September 26, 2023 • 48 mins
Chris is joined by Nets assistant coach Will Weaver to discuss returning to Brooklyn, coaching around the world, and getting lost in Paris.
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Speaker 1 (00:10):
Hey, what's going on. It's Chris Carino and this is
the Voice of the Nets podcast. Thank you so much
for tuning in subscribing leave its a good rating. Really
appreciate it. We're going to continue to tell the stories
of some NETS staffers who have very interesting basketball journeys
and one of those guys is Will Weaver. Will Weaver
(00:31):
is going to be one of the top assistants for
Jacque Vaughn this year. It's his second, or you could
even say third stint with the Nets, because he started
in twenty sixteen as a special assistant to Kenny Atkinson
and then he left to move over to Long Island
the Long Island Nets, who is the head coach in
(00:51):
the twenty eighteen nineteen season, was Coach of the Year
in the G League. He would then make stops in Sydney, Australia,
ended up with the Houston Rocket staff. He's been an
Australian national team assistant coach. Was in the mixture of
the Okay See job a few years ago. Last year
spent a season as a head coach in Paris. He
(01:12):
is from Austin, Texas. NETS. You're gonna play a game
in Austin Texas this year, They're gonna celebrate Saint Patrick's
Day in Austin in the second half of a difficult
back to back. You're gonna play in Indiana on March sixteenth,
and then in Austin against the Spurs on March seventeenth.
Spurs are playing a number of games home games in
Austin this year. You know, one thing about Austin is
(01:34):
Austin's become sort of a brand name. It's kind of
like Brooklyn. You know, you have an idea of what
Austin's about. It's developed this reputation. A lot of young, artistic, progressive,
creative people are gravitating toward Brooklyn. They're gravitating toward Austin, Texas.
And you know, Austin's a very eclectic city. It has
(01:56):
that slogan, you know, keep Austin weird. It doesn't really
fit the mold of a big city in Texas, but
it's the capital of the state as much the same way.
Austin native Will Weaver, who attended College University of Texas
got his master's in education, met Sam Hanky when he
was working at Sam Houston State. Hanky brought him to Philadelphia,
(02:18):
which started his NBA journey, but Will Weaver doesn't necessarily
fit the mold of your prototypical NBA assistant coach. When
we did the Adam Kporn episode, Will Weaver described what
the next coaching staff and their system was like, and
it describes Will Weaver. His quote was their unselfish, evidence
(02:42):
based modern coaches who enjoy keeping the game fun but
take it very seriously. Will Weaver is an eclectic, interesting person.
You can have a conversation with him about many different things,
and we do here on this pot. But make no
doubt he is an unselfish, evidence based modern coach who
(03:05):
keeps the game fun but takes it very seriously. And
he's got his eye one day on being an NBA
head coach. But he's a perfect example of sometimes the
shortest distance between two points is not necessarily a straight line.
So hope you enjoyed this conversation with one of Jacques
Vaughan's lead assistants going into the twenty three twenty four season.
(03:29):
It is Will Weaver right here on the Voice of
the Nets. It's so great to see you again.
Speaker 2 (03:38):
I feel the same way. It's cool to be back.
Speaker 1 (03:40):
Yeah, your second stint. The first time around. I gotta
admit you kind of were you were this sort of
mysterious character the first time around, right you had you
had a title of you know, special assistant to Kenyackinttson,
the head coach. You know, you look more like a
(04:00):
professor off a campus of University of Texas where I
know you're from. Then then then a basketball coach, and
you were sure it was like it was almost like
a clandestine function that you had. So how would you
describe your, uh, your purpose, your role when you were
first with the Nets under Kenny Atkinson.
Speaker 3 (04:22):
Yeah, not any differently than I'd describe my role now,
which is just trying to help, you know, trying to
assess where I can help the most and provide support
to people that need it, you know, obviously focused on
the players, try to zoom out when it's helpful to
zoom out and.
Speaker 2 (04:41):
Provide a wider view.
Speaker 3 (04:43):
To make sure that we don't get lost in the
weeds that Kenny. You know, at that time, we were
all new and so it took a lot of I
think all of us were so excited to jump in
that we ran the risk of sometimes getting too specific
and losing sight of the forest. For the tree, and
then occasionally, once we identified something zooming in really tight
(05:04):
on that and saying, all right, we need we need
a protocol, we need a system to try to consolidate,
to sharpen, to speed up something that we were doing.
So it vacillates between what's needed, but it's always born
out of the same spirit that we'd preached to our
guys versus like be a teammate, try to help.
Speaker 1 (05:23):
But that was a time where the organization was sort
of had coming off rock bottom. I mean, you were
coming away from the pierced Garnett deal. You came in
and Sean Marx put together this group and you were
bereft of draft picks and bereft of cap space. It
was almost like a build now, tear it down, build
(05:46):
from the ground up. Was it? It seemed to be
a new experience for everybody. So what do you think
made it work?
Speaker 2 (05:55):
The people?
Speaker 1 (05:56):
You know?
Speaker 3 (05:56):
I think Sean Kenny get huge credit for their leadership,
that their attitude was always good. We don't how to
picks good like, we're not incentivized to be bad like.
We're going to try our damnedest to win and win
as soon and as sustainable as we can, but that
(06:17):
they weren't distracted by the context. They were focused on
the next day and stacking up those days. And that's
the only approach that works. You only eat a whale
one by the time, and those guys kept us all
focused on the micro that would turn into the macro.
Speaker 1 (06:35):
Interesting analogy.
Speaker 2 (06:36):
There eat a whale had my touch point. Sure, who
hasn't had a whale?
Speaker 1 (06:42):
Uh No, But there really is nowhere to go but up.
I guess when you were the position that you guys
found yourself in at that point, and sometimes that's do
you find that could you could be a little more creative,
a little more bold because that maybe that pressure isn't
there help not?
Speaker 3 (06:57):
Like I hope for all of us that we savor
the chance to coach at the highest level and be
on each other's journeys for just a short little time.
You know, even in the best case scenario, Jock's been
here a long time, right Like from that moment until now,
he's been run the whole time. And that's a tiny
part of Jock's career in life. And I know that
(07:20):
he looks at it the same way I do, which
is that he savors the chance to get introduced to
work alongside Cheer four build back up again depending on
how things go, because we all know that it's not
going to last for ever, and we're all extremely grateful
to be here and we should be.
Speaker 1 (07:43):
Where you find the organization now as opposed to when
you left, a lot of the work that was done
when you originally hear in that group, I'm sure you
see a lot of that infrastructure that's strong here right now. Definitely,
but they are coming off a time where, you know, listening,
they took a shot with the Superstars. It didn't work out,
(08:06):
but you still find yourself in a pretty good place.
And because I because I hear fans and pundits sort
of refer to what's going on now as more of
an extension of what was going on when you guys
originally came in with Kenny, I don't know you have
you weren't here for that kind of Superstar era, but
do you do you find the organization is a little
(08:29):
more related to when you first got here and the
things that you've built.
Speaker 3 (08:32):
Yeah, I think one of the biggest competitive advantages you
can have is continuity, and that edges compound and stack
over time, and so the biggest edge is people, and
they have a symboled a remarkable set of people, many
of whom have were there when I arrived, and others
(08:52):
who have joined in between. And so I have such
appreciation for the colleagues I'm getting round two with, and
a real excitement to get to learn from all the
folks that either weren't here or were in such different
roles than when I was here last that I'm getting
to benefit from all the wisdom that they've accrued over
this last period of time and hopefully contribute my own,
(09:15):
represented by my gray hairs that I've picked up in
other spots in between.
Speaker 1 (09:19):
Yes, you now, it's almost that you went on a
journey after your original stint with the Nets. We're going
to go back to your beginnings in a little bit,
but since the Nets, you went to Long Island to
be the head coach. So there was a jump, right,
I mean, you were thrown into being a head coach
for the first time. You had always been kind of
(09:40):
a special assistant going back to your days with the
Sixers and the Nets, and then you find yourself as
a head coach with the Long Island Nets. Was that
always your journey that you saw and when you got
the chance to do it, what did you learn about yourself?
