After news broke yesterday about the hiring of Kevin Young becoming the top paid assistant coach in the NBA, Mat Ishbia went right back to work as he hires Utah Jazz’s associate GM David Fizdale as an assistant head coach to join Frank Vogel in Phoenix according to Adrian Wojnarowski.
Thank you for reading this post, don't forget to subscribe!The Phoenix Suns are hiring Jazz associate GM David Fizdale as an assistant coach, sources tell ESPN. Suns made a significant financial play for Fizdale and drew upon his history with new coach Frank Vogel and GM James Jones. Fizdale is a former HC with Knicks and Grizzlies.
— Adrian Wojnarowski (@wojespn) June 5, 2023
Fizdale has a ton of history with Vogel as the two spent time together in Los Angeles with the Lakers and he also served as an assistant coach under Erik Spoelstra during his time in Miami with the big three in LeBron James, Dwyane Wade, and Chris Bosch.
Ishbia is definitely going for pedigree and championship-level experience with the coaching staff in Phoenix. Fizdale understands how to help coach and assist a team with multiple superstars on it as he did so in Miami.
He’s been around LeBron James in two different stops in his career and now he will get the chance to coach up Kevin Durant and Devin Booker in hopes to get those two over the hump in Phoenix.
Fizdale spent time coaching in New York (Knicks) and Memphis (Grizzlies) during portions of his career while getting to one postseason back in 2016. He’s also known for a very famous postgame rant that went down in the archives as one of the best.
Welcome to the team David Fizdale 🤝
Never forget this ALL TIME “take that for data” post game presser 😭 pic.twitter.com/TXaEDALsrj
— Suns Lead (@SunsLead) June 5, 2023
Jason McIntyre on Frank Vogel: “He’s Going Into a Really Toxic Situation in Phoenix”
This hire shows that Ishbia is a man of his word in terms of doing whatever it takes to bring a championship home to Phoenix. Let’s see if he delivers.
