Jerry Sloan resigns and ends 23-year coaching tenure
The Utah Jazz are now without their head coach, Jerry Sloan, who stepped down as their coach after serving the team for 23 seasons.
The hard working, devoted, and, successful 68-year-old coach called it a day on Thursday, 11 February 2011. The coach is one of the longest-serving coaches in the four major sports leagues of U.S.A.
Gerald Eugene "Jerry" Sloan was facing a series of clashes with Deron Williams, who is the point guard of Utah. Things grew intense when the coach and the player heated up in an argument during a halftime loss against the Chicago Bulls, Wednesday, 9 February.
It was an intense confrontation that kept flaring up. It even made two Jazz players think that the situation might get worse. Thankfully, it didn’t reach that point and ended before the two could come to blows against each other.
The Utah Jazz lost their 10th game in 14 matches. The coach was tired of being put behind Williams by Greg Miller, the owner of the team. A resource shared that the coach had made a final decision of resigning during the halftime. The coach had
the feeling that he was being overlooked and this made him step down from the allotted position.
It was a touching moment to see the respected coach quoting his final words, his voice hoarse with emotion, "This is going to be harder than I thought. My time is up and it's time to move on".
Sloan had signed a one-year contract extension with the team three-days ago but the situation led him to take a completely opposite course of action.
It all escalated in the locker room during halftime of the Bulls and Utah game. Both of them had been talking to the ownership about the situation. Williams had been very loud and had lashed out at teammates at certain times.
The coach was worried about what was going on and he had to talk to the ownership about whatever was happening in the team. The situation reached a boiling point after what happened in the locker room and Sloan finally decided to call it quits.
As a coach, Sloan never won a NBA title, neither did he ever receive the recognition of NBA’s coach of the year but he was respected for the 37-years of his life that he dedicated to the NBA.
Even though everyone was well aware of the increasing friction between the coach and the 26-year old player but the coach declared it a decision taken on a basis of fatigue.
Sloan informed General Manager, Kevin O’Connor, about his resignation on Wednesday night, who after knowing about it, asked him to wait. The coach did wait, he waited for the sun to rise and he resigned the next morning.
He was followed by Phil Johnson, his long time assistant, who resigned too. The assistant was quoted as saying to a TV station that, "It's a process. It's not like its one night or one practice or one game."
Ty Corbin, assistant coach of Utah, will be replacing Sloan as the acting head coach and there are chances that he might fill in as a long-term coach to Utah.
Sloan, who is also a member of the Basketball Hall of Fame has a career regular-season win-loss record of 1221-803 that makes him third among the list of all-time most wins coaches in the NBA.
Miller said that he did not force Sloan and Johnson to take the decision and said, "I loved and respected Jerry for as long as I can remember. I will miss him but benefit from the things he taught me for the rest of my life".
Tags: