David Fizdale isn't afraid to speak the truth.
Last summer in Memphis, Fizdale wasn't afraid to tell the city that he thought it was about time it removed the Confederate war statues. This fall, he wasn't afraid to butt heads and ultimately bench Grizzlies franchise player Marc Gasol, even though that decision cost him his job.
Fizdale, who according to a league source has agreed in principle to be the next Knicks coach, is not a yes man. This fact alone is cause for Knicks fans to celebrate, because it shows that the management team of Steve Mills and Scott Perry is serious about finding a way to move the franchise forward rather than just picking someone who isn't going to make waves.
Fizdale is young and popular with many of the game's big- name players like LeBron James. But those who know him say he is also a guy who has his own ideas about how a game should be played, that he never would have been the sort to be nudged into playing the triangle offense or use a player he didn't want to play.
"I know I always get the truth out of Fiz, even if it's not what I want to hear," said Miami Heat coach Erik Spoelstra, a close friend of Fizdale's from his days as an assistant on the Heat staff.
The Knicks interviewed 11 candidates to fill the vacancy created when they fired Jeff Hornacek at the end of the season. There are several easier routes they could have taken. They could have hired Mark Jackson, who might have been the most popular choice locally given that he played for the Knicks and St. John's. They could have hired David Blatt, a former teammate of Mills' at Princeton. They could have hired a young coach like Jerry Stackhouse with no head coaching experience. All three would have been fairly close or indebted to management initially and maybe somewhat reluctant to rock the boat.
And let's face it. The Knicks are a boat that is going to need more than an occasional rocking to get on the right course.
The only candidate on the Knicks list more intriguing than Fizdale was Mike Budenholzer, the former Atlanta Hawks coach. By most reports, Fizdale was the leading contender when Budenholzer became available and there is some thought the Knicks should have reset and gone right after him given his record and years of experience and San Antonio Spurs pedigree.
It's possible that Budenholzer was more interested in the opening in Milwaukee. But it's also possible that the Knicks hope this hiring will lead to something bigger, that Fizdale's relationship with James, whom he coached in Miami, will give them the inside track when he becomes a free agent.
If that were the only reason to hire a coach, it would be pretty faulty reasoning. But it's not a bad bonus considering Fizdale brings a lot to the table. Leading that list is that, despite what happened with Gasol, he is known as a player's coach who understands today's generation.
Gasol seems to be the one player that Fizdale struggled to get along with and there are some who think that means that he might also struggle to relate to Knicks star Kristaps Porzingis. Somehow, I find that a little weird. Just because you didn't get along with one European guy, it means you are going to have trouble with another?
There's no one more difficult to coach than a superstar who is past the zenith of his career. That, more than anything, may explain the problems Fizdale had in Memphis. Porzingis, who has had three coaches in his three years in the league, is just at the start of his career. He's got to be dying to play for someone who knows what he's doing and, unlike Hornacek, has the full support of management to run the system he wants to run.
Spoelstra doesn't think the Knicks could make a better hire.
"You can throw him into any room, and he will be able to work with that room," Spoelstra told the Palm Beach Post. "Anywhere. From where he grew up in South Central (Los Angeles) to a board meeting to a basketball camp, he can bring any group of people together."
Knicks fans would sure like to see that.
