game and nine of its past 10.
ESPN’s Ramona Shelburne and Ian Begley first reported the firing.
The Knicks are 23-31 this season after going 17-65 in Fisher’s first season in 2014-15. New York’s current losing skid contributed to the timing of the move, but the team was already convinced Fisher was not transitioning from the role of player to coach effectively, sources told ESPN’s Brian Windhorst.
Interesting. He also had that incident with former Laker teammate Matt Barnes earlier this season. While I thought this firing was a bit hasty, Phil Jackson definitely had higher expectations. And after David Blatt got fired by Cleveland, should we be surprised these days about coaches getting axed?
We know Fisher wasn’t exactly Jackson’s first choice. He wanted Steve Kerr to coach the Knicks but Kerr decided to coach the Warriors instead. We know how that turned out. We were all a bit surprised Jackson got Fisher to coach, who had just retired as a player then.
Kurt Rambis will take over as the interim head coach. It was mentioned that Jackson will also go after some of his other former players who are now coaches like Brian Shaw or Luke Walton, who is possibly the hottest coaching free agent by this coming summer due to his work for Golden State. In the meantime, Rambis will try to steer the ship right and go after that playoff spot.
Fisher had an overall 40-96 (.294) record as a coach.
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