Boston's Doc Rivers, New Orleans' Byron Scott and Portland's Nate McMillan are among the league's three most successful coaches from the recent generation of players. Here each offers advice on how to make the transition.
5. Above all, believe in yourself. "You can't coach to the way the GM wants you to coach, you can't coach to the way the fans want you to do it, you can't change your style because of criticism,'' Rivers said. "You've just got to stick with what you do and what you believe in, and if it's good enough, it's good enough. And if it's not, you'll find that out too.
"You learn that you change from experience. But you don't change your personality or who you are.''
4. Understand -- but don't behave like -- the players. "Once you're a coach, you're no longer one of the guys and you've got to move out of that,'' Rivers said. "I tell Sam [Cassell] that right now, because I think Sam has a chance [to become a coach] -- that nothing you've done in the past has anything to do with what you're doing in the future. No one cares that you were a good player. You can bring that up to your players as a joke, and that's what I do. I always joke about it -- 'Man, when I played I was awful,' or 'When I played I kicked your ass' -- and they know I'm joking about it. Because they couldn't care less. They want to know what you can do for them now.
"When players who want to coach ask me for advice, I say, 'You've got to work. I don't care that you worked as player. You've got to work as a coach. This is not a tour of you being a great player, so now it's residual that you can coach. It doesn't work that way. They don't care. They want to see what you can do.' "
Said Scott: "The fact that all three of us have been very successful as basketball players -- Nate and Doc and myself -- I think that gives you the respect from the start when you're talking to these guys about what it takes to be successful in this league. I have a feel for situations on the basketball court. But that's just half of it; the other half is being able to relate to these guys. I've been blessed with having a team in [New] Jersey that wanted to play for me -- at least for a couple of years -- and then I have a team here that you know these guys, they play hard for me, and that's all I can ask.
3. Manage the team. "I come in early,'' McMillan said. "I'm in the office normally between 7:30 and 8 every day. I go through film, I'll go through my practice plan or my game plan, and then I'll meet with my staff at 9. I'll give them the practice plan and then I'll listen to them. 'What do you think? This is what I want to do today.' But I really want their input. I've seen coaches who don't even talk to their assistants.''
After a morning shootaround on gameday, McMillan continues the ritual he maintained as a player.
"I sleep,'' he said. "I'm in bed, I don't take calls for a couple of hours. Then normally I'm at the arena at least two-and-a-half hours before the game. After games I go back and I watch tape that night. I get up the next morning and I'll edit the game and then, if we play the day after, I'll start to work on the next game.''
2. Be secure. Shortly after Scott arrived in New Orleans, he found himself in the middle of a skirmish between management and star point guard Baron Davis. Scott had recently been fired by the Nets amid rumors of a falling-out with Jason Kidd, yet in this new situation he stood up to Davis.
"I never thought I was in a vulnerable position,'' Scott said. "I know from the outside people probably said, 'This is either going to make or break him, it's going to go back to the whole Jason Kidd thing.' But I never thought of it that way.
"I just thought we're going to do it my way, this is how we're going to do it. I just came off going to the Finals two straight years [with the Nets], and I won three championships [as a player in the 1980s with the Lakers], and I've got a pretty good idea of what it takes to win. And so you're either on board or you're not. And luckily for me as well, I had the backing of my GM and my owner, and we saw fit to make some changes, and you see where we are today.''
1. Commit to the job at hand today, even if it may not lead to a championship tomorrow. "The networking,'' McMillan said. "I don't network. Not that it's anything against that, or that you are preparing for the day that you don't have a job. But or me, I'm not afraid to lose my job. And while I'm here I'm not going to be working toward my next job. I have an opportunity right here: You've got me. I'm not thinking about going anywhere else. I came here to make this work. I tried to do it in Seattle, and I was able to stay there for 19 years [as a player, assistant coach and head coach] by not ever assuming that I would have my job tomorrow.''
McMillan acknowledges that others in his position are looking for better opportunities elsewhere.
"It happens all the time and I see it a lot,'' he said. "But I've just been one who, I don't know -- talking to the competition or your peers and all of that, I've never been one to do that on the court as a coach. I respect them, I respect my friends, but I'm not a big phone guy. I don't do a lot of calling. I think about it and I know I should, but I've never been one to call other coaches, even coaches I've worked with. I focus on the group I'm working with and how can we get better.''
The key to winning a championship -- and this is echoed by Rivers, Scott and other coaches -- is to do the hard work of trying to win every day regardless of whether the team is capable of winning or not.
"I've asked our coaches, 'Would you take a championship ring, or would you take the career of Coach [Jerry] Sloan?' '' McMillan said in reference to the league's longest-serving coach. Sloan is in his 21st year as Jazz coach, and he has suffered but one losing season. But he has also never won a championship.
"I would take the career of Coach Sloan,'' McMillan said, "because he is consistent with what he does. They've won and they continue to consistently win.
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