FanHouse MarcIavaroni

By theory, the NBA Draft Lottery (Tuesday at 8:00 PM ET) is left to randomness. But what if basketball karma dictated the results? Good triumphs over evil. Fairness and compassion reign. Robert Horry does not exist. It's a wonderful world.

Close your eyes and imagine how the ping pong balls would bounce if karma ruled tonight's lottery ...

As teams get eliminated from the 2009 NBA playoff picture, Fork 'Em figures out what went wrong.

"The road to hell is paved with works-in-progress." -Philippe de Comines

It's also paved with the 2008-2009 Memphis Grizzlies and their fans.

The Grizzlies entered the season with a bizarre self-awareness. They were a young team with a coach that preached speed and aggression, but who had been told by his boss to instill defense, or else. They had lost their longtime franchise player in a rebuilding trade that resulted in much of the league mocking them, then pulled off a brilliant draft day trade to acquire O.J. Mayo. They had a deep set of guards, a great combination of young frontcourt players, returning superstar Rudy Gay, and a possible superstar in O.J. Mayo. And they were still expected to only win only 20-25 games.

The one plus to Thursday's firing of Grizzlies coach Marc Iavaroni was the report that deposed 76ers coach Mo Cheeks would join Lionel Hollins in Memphis as an assistant. Cheeks, you'd assume, would try his hand at developing O.J. Mayo's point guard skills and fixing Mike Conley.

Phil Jasner of the Philadelphia Daily News reports that Cheeks will not join Hollins in Memphis, however.

Ronald Tillery of the Memphis Commercial-Appeal reports that after sacking Marc Iavaroni on Thursday, the Grizzlies have decided to hire Milwaukee assistant Lionel Hollins to take over for the season. Most interesting to many will be the footnote: deposed 76ers coach Maurice Cheeks will join Hollins as an assistant.

The Cheeks move scrambles the other summer vacancies a bit, though it'd be hard to estimate just how many of the 6-10 teams seeking new coaches come April and May would have targeted Cheeks. But the decision to bring Hollins back really sticks out as odd considering the circumstances and the history.

After 1-1/2 seasons at the helm of the Grizzlies, Marc Iavaroni has been sacked according to Memphis Commercial-Appeal and NBA.com's David Aldridge.

Iavaroni's head has been at risk since last April, when the team reportedly considered ending the coach's run after one bad season. Team owner Michael Heisley pardoned Iavaroni (how gracious) but the guillotine has hung over this season like a promise.

Iavaroni escaped the holiday bloodletting -- six coaches were fired between November 22 and December 15 -- but apparently Heisley's seen enough.

Your standard "who's next?" list of endangered NBA head coaches now includes Sacramento's Reggie Theus and Memphis' Marc Iavaroni. Actually, both men have been on the hot seat most of the season -- Iavaroni was reportedly under fire last April, and Theus almost lost his job in early November before getting a win over (irony) Memphis.

Both seemingly solidified their jobs this week. The Grizzlies have won three straight. The Kings almost swept a pair against the Lakers. But all beautiful things die sometime. For Theus, the premature death came Saturday night, as the Knicks waltzed into ARCO Arena and simply destroyed the Kings. Sacramento trailed by 30 in the first half, and it hardly got prettier.

I mentioned Saturday that the Lakers win on Tuesday likely saved Reggie's job this year, barring a basketball apocalypse. Losing to the Knicks by 24 at home, showing little to no defensive effort from the starters and a languid, boring offense -- that's basically basketball apocalypse. Earlier today, I discussed a wrinkle in Theus' job security: Eddie Jordan, believed to be a top preference of Kings GM Geoff Petrie, is getting interest from Philadelphia. Petrie isn't one to rush into action, but after losing Stan Van Gundy two years ago I wouldn't be surprised if he went rash all of a sudden.

The logistics of a Theus sacking remain difficult, as it appears the team won't make a move today. The Kings play Minnesota at home Monday before leaving for a road trip which will take us to Christmas. The team has a spell of four games in five nights between the holidays. On paper, Theus survives another few weeks. But I find it hard to believe Petrie (who has the call on the coach's tenure; the Maloofs have OKed it, apparently) can stand to watch basketball like this much longer.

