The Toronto Raptors are still looking for someone who can come in and replace Nick Nurse as the team’s next head coach. The Milwaukee Bucks have followed Masai Ujiri’s lead, as their poor postseason performance precipitated the firing of longtime head coach Mike Budenholzer.
Budenholzer was fired by the Bucks after the No. 1 seed fell in embarrassing fashion to the No. 8 seed Miami Heat. Despite the fact that Nurse and Budenholzer won championships in a three-year span, both of them are currently looking for gainful employment in the NBA.
Budenholzer, who shouldn’t be admonished too harshly for his performance in the first round due to the fact he had a personal tragedy in the middle of the series, will likely not have to wait long for his next job, as coaches that have a championship ring and a two-time MVP winner as a pupil don’t walk down the street every day.
The Raptors need to weigh all of the potential benefits and issues that could come with making Budenholzer the next leader of the squad, as he is coming off one of his most disappointing seasons. Will swapping Nurse for Coach Bud be enough to get the Raptors back into that elite tiet?
Pros and Cons of Toronto Raptors hiring Mike Budenholzer.
Pros
Budenholzer, like Nurse, won a championship in the last five years. Giannis Antetokounmpo obviously had a ton to do with that, but you don’t coach a team to a championship while being a complete dullard on the sidelines. Milwaukee’s offense helped carry them to a ring, which could get the Raptors interested.
Budenholzer helped turn Giannis into a game-changing star, Khris Middleton into a consistent All-Star, Brook Lopez into a Defensive Player of the Year contender, and Grayson Allen turn into a viable bench piece. That will likely get Ujiri as interested in him as his win-loss record.
Mike Budenholzer brings scoring, development to the Toronto Raptors.
The Budenholzer coaching tree includes high-end coaches like Quin Snyder and up-and-comers like Darvin Ham and Taylor Jenkins. Why bother adding top assistant and Budenholzer disciple Charles Lee when the real deal is now free to come up north to Toronto?
He didn’t end his career on the best note, and his playoff record is what it is, but bringing in someone with a lengthy resume for a situation that requires winning immediately would be better than bringing in a no-name assistant that needs to learn how to be a head coach on the job.
Cons
Budenholzer did win his ring, but it’s hard to look at a tenure in which he got two MVP seasons and three more almost MVP seasons out of Antetokounmpo and appeared in the Finals just once. Giannis, Middleton, and Jrue Holiday should have been more than enough to get to the Finals quite frequently.
Whereas the much-maligned Nurse would change the rotation seemingly every other game, Budenhozler has come under fire for not making enough adjustments in a series that called for some true coaching excellence. Budenholzer’s status as an offensive genius has never been in more peril than right now.
Mike Budenholzer might not fix the Toronto Raptors.
While Budenholzer’s coaching played a part in Milwaukee’s excellent regular seasons, the debate over how much of their success was Giannis smashing the opposition into a pancake and how much his acumen on the sidelines. If the former was the main reason, the Raptors might fall on their face.
Budenholzer is so committed to playing most of his bench that the mighty Giannis Antetokounmpo was regularly playing fewer than 30 minutes in a handful of games this season. The Raptors need to play their bench more, but that philosophy might mean less Pascal Siakam on the floor. Is that part of why he struggled late so often?
Verdict
Let us take a look at the list of candidates Toronto has lined up. They include unproven assistants galore, a last-second hail mary in Becky Hammon, and another former head coach that has never won a playoff series in Kenny Atkinson. None of them have the resume Budenholzer does.
Budenholzer has some negatives alongside him, as he has mustered just one Finals appearance with an elite Bucks team and those always sneaky Atlanta Hawks teams in the early 2010s. That shouldn’t be enough to totally preclude Toronto from taking a look.
The Toronto Raptors should pursue Mike Budenholzer.
Rather than pursue two of his former top assistants in Atkinson (dating back to his time in Atlanta) and Lee, the Raptors could drink straight from the source and bring in someone who has shown that he can consistently win games across multiple eras and decades.
As Budenholzer proved in Milwaukee following his departure in Atlanta, sometimes a change of scenery could be exactly what a particular coach needs to rehabilitate their status within the league. Coach Bud is by no means a perfect candidate, but the Raptors shouldn’t let him take the Quin Snyder route and join another contender mid-season.