Typically when Dwight Howard name-drops one of his former NBA comrades on Twitter, it's because he's recruiting them to come play or coach in Taiwan. But on Wednesday night, Howard's basketball-related musings remained in the Western Hemisphere, as he pitched a former teammate, Rajon Rondo, as a head coaching candidate for the Detroit Pistons.
The Detroit Pistons have been a mess for the last half-decade, failing to win more than 23 games in each of the last five seasons. The Pistons have shuffled through two head coaches in that span, and despite the fact that the 1st Round of the 2024 NBA Draft came and went on Wednesday night, Detroit remains the only team in the league without a head coach at this moment. Enter Rajon Rondo?
“Man give Rondo a Head coach job at Detroit I bet he turn everything around!” Dwight Howard tweeted on Wednesday night.
With 957 career regular season games and an additional 134 games of postseason experience — which netted him three NBA Finals appearances and two championship rings — Rondo certainly has the on-court CV of someone who is qualified for the job. And if recommendations is what Rondo needs to be considered, then look no further than what LeBron James had to say about Rondo on a recent episode of the Mind The Game, when he was asked what former player he believed should be coaching in the NBA.
“Rajon Rondo. He could do things on the go. It’s very weird to me that he’s not coaching at a high level – I think it’s because he doesn’t want to do it.”
Rondo responded on Instagram, seemingly throwing his hat in the ring, asking the question, “Should I start college or pro level,” and since the Lakers hired JJ Redick to be their head coach, Rondo has been rumored as a potential option to join his staff in Los Angeles.
Rajon Rondo brings with him a prickly personality… one that has rubbed teammates and coaches the wrong way. But geniuses don't always have the ideal set of people skills, and by all accounts, on the hardwood, Rajon Rondo is a genius.
The Beautiful Basketball Mind of Rajon Rondo
Whether it's finding ways to ice opponents when they're at the free throw line or instructing teammate DeMarcus Cousins to stand in an empty corner while defending a late game out of bounds play — Rondo knew that's where the play was intended to go — there are countless examples of Rondo's on-court IQ levitating above most of his peers. Even off the court, Rondo's dominance at poker, bourre and yes, Connect Four, highlight his ability to think multiple moves ahead. But it's the firsthand testimonials of the guys he played with, for, and against that give you the full picture of how smart Rajon Rondo is.
Former teammate Brian Scalabrine shared a story during an NBC Sports Boston documentary on the 2008 Celtics about an instance when he was coaching against Rondo while on the staff of the Golden State Warriors, where Rondo knew that then-Warriors head coach Mark Jackson was bluffing on a play call.
“Rondo looked at Mark, and then he looked in the air and said, ’42 cross, 42 cross,’ and then he looked back at Mark and said, ‘You don’t have a 42 cross.’ I was like, ‘How the hell did he just know that?’ Somehow, some way, he knew that. And they’re not a rival. It wasn’t a playoff series. It was an insignificant game during the middle of the week. He was the smartest player I’ve ever played with and it’s not even close.”
Alvin Gentry, who coached Rondo for one season in New Orleans, is on record saying that Rondo was often “granted permission to conduct the occasional Pelicans film session or morning walk-through instead of his coaches.” (h/t Timothy Rapp of Bleacher Report).
“When you have a point guard this smart, you should let him run the team,” Gentry said. “You can't go in that locker room and talk to one guy that doesn't believe in him. I'd coach him again and again and again.”
And then there's the opinion of the late Kobe Bryant, whose thoughts on basketball matters carry more weight than maybe anyone else's.
“He knows all the plays, knows all the actions and can think two, three moves ahead,” Bryant said back in 2015. “He's freakishly smart.”
Freakishly smart. Relentlessly competitive. And he wants his shot. Soon enough, Rajon Rondo will get it. Maybe the Detroit Pistons would be wise to be the team to give it to him.
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