Portland Trail Blazers: 4 candidates to replace Chauncey Billups

Darvin Ham has earned his shot to lead an NBA team

Some of the NBA’s historically best coaches were successful, but marginal journeyman-type players: Pat Riley, George Karl, and Erik Spoelstra come to mind immediately. But former star players tend to expect perfection from up and down the roster, and often their on-court motivational skills and leadership don’t transfer as well to the coaches end of the bench.

There are a host of reasons this is the case. Rotation or bench players have more time and mental space to be observers of the game. Playing and coaching for a variety of teams also exposes them to multiple on-court systems, strategic approaches, and organizational philosophies.

What if I told you there was an undrafted player who carved out an eight-year NBA career with six different teams, has been an assistant in the league since 2011, and was a head coach in the development league the season before that?

And what if that same candidate won a ring as a player with the 2004 Detroit Pistons and as an assistant coach with the 2021 Milwaukee Bucks?

You’d give Darvin Ham an interview is what you would do. Well it’s at least what we would do.

Ham was instrumental in building the Atlanta Hawks from laughingstock into contender and the Bucks from contender to champion. He’ll get a head coaching job soon; the Portland Trail Blazers would do well to put him on their very short list.

But hiring a coach with zero prior NBA head coaching experience hasn’t gone so well thus far this season, so perhaps they’ll look for someone with a longer list of coaching credentials.