According to a Yahoo Sports report that broke early Monday morning, the Sacramento Kings have fired head coach Mike Malone.
This season Malone has coached the Kings to a record of 11-13, however the team has been without franchise player Demarcus Cousins for nine games. In Cousins’ absence the team has gone 2-7. Given the circumstances was the Malone firing too abrupt?
Last season, Malone guided the Kings to a 28-54 regular season record. At this season’s pace, Malone would have the Kings finishing near .500, an incredible feat for a team that failed to win 30 games the previous year.
In addition, the Sacramento Kings won five of its first six games during the 2014-15 season. So, what was the catalyst in the firing of Malone? It all started when Kings owner Vivek Ranadive hired Malone before General Manager Pete D’Alesandro.
During Malone’s tenure D’Alesandro became displeased with the way Malone executed his offense.
Malone was simply not D’Alesandro’s top choice, and along with “advisor to the chairman” Chris Mullin, he opted to let coach Malone go in favor of an offense more suited to their style of play.
Adrian Wojnarowski is reporting the team has its sights set on current ESPN analyst George Karl.
The move makes quite a bit of sense as D’Alesandro worked with Karl when they were a part of the Denver Nuggets organization. In the meantime, the team will put the interim tag on assistant coach Ty Corbin.