Jeff Van Gundy, a leading candidate to be the next coach of the Nets, reportedly won’t be coaching anywhere next season. Dave D’Alessandro is reporting, and Rod Thorn more or less confirmed that JVG has informed executives that he’s going to keep his spot as a television analyst next season.
“I don’t want to say anything about it … but I think from everything I gather, that it’s probably true,” Thorn said today.
Asked whether it was accurate to state it from another perspective, and confirm that Van Gundy is no longer one of the “four to six” candidates on his short list, Thorn replied, “That would be correct.”
I think JVG is a great coach, but the biggest knock against the guy is his commitment to coaching. He’s left both the Knicks and the Rockets high and dry during his career and with so many teams looking for coaches this summer, this was probably his best shot to get back into it. If he’s taking himself out of the running, I think it’s fair to question whether he’ll ever want to coach in the NBA again, and if there’s a situation where he says he does, I don’t know if you can believe him.