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End of the Road
Nets fire Frank after 0-16 start:
New Jersey Nets management wanted to give Lawrence Frank a chance to get several injured players back on this Western trip, end a historic losing streak and allow him to stay a little longer on the job.
As the consecutive losses to start the season have reached 16, the return of several key players has done little to improve the Nets’ performance and that will cost Frank his job, multiple sources told Yahoo! Sports on Saturday night.
Management has made the decision to fire Frank, a move that will be carried out when the team returns to New Jersey after Sunday night’s game against the Los Angeles Lakers, the sources said. Even if the Nets beat the Lakers, Frank is still expected to be fired.
The plan is for Nets general manager Kiki Vandeweghe to take over as interim coach, but there is still some support within the organization for veteran assistant John Loyer. The new coach is expected to be on the bench when the Nets play host to the Dallas Mavericks on Wednesday night in New Jersey, sources said. The Nets could set an NBA record for futility with an 18th straight loss against the Mavs.
Vandeweghe has been on the Nets’ Western trip, studying the team’s personnel and formulating a plan to coach the team. Vandeweghe has wanted to dismiss Frank as far back as last season, sources say, but Thorn has resisted until now.
Sources say Nets management has come to believe that Frank has lost much of the team, a fact that has played out in losses to Denver and Sacramento in the past week. Once the Nets played so poorly against the Kings – believed to be the most winnable game on the trip – management decided it could no longer go on with Frank as coach.
Frank is in the final year of his contract, earning $4 million for the season.
Despite the return of point guard Devin Harris and shooting guard Courtney Lee, the Nets have played long stretches of uninspired basketball. “Most of the guys have tuned him out,” one source with direct knowledge of the locker room environment said. “This isn’t all Lawrence’s fault, but everyone knows that this can’t go on anymore.”
Vandeweghe was an assistant coach in Dallas for two seasons and also has worked as an executive for the Mavericks and Denver Nuggets since retiring as a player. If Vandeweghe takes over the Nets as expected, it will be for a similar reason that New Orleans GM Jeff Bower did after the dismissal of Byron Scott earlier this month: With cost-cutting, there was no assistant coach deemed capable of navigating the interim job.
With the Nets bleeding money and awaiting NBA approval of Russian billionaire Mikhail Prokhorov’s ownership, New Jersey simply doesn’t have the money to look outside the organization for a coach now.
Frank took over for Scott as New Jersey’s coach in January of 2004, winning his first 13 games on the bench. Frank led the Nets to the playoffs three times, including two Atlantic Division titles. Frank has a close relationship with Thorn and has repeatedly said that Thorn has stood by him in the past couple seasons when other executives would’ve probably fired him. Frank has a 225-241 record in parts of six seasons, and most league executives believe that he’ll work again as a head coach.
End of the Road
Nets fire Frank after 0-16 start:
New Jersey Nets management wanted to give Lawrence Frank a chance to get several injured players back on this Western trip, end a historic losing streak and allow him to stay a little longer on the job.
As the consecutive losses to start the season have reached 16, the return of several key players has done little to improve the Nets’ performance and that will cost Frank his job, multiple sources told Yahoo! Sports on Saturday night.
Management has made the decision to fire Frank, a move that will be carried out when the team returns to New Jersey after Sunday night’s game against the Los Angeles Lakers, the sources said. Even if the Nets beat the Lakers, Frank is still expected to be fired.
The plan is for Nets general manager Kiki Vandeweghe to take over as interim coach, but there is still some support within the organization for veteran assistant John Loyer. The new coach is expected to be on the bench when the Nets play host to the Dallas Mavericks on Wednesday night in New Jersey, sources said. The Nets could set an NBA record for futility with an 18th straight loss against the Mavs.
Vandeweghe has been on the Nets’ Western trip, studying the team’s personnel and formulating a plan to coach the team. Vandeweghe has wanted to dismiss Frank as far back as last season, sources say, but Thorn has resisted until now.
Sources say Nets management has come to believe that Frank has lost much of the team, a fact that has played out in losses to Denver and Sacramento in the past week. Once the Nets played so poorly against the Kings – believed to be the most winnable game on the trip – management decided it could no longer go on with Frank as coach.
Frank is in the final year of his contract, earning $4 million for the season.
Despite the return of point guard Devin Harris and shooting guard Courtney Lee, the Nets have played long stretches of uninspired basketball. “Most of the guys have tuned him out,” one source with direct knowledge of the locker room environment said. “This isn’t all Lawrence’s fault, but everyone knows that this can’t go on anymore.”
Vandeweghe was an assistant coach in Dallas for two seasons and also has worked as an executive for the Mavericks and Denver Nuggets since retiring as a player. If Vandeweghe takes over the Nets as expected, it will be for a similar reason that New Orleans GM Jeff Bower did after the dismissal of Byron Scott earlier this month: With cost-cutting, there was no assistant coach deemed capable of navigating the interim job.
With the Nets bleeding money and awaiting NBA approval of Russian billionaire Mikhail Prokhorov’s ownership, New Jersey simply doesn’t have the money to look outside the organization for a coach now.
Frank took over for Scott as New Jersey’s coach in January of 2004, winning his first 13 games on the bench. Frank led the Nets to the playoffs three times, including two Atlantic Division titles. Frank has a close relationship with Thorn and has repeatedly said that Thorn has stood by him in the past couple seasons when other executives would’ve probably fired him. Frank has a 225-241 record in parts of six seasons, and most league executives believe that he’ll work again as a head coach.
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