Firing coaches is much easier than firing up teams

Jay Triano and the Raptors were booed at home during a loss to Dallas this week. AP Steve Aschburner's Mailbag Submit a comment or question for Steve. Name: Email: Hometown: Question: SEND

The list of NBA general managers' nightmares is a long one, crammed with all sorts of cruel if colorful possibilities. There's the Worst Record in the League, Fourth Pick in the Draft Thanks to That Infernal Lottery nightmare. There's the You Let Sam Bowie Off the Hook nightmare, in which some unfortunate GM passes up the next Michael Jordan to select instead a really, really tall future thoroughbred farmer. In the recurring category, they've got the Celebrates His $66 Million Contract Extension By Buying a Moped or Even a Harley chiller. Let's not forget the Looks Like the Big O (Robertson) When You Sign Him in July, Looks Like the Big O (Winfrey) When He Shows Up in October nightmare.

Still, the one that is certain to jolt each of these 30 team-builders awake in the middle of the night, pillow drenched in cold sweat, gasps for air and a frightened spouse in that darkened room, is the Fire the Head Coach -- And Get Worse nightmare.

That's where we are right now after the NBA's early spate of coaching changes. Separately, three or four of the six teams that already have whacked coaches in 2008-09 are headed, or soon may head, in the wrong direction in the standings. Collectively, the results appear even worse: Oklahoma City, Washington, Toronto, Minnesota, Philadelphia and Sacramento were a combined 29-78 playing for the men who took them through training camp. That's a .271 winning percentage. Since then, led by replacements, those half-dozen clubs have gone 9-34 heading into Friday's action, a meager .209 success rate.

In the spirit of the season, we'll put it this way: The NBA can't vouch for all the other extravagances, the turtle doves or the golden rings, but it has your six geese a-laying right here.

Here is a brief outpost-by-outpost review, from the worst reset to ... well, best doesn't quite capture it. So consider it worst to least worst:

• Minnesota: (4-15 under Randy Wittman, 0-6 under Kevin McHale)

The Timberwolves felt oppressed by Wittman's demands and a tough-love demeanor that didn't cushion their f-e-e-l-ings when he wasn't satisfied with the results, which was pretty much all the time. So McHale took over, pledging to make the game fun again, which it was for about one half of his first game back on the sideline. The Wolves' latest woe is outside shooting; Al Jefferson, the consummate low-post threat, ranks as the team's second-best option (43.4 percent shooting, behind Mike Miller's 50.0) from beyond 15 feet. A 1-16 December is a very real possibility, with the victory posing the trickiest part.

• Toronto (8-9 under Sam Mitchell, 2-6 under Jay Triano)

Patience is running out at Air Canada Centre. Either that, or the Raptors' plucky fans were doing their darnedest to prepare the struggling club for a six-game road trip that starts Friday (kindly enough) at Oklahoma City. Whatever the reason, the team got booed at home during its loss to Dallas on Wednesday, an unpleasant parting gift to the 2008 portion of its Toronto schedule.

"If I wanted to get booed, I'd go on the road. It's real tense right now,'' said forward Chris Bosh, whose shoddy defense has been equaled lately by his spotty offense.

That's no way for fans to show love to a potential 2010 free agent but then, it's no way for a 2010 free agent to create a market, along with warm-and-fuzzies, for himself. Triano even wondered after that loss if his players' conditioning is lacking, a real loser's lament this deep into a season.

• Oklahoma City (1-12 under P.J. Carlesimo, 1-12 under Scott Brooks)

Several of the Thunder's numbers have improved under Brooks. Their offense generates 8.8 more points per game, good for a middle-of-the-pack 97.7 points for the new guy. They lose by an average of 7.6 points now rather than the 12.3 gap navigated by Carlesimo, assists are up and the team is shooting better, too. Kevin Durant and Jeff Green have moved up in weight class, one spot each, to man the forward positions and they fit.