Speaker 2 (09:56):
It was always the.
Speaker 3 (10:01):
Goal, But I was lucky that I had incredible mentors
that let me sit next to them, many of whom
were doing it for the first time. So Jason Hooton
at Sam Houston State, Jeff McCrary at St. Andrew's Episcopal
School Brett in Philadelphia, Kenny here, Like I sat next
to all those guys, and they were unselfish enough and
(10:22):
also were self critical enough that I got to observe
unfiltered what it looks like to be a head coach,
and often a head coach in a new situation, a
new league, a new team, at least a new context
than the experience they'd had previously. So I paid attention,
and I felt really confident that I knew who I was,
(10:43):
and I knew the things that I could bring to
the table, and that there were surely things that I
was going to have as weaknesses that needed to be
complimented by the folks I worked with. But even more
than that, I know what NETS culture is about, like
I know what Sean Kenny jock at that time our
ownership that like I knew what we were trying to do.
(11:05):
And so when you have a north Star, you can
lead because you know we we're headed. And so I
felt really confident, particularly in Long Island, that I was
going to be able to help grow what Ron Noraad
and his group had done before and keep it moving forward.
Speaker 1 (11:21):
Yeah, you're coach of the year. Weren't you in the
G League?
Speaker 2 (11:23):
I mean depends on who you ask.
Speaker 1 (11:26):
And had a great season there. And then what called
you to Australia because you went right from the G
League being a head coach for that one year and
now you had a chance to be a head coach?
Was that? The thing that drew to Australia was the adventure?
What was it? All that?
Speaker 2 (11:42):
A bunch of factors. I loved being a head coach.
Speaker 3 (11:44):
I there's so few head coaching jobs available, especially for
somebody that didn't play in the NBA, you know, like,
so I was hugely grateful for the chance to do
it in the G League and I was excited to
continue that. I learned so much being a head coach
in a new league, the G League, having I experienced
that before, so to now double it up and do
(12:05):
it again in a new league and much, not even
mentioning a new continent and you know, all the different
kind of competition.
Speaker 2 (12:12):
Differences.
Speaker 3 (12:14):
I also loved it from that it wasn't comfortable that
it was going to be an adventure for our family.
That my son was born that year when I was
coaching Long Island, when he was born.
Speaker 2 (12:22):
One sixty fifth yep.
Speaker 3 (12:23):
So he's born in New York and for him to
get to experience and appreciate what a big world it
is out there in a place that I was very
familiar with. I coached with the national team for six
years and I loved and loved Australian basketball and the
people there and the spirit of the athletes.
Speaker 2 (12:42):
That grow up in Australia.
Speaker 3 (12:45):
So for a bunch of reasons, I was really excited
to go not a very different place, but a very
different context. It was when now it was a veteran team,
it was a team that was should be and has
been the best team in that league. They've won championships
in the past several seasons, and I like to think
that we laid the foundation for a lot of those
(13:06):
things to happen.
Speaker 1 (13:07):
Yeah, they're a powerhouse right now in the international scene.
How good is the League, the Professional League very good.
Speaker 3 (13:14):
I think people don't fully appreciate what a sporting culture
Australia is and kids grow up surrounded immersed in sport,
and so I've never had more fun coaching than surrounded
by people who are wired from the time they're little
(13:35):
to give it up for the team, to sacrifice to
make tough plays.
Speaker 1 (13:41):
There's a developmental I guess feeling about sports in Australia.
I know we've talked about how there's an Australian accent
or at least that hemisphere in this organization from Sean
Mars with New Zealand and you know, the performance team
has I think about three Australians on it, and there's
there's very much I think that this organization, the Nets
(14:03):
have tapped into that culture for sure. Of so you
were able to see it firsthand the national team and
with the.
Speaker 3 (14:10):
And there's there's been you know, they were so ahead
in sports science that that edge persists and reverberates out
into today. We're not the only lead, you know, we
were one of the first teams I think to have
as many ausies as we do roaming around. But when
you look there's a lot of other teams that have
hired the best people and many of those best people
(14:32):
have trained in Australia or grew up in Australia. And
you see the same thing across E p l F one.
We're not the only ones hip to that.
Speaker 1 (14:41):
You know. You got hooked up with the Australian national team.
Was that through Brett Brown because you were in Philadelphia
for a while. If people just the context of your life,
you you you were at Sam Houston State as you mentioned,
and I think that's when you met Sam Hanky, right,
he was down with the with the rockets and eventually
he would go of Philadelphia where we know the process
(15:02):
you know was saying Hanky's baby, and he hired Brett
Brown and you came in and you were a special
assistant with Brett and then and then that continued over
to Kenny and then you went to as we mentioned,
Long Island, Australia, but you were an assistant coach of
the Australian nationale. Brett Brown was the head coach, that's right, right,
But brought was the time he.
Speaker 3 (15:20):
Had just finished before I started, and so he was
handed it off to his assistant coach and our Australian
Federation is a small you know, it's it's not big business.
Speaker 1 (15:32):
He coached the twenty twelve he was in London, that's.
Speaker 3 (15:34):
Right, that was his last major tournament and so from
that he named Sixers head coach in thirteen and sort
of handled the reins over Andre Lamanas, who I served
with for six years. So I was very fortunate to
get to be a part of two World Cups, an
Olympics and an Asia Cup and our good friend Adam
Capborn I worked alongside him for a couple of those tournaments.
Speaker 2 (15:56):
But Brett's life and love for where.
Speaker 3 (16:01):
Basketball can take you was something that I was deeply
connected with him on very early and I pestered him
our whole first year about international basketball and all his
experiences and all his travel. And when our season ended,
I asked him, I said, do you think there's a
chance that I could try to volunteer for one of
these teams as they get ready for the World Cup
in twenty fourteen? And he said, what about Australia, like
(16:22):
they need to help? I don't know if they do it.
They don't. Never had non Australians working for him besides meself,
him and Brian Gordon are the only guys, but they
welcomed me in. I was the only foreigner and.
Speaker 2 (16:35):
At the start it was like, we'll see where it goes.
Speaker 3 (16:37):
And by the end of that tournament six weeks later,
I was scouting half the games and crying in the
locker room when.
Speaker 2 (16:42):
We got beat on a buzzer beater.
Speaker 3 (16:44):
And had never felt such a connection to the spirit
of a team and the pride that they all felt
to represent Australia and to this day being the head
coach for the two games and the Feeble Qualifiers, to
represent Australia as the head coach of the Boomers, albeit
not with the NBA roster, That's the proudest career accomplishment
(17:08):
that I have.
Speaker 1 (17:08):
And then you go down there that you're a head
coach in the Australian League. But you know, you mentioned,
you know the connection with Brett Brown that was a
similar situation to the Kenny Atkinson regime here where with
Brett Brown coming into Philadelphia that was at a low
point with the Sixers and trying to build that up.
These are great training grounds for you, right, I mean,
(17:30):
I'm sure there were a lot of similarities. When you
got to the nets or the first time, as there
were when you got to the Sixers the first time.
Speaker 2 (17:37):
I certainly felt like the pitches were coming a.
Speaker 1 (17:41):
Little bit slower the second time.
Speaker 3 (17:43):
Yeah, you know that some of that is just generalized experience,
but there was also some specific kinds of puzzles that
we were trying to that we partially solved in those
first three years I had with the Sixers that we
were able to deal with here in Brooklyn. The same way,
I'm so lucky that my introduction to the NBA basketball
because I was a high school coach, a college coach,
(18:06):
so I was not indoctrinated, and I didn't know what
I didn't know about the NBA. Uh And so to
have my first four bosses be Brett, Sam, Kenny and Sewn,
You're not going to find a more dedicated, curious, relentless
set of basketball thinkers with the worldliness that those four
(18:31):
guys possess. So I owe those four a great deal.
