Apr 02 2015 08:20 AM
Shmoly crap, huh?
The game is that
[list=1][*]Legends don't come back to coach, because they set themselves up to damage their legacy, by putting their legacy at the mercy of
[list=a][*]alleged coaching skills that often have only modest relation to playing skills[/*:m]
[*]other people — the players and superiors that can frustrate even the best coaches[/*:m][/list:o][/*:m]
[*]If you must try and coach, don't do it for the organization where you made your name, as you have the most to lose there.[/*:m]
[*]If you must indeed try and lead your old organization, for God's sake, just don't show up there and take over. Get some experience first.[/*:m][/list:o]
And yet — brave or crazy — Mullin just jumps the hell in the deep end.
Now there is one cardinal rule of jumping in the coaching game that he is obeying. If you're going to trade on your name to land a big coaching job, do it at the college level, where the Pitinos and and Caliparis can trade on the combinations of their names and the names of their schools to give them a recruiting advantage that means bupkis at the pro level (where both have failed, sometimes miserably).
Good luck, Mullin, but man, is the deck stacked against you.