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Brown has turned team around in first season with Bobcats
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Published: January 24, 2009
The NBA's second chance in North Carolina was fizzling, even with Michael Jordan as part owner of the franchise, until feisty Larry Brown joined the Charlotte Bobcats in his latest coaching odyssey.
The 68-year-old Brown has turned an expansion team, saddled with an apathetic fan base, into one that believes it can win and contend for the playoffs. The turnaround is nothing short of remarkable, considering the Bobcats were the worst team in the NBA after training camp.
I watched the Bobcats dismantle the Phoenix Suns on Friday night and felt excitement about the NBA returning to the region for first time since the Charlotte Hornets sold out 358 consecutive games, nine straight seasons, at the old Charlotte Coliseum.
Before Jordan and Bobcats majority owner Bob Johnson signed Brown, the buzz for the Charlotte Bobcats was weaker than a cell phone signal in the Blue Ridge Mountains. The NBA had about as much chance of selling out at Time Warner Arena as a Billy Ray Cyrus greatest-hits tour.
Fans nearly had given up on the Bobcats only four years after they replaced the Hornets in Charlotte as expansion team. Initially, they liked having an NBA team in uptown Charlotte amid glimmering lights of towering skyscrapers and a shiny, new light-rail line. But the novelty quickly wore off.
In four consecutive losing seasons, the Bobcats were not improving, and Jordan and Johnson did not seem to care, aside from throwing big-money contracts at center Emeka Okafor and forward Gerald Wallace.
The Bobcats joined the league as an expansion team in 2004, two years after former owner George Shinn moved the Hornets to New Orleans. Fans were tired of Shinn and the NBA, which was declining in popularity for many reasons. Only 4 percent of respondents nationwide said their favorite sport was the NBA in a 2008 Harris poll.
The league's popularity rose in the 1980s and 1990s on the backs superstars such as Jordan, Magic Johnson and Larry Bird. When they retired, it was left without an icon to keep the sport on par with the NFL, Major League Baseball and NASCAR. It was depending on a hip-hop culture that connected in the inner city but not in places like Cabarrus County.
Brown's return was a chance to heal his bruised reputation and for the Bobcats to ride along. Brown failed as coach of the New York Knicks in 2006 after run-ins with overrated malcontent Stephon Marbury. The 2004 Olympic basketball team, filled with whiners, complainers and quitters, failed to win gold in Athens because Brown could not adjust to their style. And Allen Iverson openly mocked Brown when he coached Iverson in Philadelphia. Brown questioned Iverson's work ethic, with Iverson responding, "We're talking about practice, man, practice."
As you might have heard, Brown has been around the block a few times. He has moved more than United Van Lines, having coached 10 pro and three college teams with overwhelming success. He's the only coach to have won NBA and NCAA championships, having rescued many teams from the depths of embarrassment. He understands the importance of practice and of having the right parts.
The Bobcats desperately needed the former Tar Heels star, who thought he had seen it all. There was such a lack of talent on the Bobcats roster, outside Okafor and Wallace, that Brown thought the Bobcats might challenge the NBA record for fewest victories in a season, set in 1972-1973 by the 9-73 Philadelphia 76ers.
"I didn't have a clue how to coach that team in training camp. Nothing we had tried in the past worked,'' Brown said.
During the first week of training camp, Brown invited former UNC Coach Dean Smith to a practice.
"I remember coach Smith watching us and him saying, 'Are you sure you like coaching?'" Brown said.
During the Bobcats preseason opener, Okafor was whistled for two quick fouls.
"I looked down the bench, and no one was there (to replace him)," said Brown, noting the Bobcats trailed the Orlando Magic 40-9 after the first quarter and finished the preseason 0-8.
Brown has turned it around. A 98-76 rout of the Suns was the crowning achievement of Brown's early tenure with the Bobcats. It was the team's fifth win in six games, a modest streak, perhaps, but one that has changed Brown's mind about the team.
Since trading Jason Richardson to the Suns last month for Boris Diaw and Raja Bell, the Bobcats are playing like a playoff team. They are one of the eight best teams in the Eastern Conference, even though their record is 18-25.
"I don't think we can play better,'' Brown said. "I don't think there's even a chance, without this trade, that this would have happened.''
It would not have happened without Brown. He will be known as the man who resurrected pro basketball here, not Jordan, or even Okafor, Wallace, Diaw and Bell.
If this is the final chapter of the Larry Brown story, it will be a compelling one.
Managing editor James Bennett's column appears Sundays in the Independent Tribune. Contact him at jbennett@independenttribune.com or 704-789-9150.
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