Speaker 1 (18:35):
You're Sam Houston State after you, So let's go back.
Let's let's let's take a step back and then move
forward to feel old. Because you mentioned a little bit
of your your basketball career or you're a player at
any one point.
Speaker 2 (18:49):
Played in high school. I came to basketball late.
Speaker 1 (18:51):
I know you can play because I've seen you out playing.
Speaker 2 (18:54):
That's generous.
Speaker 3 (18:56):
Yeah, I came to basketball late. I played sports in
Texas all growing up. Of course, that means football not
built Austin. Absolutely, so my my days as an offensive
lineman and tied end were destined.
Speaker 2 (19:11):
Kid.
Speaker 1 (19:12):
Yeah, in grammar school. I mean, what are we talk
about it?
Speaker 2 (19:15):
Exactly?
Speaker 1 (19:15):
Where did you have a growth?
Speaker 2 (19:16):
Start to the end of the novel where we see,
we see where it was this thing is headed.
Speaker 1 (19:20):
But I know what. I know what high school football
is like in Texas.
Speaker 3 (19:23):
So I wasn't I wasn't big, but I was slow.
You had that, you had the double value. So I
certainly grew up loving sport, but I didn't. I didn't
even know that you could have a career in sport
other than as a professional player or something. So it
came to basketball late. Loved my experiences playing and being
on teams in high school, but it wasn't until I
(19:46):
was about to graduate that I even considered coaching. And
that was through a conversation through a mentor where I
was laying out that I didn't know what I wanted
to do, but I.
Speaker 2 (19:54):
Was really eager for it to be good for.
Speaker 3 (19:56):
The world, something I could have a family and be
a good dad and my husband with, and something that
I could compete in because I loved the energy that
competition brought. And I didn't know if that was going
to be political science or public affairs or a nonprofit
or law school or what. But he mentioned coaching. He said,
you love sport, Like, what have you ever thought about that?
(20:17):
And so I ended up spending part of my freshman
year at University of Texas volunteering coaching middle school kids,
and the first week of that made it clear to
me that that's what I was going to do for
the rest of my life.
Speaker 1 (20:28):
It's hard, you know, you mentioned one of the goals
that you had there with having a family, That's not
always probably the easiest thing to do when it comes
to coaching.
Speaker 3 (20:39):
I certainly think that the biggest decision anybody makes in
their life is who their partner is going to be.
And I mailed that one so without.
Speaker 1 (20:50):
Your wife's name, Lauren, Laura. Now, when did you meet Lauren?
Speaker 3 (20:53):
I met her in high school. I invested early. I
was an early round investor and Lauren Incorporated, And yeah,
her positivity and appreciation and always looking on the bright
side fits well within the life of a coaching family.
Speaker 2 (21:11):
But we.
Speaker 3 (21:14):
I think it's really well suited for us. She has
been on a similarly challenging kind of career path.
Speaker 2 (21:19):
She's a child.
Speaker 3 (21:20):
Neurologist that specialized in epilepsy. Dinner training at Columbia Presbyterian
at one sixty fifth and both of us were chasing
really hard things alongside of each other, so we had
real appreciation for the sacrifices that were going to go
into that. We had THEO four and a half years
ago here in New York, and so up until that point,
we've been together a long time, and we knew that
(21:41):
we wanted to be parents, and we knew we wanted
that to sit at the top of our pyramid of
what we wanted to focus on. But because we were
a little older, I think we had were better prepared
for the sacrifices that we're going to go into that.
Speaker 1 (21:55):
Yeah, I mean there's a nomadic existence to coaching. You've
already been. I mean, your son, THEO has already lived
in three continents and he's four, that's right, you know,
So there's a nomadic existence that goes with this. There's
the hours that you put in. They're not conventional kind
of thing. So I guess the fact that you've known
each other, you and Lorn have known each other for
so long you knew what each other were about totally.
(22:17):
This is not a surprise.
Speaker 3 (22:18):
We've been teammates that whole time, and that's how we
think about it and.
Speaker 2 (22:21):
Talk about it. Is what's good for our team, and.
Speaker 3 (22:27):
Jumping from place to place has been amazing for us,
the experiences, the learning, and this decision to come back
to Brooklyn was a really easy one for us, in
part because we had the comfort level and familiarity with
Jack and with Sean and with the Nets itself, but
also because this is the place that we'd love for
(22:49):
THEO to grow up and one of the cities that
we feel the most connected to of all the places
we've traveled.
Speaker 1 (22:57):
Normally, when you think of Texas, you think a certain way,
but Austin is sort of like the Brooklyn of Texas.
I mean, it's a little it's a different thinking there.
Definitely more Nets would be playing in Austin if we just.
Speaker 2 (23:09):
Had gotten Sydney on the schedule. We would have every Paris,
Austin Philly.
Speaker 1 (23:15):
He's going to be tough to work into the.
Speaker 2 (23:17):
I don't think so.
Speaker 3 (23:18):
I've done some research. There's some good flights. I think
you might be able to just do.
Speaker 2 (23:22):
A little quick, little poddle hopper.
Speaker 1 (23:24):
The jet lag it might be an issue later on
for reason, it may come back.
Speaker 2 (23:28):
Feel good about it.
Speaker 1 (23:29):
Yeah, no, I I yeah, I keep getting I have
some people I know in Australia that keep inviting me
out there and I'm like, wow, it's it's me.
Speaker 3 (23:38):
You can do the first road careno experience, all right
on Bondi Beach.
Speaker 1 (23:45):
Bondi Beach. So yeah, I just let's let's this is
like an aside. I like to go off on tangents
because I know that when you left Australia you said
one of the toughest things you had to do is
leave your surfboard. So is that a was that? Were
you a surfer an Austin?
Speaker 2 (24:03):
Hell?
Speaker 1 (24:04):
No, No, you.
Speaker 3 (24:05):
Learn that's one look at the set and you would
quickly be able to identify where the Texan is.
Speaker 1 (24:10):
So that was just a you were joking around about
the serpent.
Speaker 3 (24:14):
Hell I got obsessed. I serve every day of COVID.
I was in the water. Really, this was where in Sydney.
In Sydney, Yeah, after our season, they were there. I
started the I started from scratch and YouTube and got
a coach and went out there and struggled in the
wintertime and learned and just enough to be dangerous me
and all the Brazilian backpackers with twelve facts. You know,
(24:36):
there's Coach Weaver out there with his COVID beard and
looking like a drowned rat. But uh, it is about
a zen a sport.
Speaker 1 (24:46):
It seems to be a spiritual connection.
Speaker 3 (24:47):
That's incredible different, such a different experience up to that point. Truthfully,
the closest I'd been to it was at a mini
camp we hosted where we invited some of the players.
We took a class, so some Red Bull coaches who
taught us. They were you worked with big wig surfers
and real real athletes, and they took us out there
and the coaches had gone first, and then the players
(25:09):
were going to go, and most of the players didn't
want to do it. And the one of the exceptions
was Jared Allen from Round Rock, Texas. And even more,
if it can be more than Austin is certainly spiritually,
it's a pretty landlocked place.
Speaker 2 (25:23):
First wave.
Speaker 1 (25:26):
Jared six '.
Speaker 3 (25:27):
Ten going right like he's Hawaii five O, you know,
a throwback big Fro coming down the lineup like one
of those dudes is an athlete like that cat right there.
Speaker 2 (25:37):
Pretty impressive.
Speaker 1 (25:38):
But there's this spiritual thing you mentioned as zen like
thing about it, and I I think there's a more
holistic thing going on right now when it comes to
player development, when it comes to you know, professional athletes.
You know, we we just saw all this stuff about
you know, Aaron Rodgers going into a darkness retreat. I've
(25:59):
talked to young player like Noah Clowney who talked a
lot about mental health issues. And I know you go
to every arena now in the NBA and there's a
there's a quiet room that they can go to before games.
And I feel like, you know, there's that aspect that
(26:21):
maybe it's been embraced in years past, but I feel
like that's getting a little more at the forefront.
Speaker 2 (26:26):
I'm so lucky to be coaching in this era. I think,
like all of us, you know, there's.
Speaker 1 (26:32):
There's more room for a guy, an open minded guy
from Austin for sure learned how to He taught himself
to serve from Australia. That there's more of a function
now that might have been looked at sideways years ago
in the NBA, but now it's sort of like, well,
we're treating everything holistically and this is a part of
that now.
Speaker 3 (26:48):
Yeah, I think I think those people have always been
in the NBA. Like jacqu Vaughan didn't just wake up
in twenty twenty three as erudite and World League and
like int did curious in the broader world, I think, frankly,
like NBA basketball players have been stereotyped negatively over time.
(27:09):
You know, the whole shut up and dribble stuff is
anathema to how certainly this place operates and the people
that we want to work with and feel like we
can help the most. So I've always been drawn to
those kind of people. And that's part of what made
Jock somebody that I was so eager to work with
(27:29):
again and be a teammate of again.
Speaker 2 (27:31):
Is his.
Speaker 3 (27:34):
Clear eyed, relaxed, organized kind of brilliance. That is a
really incredible set of skills that he's cultivated in his career.
Speaker 1 (27:45):
Man, it's just just such a positive energy totally. You know,
he's just some people are energy givers. I mean energy
giver used erudite and anathema in the last like two minutes,
which goes to why I call you the professor, So
you know this broad range it actually you could see why.
Now you were somebody who was eager to broaden his
(28:09):
horizons by going to Australia, and then from Australia you
end up in France last year coaching as a head coach.
But in between you had the assistant coach spot with
the rockets another I mean they must does the bat
signal go out? Like we're at the lowest of low's,
so let's go find Will Weaver. There Will Weaver bat
(28:30):
signal that goes out?
Speaker 3 (28:31):
I certainly feel like the luck that one has to have.
I'll tell a story about Brett. So when we were
in Philly, Brown, Brett Brown, maybe in the first week
or two, you know, he and I spent a lot
together time together. He said, Willie, we're never gonna get
to do this again, like we are at the top
(28:52):
of pro sport, one of the proud franchises, getting to
build it truly from scratch, Like who gets this chance,
which tells you a lot about him and how he's
wired and why he's so special. It turns out me
like I get that chance over and over eighty times. Yeah,
it's hard for me to know how much of those
experiences are baked into my worldview and how much I
(29:15):
would have been like this regardless. But I think that
if I was handed the keys to a team that
won the champion, I was coaching the Denver Nuggets this season,
I think I would take it the exact same approach,
which is, like, how can we augment our strengths and
(29:35):
mitigate our weaknesses.
Speaker 2 (29:36):
What systems can we put.
Speaker 3 (29:37):
In place to serve our players so that they can
improve and that they can feel ready to perform, And
how can we all fulfill our roles, the players, the coaches,
everybody in a way that we can all be proud
of and that we can enjoy the privilege of getting
to be around a part of the NBA. I truly
(30:00):
come at it from that sort of perspective, with a
lot of the other stuff being details that I think
are more or less interchangeable. You know, the specific play
names and ato's and coverages. They're important, but they pale
in comparison to the ability to scale your process.
Speaker 1 (30:22):
If you were coaching Denver, though, I don't think I
would advise you to change. Just get it to Yokic,
let him, let him go through.
Speaker 3 (30:28):
It turns out players like that. They makes all look
like good coaches.
Speaker 1 (30:33):
You know you mentioned I want to go back to
your days. You you're at Sam Houston State, you meet
Sam Hanky, you know, he goes on. People know Sam
Hanky as the GM in Philly, and the term the
process came out of that. It gets mocked a little bit. Now,
they just had a ton of draft picks and a
lot of them didn't work out for whatever reason. But
(30:57):
it was there. Was it a little simplistic to say
the process was just about let's lose so many games
so that we can get draft picks or yeah, yeah,
what was Yeah?
Speaker 3 (31:06):
I think that the thing that's often a lot of
times lost on people is process was not a word
we used in our office other than to talk about
are we doing things the right way in the hopes
that they give us the best chance to earn whatever
(31:28):
success we have. The only thing I can really speak
to is my experience, which was I learned an immeasurable
amount from Sam and Brett and the way they organize
things and the spirit more importantly that they brought to.
Speaker 2 (31:42):
The people.
Speaker 1 (31:43):
Do you sometimes do you sometimes just get overwhelmed by
a sense of gratitude for these people that you've had
in your life.
Speaker 2 (31:50):
It's all I think about. Yeah, all I think about
are it's how.
Speaker 3 (31:54):
Lucky I am and how I want to spend the
rest of my life around teammates that I can learn from.
Speaker 1 (32:04):
You ended up spending a year in France. We talked
about that last last year. What was what was that?
What did that experience, you know, not only being a
head coach again, but also being in a in a
in a country like France and where basketball is you know,
started to become incredibly and I was it was. There
(32:26):
was a lot of attention this year with Wembin Yama
coming out, but you leave, You went back to the NBA.
Speaker 2 (32:33):
You were close.
Speaker 1 (32:34):
I think that the Thunder considered you for a head
coaching job at one point. But now you leave again.
I mean, you know that has that's a courageous decision
again to leave the NBA and go go to Paris.
Speaker 2 (32:46):
Thank you.
Speaker 3 (32:47):
I didn't think of it in those terms, but I
was very focused on the chance to learn again, not
only basketball, but all the things that come along with
a new country, new continent, a new league, new staff,
and I was really drawn to the ownership. Eric Schwartz
and David Kahn were super clear minded about what they
(33:09):
were trying to do where their team was at the
stage of their franchise, and I love working with people
who have a clear goal in mind and are rational
enough to say, look, we're willing to accept these kinds
of risks. These are risks that we want to stay
away from. So they were in a transition. They had
(33:30):
just started four seasons ago. There was still a new
club with big ambition and I believe that will be
realized very soon to play at the highest level of
European basketball. But they were entering into their first season
of international competition. So in Europe, you play one day
a week in your domestic league and only if you're
(33:50):
selected you get to play an international competition that increases
your games to two.
Speaker 2 (33:54):
Days a week.
Speaker 3 (33:54):
So after coming down to the last game and almost
getting relegated the season before, they were really focused on
not only not getting relegated, but also representing themselves well
in international competition for the first time. So I was
lucky that they identified me as somebody that they were
targeting to come help them, And in the meantime, I'm
(34:16):
the one that benefited because I got to coach some
amazing players that had NBA experience, as well as some
rising stars that will play in the NBA that had
been drafted by Boston and Denver and stashed with them.
Speaker 1 (34:28):
I want to get to Paris in a second. But
you you didn't directly work with the Spurs. But like
we said, you grew up in Austin and you've worked
for all these guys who were from the Spurs tree,
so you don't you don't have the direct experience. You've
got sort of secondhand experienced. But that seems to be
the secret sauce in the NBA. Right Whatever they started there,
(34:49):
it's branched out incredible.
Speaker 3 (34:50):
What do you feel is yeah, yeah, I mean the ingredient,
because that's always the ingredient, But it's how do you
identify those people, how do you train those people? How
do you retain those people? You know, whether it's Sam
Presty or Quinn Snyder or you know, folks that I've
gotten to know over the years that I haven't worked
(35:11):
with for a season. There's a lot of the same
traits that I talked about with Jocked, a curiosity, a
deeply competitive nature. The respect I have for all those
folks is immense. And you know, growing up in Austin,
the Spurs were also basically our pro team, and so
(35:32):
when I worked at the University of Texas, Quinn and
those guys were using our gym for practices sometimes when
their building was busy. So I certainly have a longstanding
love and appreciation for a lot of those people.
Speaker 1 (35:43):
Had a holistic thing, like you know, Greg Popovich is
known for just being so focused on everything in my
life is about basketball, that's right. Yeah, I'm sure that
adventurous spirit helped you out in Paris. What was were
you in Paris coaching? So what was what? What do
they think of basketball in Paris?
Speaker 2 (36:04):
Like?
Speaker 1 (36:05):
Is it is it? Is it? A? Is it a?
Speaker 2 (36:08):
Like?
Speaker 1 (36:08):
Maybe soccer is here.
Speaker 3 (36:10):
It reminded me a lot of what yeah, people think
of basketball in Texas, which is that it sometimes conflicts
with football, albeit a different code of football or spring foketball.
Speaker 1 (36:20):
Now, there's a.
Speaker 3 (36:20):
Super passionate set of fans throughout France for basketball, but
it exists mostly sort of like college towns, and so
you go to Cholet or you know, Graveling, Dunkirk and
you find incredible fan bases that have been going to
games their whole lives and care deeply about those teams.
The cities are oftentimes sort of not thought of as
(36:45):
places for basketball, you know, maybe like la is sometimes stereotyped,
or New York is like they've come late crowds and
you know, there's been.
Speaker 2 (36:54):
That sort of going on.
Speaker 3 (36:55):
There's other things going on, and it's also a place
that doesn't have annuity over decades. People come and live
there for a period of time and may not stay
there for fifty sixty years as often as they do
in these smaller towns. But I found such love for
the sport and such appreciation for where they're where the
sport is going, with the talent and really exciting things
(37:22):
that you see represented by the number of French players.
They're playing at really high levels all over the world.
Speaker 1 (37:28):
So the team is going over there in January, what
is something having spent a year. I know you haven't
spent your lifetime there, but a year and knowing you.
You probably really immersed yourself in Paris and the culture.
What's something that you would want your players when they
(37:49):
go over there to experience.
Speaker 2 (37:53):
That's a great question. It's certainly food related.
Speaker 1 (37:58):
I think they have good French.
Speaker 3 (38:00):
The simple pleasure of a unstructured walk with some croissant,
a coffee, get lost for a minute or two, even
if it's just that brief, that to me is is
quintessentially Parisian. And I know because of this organization and
(38:20):
having done an international trip with them before in Mexico City,
that we will we won't let anybody miss out on
the chance to soak up what it means to get
to represent our entire league in a place like that.
Speaker 1 (38:33):
Yeah, it's a it's a great opportunity for guys to
to experience that and go through that. A couple of
things just before we before we wrap things up here
with you, and I really appreciate you spending the time
with us.
Speaker 2 (38:45):
It's been a real bird enjoyed.
Speaker 1 (38:49):
You're you're a guy from Austin. I always think of
Austin as a music city, So are you a music
fan deeply?
Speaker 2 (38:59):
Yeah? It's a problem.
Speaker 1 (39:00):
Is there is there a specific type? But you. You
would seem to me to be the kind of guy
that would listen to, like, you know, country music as
well as like Brazilian folk music or something like that.
Speaker 3 (39:10):
My tastes are wide. One of the earliest connections Jack
and I had was I think, besides me, he might
have the widest musical taste of any of my colleagues.
But we've already had some great staff conversations about West
Coast hip hop, the Sun City era of record labels,
and what Motown represented and how that culture has spread
(39:35):
all across the world. I'm surrounded on this staff by
audio files, so it's gonna be It's gonna be a
fun year.
Speaker 1 (39:42):
Have you been to Austin City Limits.
Speaker 2 (39:45):
Festival many times?
Speaker 1 (39:46):
What was the best set that you remember? Was the
most fun you had there?
Speaker 3 (39:52):
That's a good question. You know, my brother has written
and produced electronic dance music, and he's exposed me to
a whole world of producers and DJs and performers that
I haven't So I saw bass Nectar there and really
liked that set.
Speaker 1 (40:06):
Base Nectar, I don't know them. Yeah, that's an e
d M. There's time, Okay, we.
Speaker 2 (40:11):
Can dub out on a later date.
Speaker 1 (40:13):
You know, I'm more of a like a Pearl jam
sure even you know a Jason Isbell, Frank Turner, people
like that that. I'm sure all come through Austin.
Speaker 2 (40:24):
And I'm pretty sure Eddie Veder and I would get
along great.
Speaker 1 (40:26):
I feel like there's an Eddie Vedder kind of vibe
from you.
Speaker 2 (40:29):
Thank you.
Speaker 1 (40:30):
Yeah, this is something I see. This is something I
should have known about you being from Austin, that it's
like kind of in your blood music. But now we
can talk about stuff. It's the I want you to
give me stuff, and I'll give you stuff. I'm ready
to Yeah, when when we wrap these things up. I
always talk about Barkley Center has this oculus, you know,
(40:52):
this video board outside right, and if if Will Weaver
was going to be somehow occupying Barkley Center and you
could put something up on that board as sort of
your personal mantra or something you want, a message or
an image, something you'd want to put up there that
(41:12):
represents you. What do you think it might be? Wow?
Speaker 2 (41:16):
A heavy question. I think.
Speaker 3 (41:23):
What I love about New York is that it's a
hard place to live, that it's filled with people who
are all trying to do hard stuff and this is
the only place that they can do it, and so
it's filled with that kind of energy of people that
have chosen to be here and are energetically pursuing things.
(41:48):
And so I think back about the tradition of basketball
in the.
Speaker 2 (41:52):
City and the.
Speaker 3 (41:57):
Way that people play on playgrounds in this region of
the country has reverberated out over time and space and
change the world in meaningful ways. And so rather than
a specific person, I think the image of an outdoor
basketball court in New York in Brooklyn, whether it was
(42:21):
the Cagers you know, many many many years ago, with
the chain on the hundred percent lou Alsender will change,
like all.
Speaker 1 (42:29):
That's kind of the spirit behind the gray floor that
right barkly center right to represent that.
Speaker 3 (42:34):
That a zoomed out picture of that with people surrounding
the court. That to me is New York basketball.
Speaker 1 (42:40):
Yeah, or alternatively, be proud of doing hard stuff. Yeah yeah,
not be afraid of it.
Speaker 2 (42:47):
Good for all of us.
Speaker 1 (42:48):
Yeah, that's been Uh, that kind of sums it up, right.
We've just talked about the whole time. Is you going
into situations that are not easy.
Speaker 3 (42:57):
I've got a five year old that's not in school
right now, waiting on me at home. I'll be plowing
into that hard stuff here pretty quick.
Speaker 1 (43:03):
Yeah yeah, Will Weaver always great to talk to you.
Welcome back to Brooklyn.
Speaker 2 (43:07):
Cheers buddy.
Speaker 1 (43:10):
All right, my thanks to Will Weaver, one of Jacques
Baughn's top assistants this year. I mentioned that Will has
kind of a professorial vibe. I was thinking about that
when I was watching the HBO show Winning Time, which
has abruptly come to an end. It was a fun watch.
(43:33):
It chronicled, you know, the rise of the Lakers, dramatized
the rivalry with the Celtics in the eighties, the rival
between Magic Johnson and Larry Bird, but was canceled after
two seasons, so it never got to tell the whole story.
But one of the stories it did tell early on
(43:53):
there in the early eighties, Magic first got to LA
was Paul west Ed, who had gotten the job and
was trying to put in his system clash with Magic
Johnson ended up being fired even though he had won
a championship with the Lakers. But they called Paul Westead
the professor.
Speaker 2 (44:11):
You know.
Speaker 1 (44:11):
He was fond of quoting the literary giants in the
locker room to his team. There was a famous you know,
magazine cover with him in a classroom with the Lakers,
and they called him the Professor. And eventually, you know,
Paul westad played brilliantly by Jason Siegel. And if you
(44:34):
remember our Jason Collins episode, Jason tells the story about
Jason Siegel was his backup center in his high school.
