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Utah's Sloan Lives to Coach and Is a Coach for Life
By LIZ ROBBINS
Published: November 12, 2006
As coaches seem to spin through the revolving doors of the N.B.A.,
Jerry Sloan slips in through the service entrance.
He is professional basketball's solemn standard-bearer, embarking on his 19th
consecutive season as coach of the Utah Jazz with the same uncompromising
loyalty to fundamentals since becoming head coach in December 1988.
During Sloan's unrivaled tenure, there have been 187 coaching changes in the
N.B.A., according to the Jazz. The Los Angeles Clippers have had 11 coaches
in that span, and Isiah Thomas is the Knicks' ninth coach. Thomas replaced
Larry Brown, who coached and left the Knicks and the Clippers, as well as
four other N.B.A. teams, in that time.
In an era when owners seek the quick fix on the sideline, Sloan, 64, is an
anomaly ─ in any league.
"I don't pay attention to it other than people making comments," Sloan said
last week, before Utah lost its first game of the season, to the Nets.
"It's really not important because I haven't done anything except be here."
The Jazz has begun the season with one of the N.B.A.'s best records (6-1
after last night's victory over Milwaukee, although Andrei Kirilenko sprained
his right ankle). Sloan's presence provides a contrast to the returning
coaches and those who could be exiting. Don Nelson with Golden State and
Eric Musselman with Sacramento have had mixed results with their new teams.
Doc Rivers struggles with Boston, and speculation over his future intensifies.
Mike Fratello is on edge with Memphis because the team is being sold.
"My basic feeling is, the wrong people keep getting fired," Larry Miller,
the owner of the Jazz, said Thursday in a telephone interview. "The players
should be the ones getting fired."
He added: "Jerry has always suited this franchise so well; he is so
fundamentally sound. He may be a little rough on the edges, but I believe
he represents what we want to market: consistency, hard work."
Sloan has had only one losing season with Utah (26-56 in 2004-5). The team
was 41-41 last season. Sloan has never won a championship, but he guided the
Jazz to the finals in 1997 and 1998 against Michael Jordan’s Bulls.
"He's the most constant, consistent individual that I've ever been around,"
Spurs Coach Gregg Popovich said of Sloan last week in New York. Popovich,
in his 10th season with San Antonio, has the second-longest coaching tenure
in the N.B.A.
"He doesn't want the spotlight any more than he ever did when he was younger,"
Popovich added. "He just cares about teaching, practicing. He just wants guys
to play hard. These things all of us respect, but not many people value them
to stick with it.」"
Not only is Sloan's longevity rare, so is his philosophy. He insists that
the game is not about a final reward but in finding reward through the daily
grind.
He almost sounds as if he is rationalizing his lack of titles, even if he
believes that his philosophy is the route to one. Neither glitz nor glory
becomes him; he collects antique John Deere tractors on his farm in
McLeansboro, Ill.
"A lot of guys have gotten championships, but I don't think they really
understand what this game is about," Sloan said. "Some of the great ones
probably do. I go back and look at our team when we had Stockton and Malone.
We didn't win a championship. The most difficult thing to do is, how are you
after you lost? Anybody can come back and wave the ring, but how do play
after that?
"I admire that in people probably more than people who win a championship.
That guys play and respect the game whether you've won a championship or not."
Miller understands Sloan's motivation.
"He doesn't want his players to get their heads in the clouds," he said.
"He's afraid there will be a gap if they focus on the end result only and
not tonight's game."
Sloan lives in the details of the moment because, as he said, "You are never
promised tomorrow." He acknowledged in a 2004 interview that he adopted that
attitude after the Chicago Bulls fired him after two and a half seasons as
head coach.
Miller sees how that event shaped Sloan, often making him see the negative
before the positive. "It burned him so deeply, it's like he can't fully
let go, he can't fully trust," Miller said.
Over the years, Sloan has changed little, on his sideline or in his system.
Phil Johnson, a Bulls assistant coach when Sloan was a key Chicago player,
has been with him every year since. Scott Layden, a former Knicks president
and Sloan's former general manager in Utah, is in his second year as a Jazz
assistant coach. Layden's father, Frank, handed the reins to Sloan 19 years
ago.
Ty Corbin, who played for Sloan and was a Knicks assistant coach, is a third
assistant, and he sees why Sloan has been successful.
"It's how he can adjust the game to his game, still keeping his system but
finding an even keel," Corbin said last week.
Sloan has made one noticeable strategic change. When point guard John Stockton
retired in 2003, Sloan bolstered the shaky backcourt by changing to a two-guard
front. But once the Jazz drafted the talented point guard Deron Williams in
2005, Sloan returned to a one-guard front.
He and his teams are not trendsetters.
"I'd like to be up-tempo, if I had guys who could outrun everybody else,"
he said. When he took his players' suggestions to play up-tempo ─ Stockton
and Karl Malone were still on the team ─ the Jazz went 6-2 in preseason and
started the regular season 2-5.
"All of a sudden they came to me and said, ‘What's going on here?’"
Sloan recalled. "I said, ‘Nobody is saying to me anything about winning.’
"Bottom line is with me, you've got to start off like you're going to play
in the playoffs, learn how to play a halfcourt game, push the ball whenever
you get the opportunity. None of it works unless you have good players. I
found that out."
After a 6-1 start in 2004-5, the Jazz won only 20 more games. The team was
hit by injuries, first to Kirilenko, then to Carlos Boozer and Mehmet Okur.
The team had little chemistry, and Sloan was still reeling from the death of
his wife, Bobbye.
It was a difficult time for everyone. "I never was close to letting him go,"
Miller said, "but I would say there were a couple of times out of sheer
frustration and feeling of hopelessness ─ like what on earth is going on?
─ that I said, ‘Do we need to look at something different?’ "
Miller answered his own question.
Sloan said that he had no idea how long he would coach, but that he would
tell Miller and his players immediately when he wanted to retire. "If you
spend time working with players and then you change coaches, I think it's
really frustrating because it causes chaos," Sloan said.
He does not care for chaos.
Sloan quietly remarried in September to Tammy Jessop. Relaxed and winning
again, Sloan is adjusting to his new home life, with Jessop's 10-year-old
son, Rhett, who plays football and races motorcycles. Outside the house.
"No, he doesn't run a tear," Sloan said, smiling. "I'm too old for that."
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/12/sports/basketball/12jazz.html
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