One of the biggest reasons behind the backlash the Portland Trail Blazers has received over their decision to hire Chauncey Billups as their new head coach is the fact that they chose the former NBA champ over San Antonio Spurs assistant Becky Hammon.
Hammon was reportedly one of the frontrunners to land the job, but somehow, Billups edged her out. Apparently, the reason behind this stemmed from the results of a full-blown investigation on Hammon. Unfortunately for her, the “intel” the Blazers were able to dig up on her did not bode too well for Hammon's chances of landing the job.
According to Jake Fisher of The Athletic, Hammon was able to leave quite an impression on Portland's front office during preliminary interviews. It was when the Blazers began doing their due diligence that things took a turn for the worse for Hammon.
Apparently, when the Blazers reached out to “Spurs figures,” the feedback they provided on Hammon was not “complimentary pertaining to various aspects of day-to-day coaching responsibilities.” Moreover, this was reportedly the same sentiment that sources from around the league had on the long-time Gregg Popovich assistant.
Simply put, Hammon failed the background check portion of the hiring process. The big question here is, did the Spurs just cost her the Portland coaching job because of their less-than-flattering recommendation? If personnel within the Spurs organization truly feel this way about her, then why is Hammon still on the coaching staff? Coach Pop is one of the greatest coaches in the history of the NBA and surely, he would not have kept Hammon by his side for this long if he did not see something in her, right?
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