But Jason Siegele kind of, you know, he looks at
at some point he kind of played it like a
bit of a goof there at the end when he
comes to his Laker tenure. But Paul west Head aka
the Professor, went on to really have incredible success in
(44:58):
college that loyal and Merrimack re membery coach, those Hank
Gathers bo kimball teams that used to you know, play
this fast pace that was unheard of. They would put
up one hundred and forty one hundred and fifty points
in NCAA tournament games against some of the best teams
in the country. But certainly that vibe made me think
(45:21):
of when I was talking about Will Weaver being like
a professor. You'd be on the sidelines with a tweet
jacket and you know, patches on the elbows smoking a pipe.
What was funny though about the way they ended winning
Time is that they knew that they weren't going to
be renewed for a third season. But they'd only gotten
around to the point eighty four when the Lakers lose
(45:42):
to the Celtics, So they had built up this, this
whole story in the drama of the rivalry, and you
never get to see the Lakers win. They add a
shot of Jerry Buss and Jeanie Buss at the end
to kind of because they knew they weren't coming back,
they kind of added a shot at the end of
them laying on the floor at the full and saying,
look what we did, Look what we accomplished. But the
(46:03):
last scene you see of Magic Johnson is he's in
the fetal position in a shower with the water coing
all over him because they just lost to the Celtics
in Game seventh at Boston Garden. And then they kind
of just throw up a graphic at the end that
the Lakers would go on to win, you know, win
the Finals twice over the Celtics, and Larry Bird and
Magic Johnson would become close and all that kind of stuff.
(46:26):
But you never get to see it. Unfortunately, it'd be
kind of like if you if you knew the story
of Rocky Balboa, if it was a real person, and
they and they're then gonna make the Rocky sequels. But
they ended it about three quarters of the way through
Rocky two, Like they get to the point where Rocky
is praying in the chapel at the hospital when Adrian
is giving birth and is in you know, we don't
(46:49):
know if she's gonna make it, if the child's gonna
make it, and we just end it there and we
just put up a graphic that you know, Rocky would
go on to defeat Apollo Creed in the rematch and
all that kind of stuff that happened later. It was
kind of weird. So if you haven't taken the Winning
Time Journey yet, I mean, it was fun. It was
I enjoyed it, and I know, you know, the parts
(47:11):
are they're caricatures. I mean, it's it's a dramedy, but
the way it kind of is cut off at the
end is very disappointing. So I don't know if you
want to take the whole ride if you haven't already
done it. But if you've already done it certainly go
all the way through. Curious to see what's gonna happen
with the Nets coming up. Training camp starts very soon,
about a week from when this is coming out, and
(47:33):
we will have you covered talk about training camp the
upcoming season. Incredibly curious to see what's gonna become of
this Net team this year, and I'm excited about it.
I really like the individuals involved, and I'm really curious
to see where it's going to go. So we're just
getting going here and we will chronicle it all right
here on the Voice of the Nets. And want to
(47:53):
thanks Steve Goldberg, our producer. Thanks to Chelsea Jenkins, our engineer.
I'm Chris Carrino. Thank you so much for subscribing, listening
and giving us a good rating. Really appreciated. Talk to
you again next time right here on the Voice of
the next song.
Hey, what's going on. It's Chris Carino and this is
the Voice of the Nets podcast. Thank you so much
for tuning in subscribing leave its a good rating. Really
appreciate it. We're going to continue to tell the stories
of some NETS staffers who have very interesting basketball journeys
and one of those guys is Will Weaver. Will Weaver
(00:31):
is going to be one of the top assistants for
Jacque Vaughn this year. It's his second, or you could
even say third stint with the Nets, because he started
in twenty sixteen as a special assistant to Kenny Atkinson
and then he left to move over to Long Island
the Long Island Nets, who is the head coach in
(00:51):
the twenty eighteen nineteen season, was Coach of the Year
in the G League. He would then make stops in Sydney, Australia,
ended up with the Houston Rocket staff. He's been an
Australian national team assistant coach. Was in the mixture of
the Okay See job a few years ago. Last year
spent a season as a head coach in Paris. He
(01:12):
is from Austin, Texas. NETS. You're gonna play a game
in Austin Texas this year, They're gonna celebrate Saint Patrick's
Day in Austin in the second half of a difficult
back to back. You're gonna play in Indiana on March sixteenth,
and then in Austin against the Spurs on March seventeenth.
Spurs are playing a number of games home games in
Austin this year. You know, one thing about Austin is
(01:34):
Austin's become sort of a brand name. It's kind of
like Brooklyn. You know, you have an idea of what
Austin's about. It's developed this reputation. A lot of young, artistic, progressive,
creative people are gravitating toward Brooklyn. They're gravitating toward Austin, Texas.
And you know, Austin's a very eclectic city. It has
(01:56):
that slogan, you know, keep Austin weird. It doesn't really
fit the mold of a big city in Texas, but
it's the capital of the state as much the same way.
Austin native Will Weaver, who attended College University of Texas
got his master's in education, met Sam Hanky when he
was working at Sam Houston State. Hanky brought him to Philadelphia,
(02:18):
which started his NBA journey, but Will Weaver doesn't necessarily
fit the mold of your prototypical NBA assistant coach. When
we did the Adam Kporn episode, Will Weaver described what
the next coaching staff and their system was like, and
it describes Will Weaver. His quote was their unselfish, evidence
(02:42):
based modern coaches who enjoy keeping the game fun but
take it very seriously. Will Weaver is an eclectic, interesting person.
You can have a conversation with him about many different things,
and we do here on this pot. But make no
doubt he is an unselfish, evidence based modern coach who
(03:05):
keeps the game fun but takes it very seriously. And
he's got his eye one day on being an NBA
head coach. But he's a perfect example of sometimes the
shortest distance between two points is not necessarily a straight line.
So hope you enjoyed this conversation with one of Jacques
Vaughan's lead assistants going into the twenty three twenty four season.
(03:29):
It is Will Weaver right here on the Voice of
the Nets. It's so great to see you again.
Speaker 2 (03:38):
I feel the same way. It's cool to be back.
Speaker 1 (03:40):
Yeah, your second stint. The first time around. I gotta
admit you kind of were you were this sort of
mysterious character the first time around, right you had you
had a title of you know, special assistant to Kenyackinttson,
the head coach. You know, you look more like a
(04:00):
professor off a campus of University of Texas where I
know you're from. Then then then a basketball coach, and
you were sure it was like it was almost like
a clandestine function that you had. So how would you
describe your, uh, your purpose, your role when you were
first with the Nets under Kenny Atkinson.
Speaker 3 (04:22):
Yeah, not any differently than I'd describe my role now,
which is just trying to help, you know, trying to
assess where I can help the most and provide support
to people that need it, you know, obviously focused on
the players, try to zoom out when it's helpful to
zoom out and.
Speaker 2 (04:41):
Provide a wider view.
Speaker 3 (04:43):
To make sure that we don't get lost in the
weeds that Kenny. You know, at that time, we were
all new and so it took a lot of I
think all of us were so excited to jump in
that we ran the risk of sometimes getting too specific
and losing sight of the forest. For the tree, and
then occasionally, once we identified something zooming in really tight
(05:04):
on that and saying, all right, we need we need
a protocol, we need a system to try to consolidate,
to sharpen, to speed up something that we were doing.
So it vacillates between what's needed, but it's always born
out of the same spirit that we'd preached to our
guys versus like be a teammate, try to help.
Speaker 1 (05:23):
But that was a time where the organization was sort
of had coming off rock bottom. I mean, you were
coming away from the pierced Garnett deal. You came in
and Sean Marx put together this group and you were
bereft of draft picks and bereft of cap space. It
was almost like a build now, tear it down, build
(05:46):
from the ground up. Was it? It seemed to be
a new experience for everybody. So what do you think
made it work?
Speaker 2 (05:55):
The people?
