Cavaliers can create perfect coach reunion after West team's classless firing

Good teams take advantage of dysfunctional teams.

That's the mantra in sports; if you are a great team, run by smart people who are allowed to do their jobs properly, you tend to win over the long run. One way you do that is by recognizing which teams are not competently run and taking advantage when that dysfuntion spills over.

The Cleveland Cavaliers used to be that dysfunctional team; an entire rule for trading draft picks was created because of how badly the Cavs functioned in the 1980s. Thanks to the "Stepien Rule" - named for Cavs owner Ted Stepien - teams can only trade every-other first-round pick.

Now, however, the Cavaliers are one of the league's better-run teams, building a deep roster, playing the long game and hiring a number of excellent people throughout the organization. That includes their head coach, Kenny Atkinson, brought in this past summer to revamp the offense and inject life into a good team that couldn't break through.

That move has worked out resoundingly well, and Atkinson is a candidate for Coach of the Year as the Cavaliers lead the league at 27-4. Across the country, however, a recent Coach of the Year winner is now without a job.

The Kings fired Mike Brown

Mike Brown was one of the most highly-respected head coaches in the NBA. He stepped into a role with the Sacramento Kings 2.5 seasons ago, a franchise that has stumbled and bumbled through the last two decades. They are known for disastrous free agent signings, emotionally-driven trades and colossal draft busts. They go through coaches like they are changing socks, and as a result have only made the playoffs once since 2006.

That one time? In 2022-23, when Brown came in, gave the team an identity on both ends of the court, and led them not only into the playoffs but as the third seed. They were upset in seven games by the veteran Golden State Warriors, but it was a mountaintop moment for the Kings organization.

Since then, Brown has worked hard to take ill-fitting pieces and fit them together in a way to make the team thrive, but it hasn't worked. The Kings lost in the Play-In Tournament last year and have been struggling this year. A five-game losing streak dropped them to 13-18, and in the competitive Western Conference that is a death sentence.

That losing streak also took place at home, right in front of owner Vivek Ranadive. When you take an unpredictable owner used to getting his way and wave mediocrity in front of him, it's bound to get a response. Dysfunctional teams do dysfunctional things. Despite Brown being extremely far down the list of problems in Sacramento, the Kings fired him Friday.

What's more, they didn't merely fire Brown, but they waited until after he conducted a practice and addressed the media, and then fired him over the phone as he drove home. It was a classless move by the worst organization in the NBA, and they are being roundly laughed at and called out by people inside and outside of the league because of it.

Could the Cavaliers take advantage of this level of dysfunction? There is one obvious way: set up a reunion.

Mike Brown could have a Cleveland reunion

Mike Brown first broke into the coaching ranks in the NBA as an assistant in Washington before spending time in San Antonio under Gregg Popovich. After another two seasons in Indiana, he received his first head-coaching postion: with the Cleveland Cavaliers.

Hired in 2005 to oversee the growth of a contender around budding superstar LeBron James, Brown coach the team for five seasons, including taking them to the NBA Finals in 2007. The Cavs won at least 45 games in all five seasons, including a league-leading 66 in 2008-09.

After a short stint with the Los Angeles Lakers, Brown returned to Cleveland to oversee the growth of another young team with Kyrie Irving as the centerpiece. After one season, however, LeBron James announced his return and the Cavs moved on from Brown.

Brown then reinvigorated his career as an assistant in Golden State, and it was there that he overlapped with a brilliant offensive mind and former head coach trying to do the same thing: level up under Steve Kerr for one of the best organizations in the league (sorry Cleveland fans, it's true) and prepare to be an even better head coach in the ftuure. That coach was Kenny Atkinson.

When Brown got the Sacramento job, Atkinson moved up the bench and spent two seasons as Kerr's right-hand man, waiting for the right job to open up. That job was Cleveland, and 31 games in he couldn't have done a better job.

Would Brown be open to a reunion? He is an experienced coach with chops on both sides of the ball and would without a doubt be an asset to the Cavs' coaching ranks. He may prefer to sit the rest of the year out, but if he is dying to jump back in he could join the Cavs as an "advisor" and then look to sign on full-time next offseason.

Things between Brown and the Cleveland organization were undoubtedly rocky after he was let go in 2014, but his relationship with Atkinson may be strong enough to convince him to return. If so, the Cavaliers could once again benefit from the dysfunction of others.

Firing Brown was probably the bad decision by the Kings; the way they fired him was a disaster. Hiring Brown back to Cleveland could be the perfect response for a Cavaliers team ready to arm itself for a multi-year stretch of winning at the highest level.