Hornets should dump Dunleavy once sale is finalized

NBA commissioner David Stern confirmed that the New Orleans Hornets were in the process of being sold to a group led by former NBA player and ex-coach for the Los Angeles Clippers, Mike Dunleavy. While businessmen Raj Bhathal and Larry Benson are the principal investors of the group seeking to purchase the Hornets, Dunleavy has been the principal negotiator for the group.

Dunleavy isn’t a bad choice to lead the purchase of the Hornets since he knows the league from top to bottom. He went to the NBA Finals twice as a player, he coached four different teams over the span of 17 years and he was a general manager for both the Milwaukee Bucks and the Los Angeles Clippers.

What should trouble Hornets’ fans is his shaky history as both a coach and an executive. He has been to the playoffs seven times as a coach but still only has a .461 overall winning percentage in the regular season. And while he has drafted decent talent as an executive, his teams never won during the years he was a general manager.

Still his seven playoff appearances are nothing to sneeze at. His first coaching opportunity came with the Los Angeles Lakers back in 1990. Dunleavy replaced the legendary Pat Riley and led the Lakers to the NBA Finals but they would lose to Michael Jordan and the Chicago Bulls in five games. He would coach one more year with the Lakers before stepping down.

After a miserable five-year stint with the Bucks, Dunleavy would take over as head coach of the Portland Trailblazers. Dunleavy would reach the playoffs all four seasons he coached in Portland, advancing to the Western Conference Finals twice but he would be fired after his team was ousted in the first round of his fourth season.

It also didn’t help that during his tenure as coach in Portland his team gained the nickname the “Jail Blazers” because players like Isaiah Rider and Rasheed Wallace stayed in the news for drugs and other incidents. His lack of control over his players was the final straw leading to his dismissal in Portland.

His last stop as a coach was with the Clippers from 2003-2010. While he was responsible for drafting Blake Griffin, DeAndre Jordan, and current-Hornet Eric Gordon, Dunleavy would only have one winning season during the seven years he was with the team.

But overall, Dunleavy has shown he can produce winning records when he has a talented team. He has also shown a penchant for drafting talented players although he doesn’t have a good track record with developing talent which leaves the Hornets in an interesting position.

With that being said, do you keep Dunleavy in the organization and take a chance on him being able to turn the team’s fortunes around or do you go with someone who has more of a proven record of results? Dunleavy has an up-and-down track record as an executive and coach which doesn’t bode well for a struggling franchise like New Orleans so I would say no but let’s see what Bhathal and Benson think.

Roosevelt Hall is an NBA Blogger for The Sport Mentalist 2 and also writes for Shatter The Backboard. He can be contacted at RHall@shatterthebackboard.com. Follow him on Twitter @sportmentalist and add him on Facebook Roosevelt Hall Thesportmentalist.  

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