Speaker 1 (05:56):
You know?
Speaker 3 (05:56):
I think Sean Kenny get huge credit for their leadership,
that their attitude was always good. We don't how to
picks good like, we're not incentivized to be bad like.
We're going to try our damnedest to win and win
as soon and as sustainable as we can, but that
(06:17):
they weren't distracted by the context. They were focused on
the next day and stacking up those days. And that's
the only approach that works. You only eat a whale
one by the time, and those guys kept us all
focused on the micro that would turn into the macro.
Speaker 1 (06:35):
Interesting analogy.
Speaker 2 (06:36):
There eat a whale had my touch point. Sure, who
hasn't had a whale?
Speaker 1 (06:42):
Uh No, But there really is nowhere to go but up.
I guess when you were the position that you guys
found yourself in at that point, and sometimes that's do
you find that could you could be a little more creative,
a little more bold because that maybe that pressure isn't
there help not?
Speaker 3 (06:57):
Like I hope for all of us that we savor
the chance to coach at the highest level and be
on each other's journeys for just a short little time.
You know, even in the best case scenario, Jock's been
here a long time, right Like from that moment until now,
he's been run the whole time. And that's a tiny
part of Jock's career in life. And I know that
(07:20):
he looks at it the same way I do, which
is that he savors the chance to get introduced to
work alongside Cheer four build back up again depending on
how things go, because we all know that it's not
going to last for ever, and we're all extremely grateful
to be here and we should be.
Speaker 1 (07:43):
Where you find the organization now as opposed to when
you left, a lot of the work that was done
when you originally hear in that group, I'm sure you
see a lot of that infrastructure that's strong here right now. Definitely,
but they are coming off a time where, you know, listening,
they took a shot with the Superstars. It didn't work out,
(08:06):
but you still find yourself in a pretty good place.
And because I because I hear fans and pundits sort
of refer to what's going on now as more of
an extension of what was going on when you guys
originally came in with Kenny, I don't know you have
you weren't here for that kind of Superstar era, but
do you do you find the organization is a little
(08:29):
more related to when you first got here and the
things that you've built.
Speaker 3 (08:32):
Yeah, I think one of the biggest competitive advantages you
can have is continuity, and that edges compound and stack
over time, and so the biggest edge is people, and
they have a symboled a remarkable set of people, many
of whom have were there when I arrived, and others
(08:52):
who have joined in between. And so I have such
appreciation for the colleagues I'm getting round two with, and
a real excitement to get to learn from all the
folks that either weren't here or were in such different
roles than when I was here last that I'm getting
to benefit from all the wisdom that they've accrued over
this last period of time and hopefully contribute my own,
(09:15):
represented by my gray hairs that I've picked up in
other spots in between.
Speaker 1 (09:19):
Yes, you now, it's almost that you went on a
journey after your original stint with the Nets. We're going
to go back to your beginnings in a little bit,
but since the Nets, you went to Long Island to
be the head coach. So there was a jump, right,
I mean, you were thrown into being a head coach
for the first time. You had always been kind of
(09:40):
a special assistant going back to your days with the
Sixers and the Nets, and then you find yourself as
a head coach with the Long Island Nets. Was that
always your journey that you saw and when you got
the chance to do it, what did you learn about yourself?
Speaker 2 (09:56):
It was always the.
Speaker 3 (10:01):
Goal, But I was lucky that I had incredible mentors
that let me sit next to them, many of whom
were doing it for the first time. So Jason Hooton
at Sam Houston State, Jeff McCrary at St. Andrew's Episcopal
School Brett in Philadelphia, Kenny here, Like I sat next
to all those guys, and they were unselfish enough and
(10:22):
also were self critical enough that I got to observe
unfiltered what it looks like to be a head coach,
and often a head coach in a new situation, a
new league, a new team, at least a new context
than the experience they'd had previously. So I paid attention,
and I felt really confident that I knew who I was,
(10:43):
and I knew the things that I could bring to
the table, and that there were surely things that I
was going to have as weaknesses that needed to be
complimented by the folks I worked with. But even more
than that, I know what NETS culture is about, like
I know what Sean Kenny jock at that time our
ownership that like I knew what we were trying to do.
(11:05):
And so when you have a north Star, you can
lead because you know we we're headed. And so I
felt really confident, particularly in Long Island, that I was
going to be able to help grow what Ron Noraad
and his group had done before and keep it moving forward.
Speaker 1 (11:21):
Yeah, you're coach of the year. Weren't you in the
G League?
Speaker 2 (11:23):
I mean depends on who you ask.
Speaker 1 (11:26):
And had a great season there. And then what called
you to Australia because you went right from the G
League being a head coach for that one year and
now you had a chance to be a head coach?
Was that? The thing that drew to Australia was the adventure?
What was it? All that?
Speaker 2 (11:42):
A bunch of factors. I loved being a head coach.
Speaker 3 (11:44):
I there's so few head coaching jobs available, especially for
somebody that didn't play in the NBA, you know, like,
so I was hugely grateful for the chance to do
it in the G League and I was excited to
continue that. I learned so much being a head coach
in a new league, the G League, having I experienced
that before, so to now double it up and do
(12:05):
it again in a new league and much, not even
mentioning a new continent and you know, all the different
kind of competition.
Speaker 2 (12:12):
Differences.
Speaker 3 (12:14):
I also loved it from that it wasn't comfortable that
it was going to be an adventure for our family.
That my son was born that year when I was
coaching Long Island, when he was born.
Speaker 2 (12:22):
One sixty fifth yep.
Speaker 3 (12:23):
So he's born in New York and for him to
get to experience and appreciate what a big world it
is out there in a place that I was very
familiar with. I coached with the national team for six
years and I loved and loved Australian basketball and the
people there and the spirit of the athletes.
Speaker 2 (12:42):
That grow up in Australia.
Speaker 3 (12:45):
So for a bunch of reasons, I was really excited
to go not a very different place, but a very
different context. It was when now it was a veteran team,
it was a team that was should be and has
been the best team in that league. They've won championships
in the past several seasons, and I like to think
that we laid the foundation for a lot of those
(13:06):
things to happen.
Speaker 1 (13:07):
Yeah, they're a powerhouse right now in the international scene.
How good is the League, the Professional League very good.
Speaker 3 (13:14):
I think people don't fully appreciate what a sporting culture
Australia is and kids grow up surrounded immersed in sport,
and so I've never had more fun coaching than surrounded
by people who are wired from the time they're little
(13:35):
to give it up for the team, to sacrifice to
make tough plays.
Speaker 1 (13:41):
There's a developmental I guess feeling about sports in Australia.
I know we've talked about how there's an Australian accent
or at least that hemisphere in this organization from Sean
Mars with New Zealand and you know, the performance team
has I think about three Australians on it, and there's
there's very much I think that this organization, the Nets
(14:03):
have tapped into that culture for sure. Of so you
were able to see it firsthand the national team and
with the.
Speaker 3 (14:10):
And there's there's been you know, they were so ahead
in sports science that that edge persists and reverberates out
into today. We're not the only lead, you know, we
were one of the first teams I think to have
as many ausies as we do roaming around. But when
you look there's a lot of other teams that have
hired the best people and many of those best people
(14:32):
have trained in Australia or grew up in Australia. And
you see the same thing across E p l F one.
We're not the only ones hip to that.
Speaker 1 (14:41):
You know. You got hooked up with the Australian national team.
Was that through Brett Brown because you were in Philadelphia
for a while. If people just the context of your life,
you you you were at Sam Houston State as you mentioned,
and I think that's when you met Sam Hanky, right,
he was down with the with the rockets and eventually
he would go of Philadelphia where we know the process
(15:02):
you know was saying Hanky's baby, and he hired Brett
Brown and you came in and you were a special
assistant with Brett and then and then that continued over
to Kenny and then you went to as we mentioned,
Long Island, Australia, but you were an assistant coach of
the Australian nationale. Brett Brown was the head coach, that's right, right,
But brought was the time he.