Still, one out of 13 is still one out of 13, and a team as young as Oklahoma City -- with as much room for improvement -- should be getting tangibly better outcomes. Things won't get easier when the questions about the 1972-73 76ers' 9-73 mark start coming on a regular basis.

• Washington (1-10 under Eddie Jordan, 3-9 under Ed Tapscott)

Four straight blowout losses and too many changes have hurt the Wizards lately, and their struggle against on Detroit Wednesday was described thusly by The Washington Post: "[T]he Wizards more resemble a group of strangers thrown together for a recreational league tournament than an NBA squad that had a full training camp, preseason and opening two months of the season to work things out.''

Tapscott, like all suddenly anointed coaches, can blame a lack of practice time, along with rotation and roster tweaks, for any post-firing struggles. But is that stuff really worse than the significant injuries (Gilbert Arenas, Brendan Haywood), underperforming vets and ho-hum start that cost Jordan his job?

• Sacramento (6-18 under Reggie Theus, 1-1 under Kenny Natt)

Natt's mission, artificially buoyed because he had Minnesota served up for his debut game Monday, is simple: Win more than Theus won. But Theus' mission was more complex; he was supposed to win enough games to preserve his job (his contract wasn't guaranteed beyond this season) while developing the Kings' young talent, while maintaining some harmony between the inevitable old/new factions in his locker room. Injuries to Kevin Martin and Francisco Garcia, and center Brad Miller's season-opening suspension, all hurt Theus' chances while providing little cover. Nurturing Spencer Hawes and Jason Thompson is important but not easy, working for owners with lofty (maybe even warped) expectations.

• Philadelphia (9-14 under Maurice Cheeks, 2-0 under Tony DiLeo)

Good thing the Sixers won their first two after DiLeo took over for Cheeks last weekend, since Elton Brand is expected to miss at least a month recovering from the dislocated right shoulder he suffered Wednesday. Then again, losing Brand from the rotation might be more of a short-term fix than a problem because there had been a clash of styles -- low-post sets vs. transition ball, sort of Phoenix Lite -- since Brand's arrival. Philadelphia doesn't have the shooters to make opponents pay for double-teaming the man in the middle, something president/GM Ed Stefanski needed to address while pursuing Brand in free agency. With Cheeks out and DiLeo beholden to the GM, the next phase supposedly will require Brand to keep up with his teammates' running ways.

By the way, we're slightly discounting the 2-0 mark under DiLeo because Cheeks' firing came right after a home-and-home set with Cleveland -- and right before winnable games against Washington and Milwaukee. (Come to think of it, we should filter out all head-to-heads among these six teams, since someone is bound to win.)

Where does all this leave these quick-trigger teams? Running on fumes left from whatever adrenaline the firings spiked, and enticing almost no one to their box offices for tickets that wouldn't have sold a few weeks earlier.

Where are they headed? Possibly back to 2004-05, the last time any NBA team used three distinct head coaches in one season (not counting one- or two-night "interim'' guys). Memphis and Denver both did it that season. Hubie Brown stepped down after a dozen games and was replaced by Lionel Hollins, who went winless in four tries. Then Mike Fratello was hired and he got the Grizzlies going again with a 40-26 finish, good for the second of three straight playoff appearances. The Nuggets that season burned through Jeff Bzdelik (13-15) and Michael Cooper (4-10) before landing George Karl, whose 32-8 turnaround got Denver to the playoffs.

No team is likely to match the 1988-89 Pacers, who ran a relay team of coaches from Jack Ramsay (0-7) to Mel Daniels (0-2) to George Irvine (6-14) to Dick Versace (22-31). Then again, in this economy, I wouldn't risk a dime betting that one of the six quick starters -- based on the results so far -- won't try.

Steve Aschburner covered the Minnesota Timberwolves and the NBA for 13 seasons for the Minneapolis Star Tribune. He has served as president or vice president of the Professional Basketball Writers Association since 2005.