Via SLAM, Griz beat writer Ronald Tillery of the Memphis Commercial-Appeal uses his blog to express skepticism at national media claims Marc Iavaroni's job is in danger.

Tillery insists that former Memphis GM Jerry West had been the cat pushing for Iavaroni's ouster last summer, both in owner Michael Heisley's ear and through the national media (namely, ESPN). But Tillery thinks Heisley, burned by scathing criticism to the Pau Gasol trade, is no longer listening to West ... or anyone.

Heisley no longer seeks or accepts advice. Whatever happens will be his decision without influence.

Tillery adds all this up to a prediction Iavaroni has until at least January to get his Grizzlies on the right path. Monday night offered two promising events: Memphis beat the shorthanded but potent Rockets, and Iavaroni proved he had sway in the locker room by benching Rudy Gay for a tardiness infraction. Gay played his tail off once he got in, scoring 20 points in 24 minutes. Players don't do that if they want their coach fired. (Of course, the real news from Memphis-Houston was Darko Milicic's insane display of anger/strength.)

While the four early sackings have made writers like ESPN's Chris Sheridan predict there will be more blood, there's a distinct possibility we won't see any more changes until the summer. Sacramento GM Geoff Petrie seems distinctly content with Reggie Theus, Mike Dunleavy isn't going anywhere, and I remain dubious to the idea Maurice Cheeks could be canned after an admittedly slow start with a reinvented wheel.

Technically speaking, the Grizzlies aren't the youngest team in the league -- Golden State and Portland just barely edged them out.

But in terms of players who actually play the most minutes, there's no doubt that the Grizzlies lead the way: they start three rookies (O.J. Mayo, Marc Gasol and Darrel Arthur), a second-year point guard (Mike Conley) and a third-year small forward (Rudy Gay) who's the old man of the group at 23 years old.

With that much inexperience, it's not a surprise the team is just 4-13 ... but at least one player thinks they probably could be better. When asked if he thought the Grizzlies were a well-coached team, Gay gave one of the worst endorsements of a coach I've ever seen.

Yesterday my colleague Tom Ziller talked about how some NBA teams are embracing blogs in the wake of ever-shrinking coverage from slowly-dying newspapers. He referenced the Golden State Warriors but could have just as easily been talking about the Memphis Grizzlies, who have routinely offered the excellent 3 Shades of Blue blog exclusive sit-downs with owner Michael Heisley, GM Chris Wallace and, today, head coach Marc Iavaroni.

It's a win-win situation for everybody involved -- the team gets a few thousand words of coverage during the dog days of September and the blog gets some well-deserved publicity. Fans of the team win, too, especially considering Chip from 3 Shades asked tough questions and prints Iavaroni's complete, in-depth answers and not just a boiled down one-liner readers would have received from a traditional reporter constrained by inches on a dead tree. The whole interview is worth reading, but here's my favorite highlight:

3SOB: It was reported that you played the devil's advocate on the O.J. Mayo trade. What were the reasons against the trade and what arguments were being made in favor of it?

MI: I think again another healthy situation. Here we are in what used to be called the war room but here we are in the draft night and frankly I think it was positive. We said let's look at everything. Now if someone wants to brand me the devil's advocate as several people were saying that is fine. I've never been a sheep. Mr. Heisley has never been a sheep. Heisley has always led by leading and I am the same way. Obviously, foremost on my mind is that we were a young team and we were going to get younger. Like it or not I tend to develop affinities for players in my corner and one of those players was Mike Miller.

It's been almost two years since Larry Brown's debacle in New York ended, and to the surprise of, well, no one, he's hoping to get back on the sidelines. From the Philadelphia Inquirer:

"I've got to figure out if I can get a coaching job," Brown said. "I want to get back so bad. I'm so bored."

[...] "I just miss it. I don't miss the games so much, but I miss being around the coaches and the players. I still have something to offer. . . . After my last experience [in New York], I just want to go where I can do a better job and move forward."

For the time being, Brown has sated his coaching jones by assisting Mo Cheeks in evaluating players, as well as helping out at Villanova practices. In fact, he doesn't care if he coaches in the pro game or returns to his college roots, he just wants a job -- any job (so long as it's a head coaching job, natch -- he's turned down offers to be an assistant for the Celtics as well as Marquette over the past 12 months).