As the NBA regular season comes to an end, we are only a few weeks away from finding out who will win the various awards based on the past regular season. While there is no question that the MVP race is as tight as the race for the Western Conference’s top seed in the playoffs, the NBA Coach Of The Year may be the closest race as far as all the awards are concerned.
The two major candidates are the Boston Celtics’ Doc Rivers and the New Orleans Hornets’ Byron Scott. Both have done exemplary jobs this year respectively and both teams should have a lot of confidence when it comes to what they believe their capable of in the playoffs. I personally do not think that the race should be as close as it is, because it is somewhat of an apples to oranges situation.
Rivers’ team will finish with the top overall record in the NBA this year and as the only team to win more than 60 games. His team is as close a thing as there is to a dominant team in the pretty much wide-open Eastern Conference as well. However, he is lucky enough to coach in the inferior conference in comparison to the West, so that has to amount for at least a percentage of this season’s success. Also, he is coaching two almost sure first ballot Hall of Fame players in Kevin Garnett and Sam Cassell when they retire, and probably two additional Hall of Famers in Ray Allen and Paul Pierce one day. Let’s not forget, this time last year a lot of people thought that Rivers was going to get canned, while you cannot fully blame him for last year’s poor season, and he probably did not have a lot of help as far as player personnel is concerned, he probably would not have the success or even half of what he is having without the additions of just Garnett and Allen during the offseason, not to mention any of their other additions during this season. If it were not for Scott and this was another year, I would give Rivers the award for just having the best overall record because usually that makes the candidate a shoe-in, but I will not give it to him in a year where Scott has done a lot with a lot less, and with a team that just about anyone could coach to a top playoff spot with this personnel.
Scott would have to the be pick if you look at everything but the overall best record in the league. First of all, his team plays in the extremely difficult Western Conference, even more impressive is their record in a year where the conference is the tightest that it has been in the past decade where it has dominated the Eastern Conference. While his team will not finish as the best overall in the NBA, his team could still finish as the best team in the Western Conference which would be very impressive. Also, Scott’s team is playing with significantly less talent and experience than the Boston Celtics. Boston’s best player (Garnett) is like I said, most likely a first ballot Hall of Famer when he is finished with the game, the Hornets’ best player (Chris Paul) is in his third season in the NBA. In terms of talent it is not even close. The fact that Scott has done more with less, or done about as much if not right under what Rivers has been able to do this year, should mean that he separates himself from Rivers in this Clinton and Obama like race as far as closeness is concerned and ultimately wins NBA Coach Of The Year this season.
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