Speaker 3 (15:20):
Had just finished before I started, and so he was
handed it off to his assistant coach and our Australian
Federation is a small you know, it's it's not big business.
Speaker 1 (15:32):
He coached the twenty twelve he was in London, that's.
Speaker 3 (15:34):
Right, that was his last major tournament and so from
that he named Sixers head coach in thirteen and sort
of handled the reins over Andre Lamanas, who I served
with for six years. So I was very fortunate to
get to be a part of two World Cups, an
Olympics and an Asia Cup and our good friend Adam
Capborn I worked alongside him for a couple of those tournaments.
Speaker 2 (15:56):
But Brett's life and love for where.
Speaker 3 (16:01):
Basketball can take you was something that I was deeply
connected with him on very early and I pestered him
our whole first year about international basketball and all his
experiences and all his travel. And when our season ended,
I asked him, I said, do you think there's a
chance that I could try to volunteer for one of
these teams as they get ready for the World Cup
in twenty fourteen? And he said, what about Australia, like
(16:22):
they need to help? I don't know if they do it.
They don't. Never had non Australians working for him besides meself,
him and Brian Gordon are the only guys, but they
welcomed me in. I was the only foreigner and.
Speaker 2 (16:35):
At the start it was like, we'll see where it goes.
Speaker 3 (16:37):
And by the end of that tournament six weeks later,
I was scouting half the games and crying in the
locker room when.
Speaker 2 (16:42):
We got beat on a buzzer beater.
Speaker 3 (16:44):
And had never felt such a connection to the spirit
of a team and the pride that they all felt
to represent Australia and to this day being the head
coach for the two games and the Feeble Qualifiers, to
represent Australia as the head coach of the Boomers, albeit
not with the NBA roster, That's the proudest career accomplishment
(17:08):
that I have.
Speaker 1 (17:08):
And then you go down there that you're a head
coach in the Australian League. But you know, you mentioned,
you know the connection with Brett Brown that was a
similar situation to the Kenny Atkinson regime here where with
Brett Brown coming into Philadelphia that was at a low
point with the Sixers and trying to build that up.
These are great training grounds for you, right, I mean,
(17:30):
I'm sure there were a lot of similarities. When you
got to the nets or the first time, as there
were when you got to the Sixers the first time.
Speaker 2 (17:37):
I certainly felt like the pitches were coming a.
Speaker 1 (17:41):
Little bit slower the second time.
Speaker 3 (17:43):
Yeah, you know that some of that is just generalized experience,
but there was also some specific kinds of puzzles that
we were trying to that we partially solved in those
first three years I had with the Sixers that we
were able to deal with here in Brooklyn. The same way,
I'm so lucky that my introduction to the NBA basketball
because I was a high school coach, a college coach,
(18:06):
so I was not indoctrinated, and I didn't know what
I didn't know about the NBA. Uh And so to
have my first four bosses be Brett, Sam, Kenny and Sewn,
You're not going to find a more dedicated, curious, relentless
set of basketball thinkers with the worldliness that those four
(18:31):
guys possess. So I owe those four a great deal.
Speaker 1 (18:35):
You're Sam Houston State after you, So let's go back.
Let's let's let's take a step back and then move
forward to feel old. Because you mentioned a little bit
of your your basketball career or you're a player at
any one point.
Speaker 2 (18:49):
Played in high school. I came to basketball late.
Speaker 1 (18:51):
I know you can play because I've seen you out playing.
Speaker 2 (18:54):
That's generous.
Speaker 3 (18:56):
Yeah, I came to basketball late. I played sports in
Texas all growing up. Of course, that means football not
built Austin. Absolutely, so my my days as an offensive
lineman and tied end were destined.
Speaker 2 (19:11):
Kid.
Speaker 1 (19:12):
Yeah, in grammar school. I mean, what are we talk
about it?
Speaker 2 (19:15):
Exactly?
Speaker 1 (19:15):
Where did you have a growth?
Speaker 2 (19:16):
Start to the end of the novel where we see,
we see where it was this thing is headed.
Speaker 1 (19:20):
But I know what. I know what high school football
is like in Texas.
Speaker 3 (19:23):
So I wasn't I wasn't big, but I was slow.
You had that, you had the double value. So I
certainly grew up loving sport, but I didn't. I didn't
even know that you could have a career in sport
other than as a professional player or something. So it
came to basketball late. Loved my experiences playing and being
on teams in high school, but it wasn't until I
(19:46):
was about to graduate that I even considered coaching. And
that was through a conversation through a mentor where I
was laying out that I didn't know what I wanted
to do, but I.
Speaker 2 (19:54):
Was really eager for it to be good for.
Speaker 3 (19:56):
The world, something I could have a family and be
a good dad and my husband with, and something that
I could compete in because I loved the energy that
competition brought. And I didn't know if that was going
to be political science or public affairs or a nonprofit
or law school or what. But he mentioned coaching. He said,
you love sport, Like, what have you ever thought about that?
(20:17):
And so I ended up spending part of my freshman
year at University of Texas volunteering coaching middle school kids,
and the first week of that made it clear to
me that that's what I was going to do for
the rest of my life.
Speaker 1 (20:28):
It's hard, you know, you mentioned one of the goals
that you had there with having a family, That's not
always probably the easiest thing to do when it comes
to coaching.
Speaker 3 (20:39):
I certainly think that the biggest decision anybody makes in
their life is who their partner is going to be.
And I mailed that one so without.
Speaker 1 (20:50):
Your wife's name, Lauren, Laura. Now, when did you meet Lauren?
Speaker 3 (20:53):
I met her in high school. I invested early. I
was an early round investor and Lauren Incorporated, And yeah,
her positivity and appreciation and always looking on the bright
side fits well within the life of a coaching family.
Speaker 2 (21:11):
But we.
Speaker 3 (21:14):
I think it's really well suited for us. She has
been on a similarly challenging kind of career path.
Speaker 2 (21:19):
She's a child.
Speaker 3 (21:20):
Neurologist that specialized in epilepsy. Dinner training at Columbia Presbyterian
at one sixty fifth and both of us were chasing
really hard things alongside of each other, so we had
real appreciation for the sacrifices that were going to go
into that. We had THEO four and a half years
ago here in New York, and so up until that point,
we've been together a long time, and we knew that
(21:41):
we wanted to be parents, and we knew we wanted
that to sit at the top of our pyramid of
what we wanted to focus on. But because we were
a little older, I think we had were better prepared
for the sacrifices that we're going to go into that.
Speaker 1 (21:55):
Yeah, I mean there's a nomadic existence to coaching. You've
already been. I mean, your son, THEO has already lived
in three continents and he's four, that's right, you know,
So there's a nomadic existence that goes with this. There's
the hours that you put in. They're not conventional kind
of thing. So I guess the fact that you've known
each other, you and Lorn have known each other for
so long you knew what each other were about totally.
(22:17):
This is not a surprise.
Speaker 3 (22:18):
We've been teammates that whole time, and that's how we
think about it and.
Speaker 2 (22:21):
Talk about it. Is what's good for our team, and.
Speaker 3 (22:27):
Jumping from place to place has been amazing for us,
the experiences, the learning, and this decision to come back
to Brooklyn was a really easy one for us, in
part because we had the comfort level and familiarity with
Jack and with Sean and with the Nets itself, but
also because this is the place that we'd love for
(22:49):
THEO to grow up and one of the cities that
we feel the most connected to of all the places
we've traveled.
Speaker 1 (22:57):
Normally, when you think of Texas, you think a certain way,
but Austin is sort of like the Brooklyn of Texas.
I mean, it's a little it's a different thinking there.
Definitely more Nets would be playing in Austin if we just.
Speaker 2 (23:09):
Had gotten Sydney on the schedule. We would have every Paris,
Austin Philly.
Speaker 1 (23:15):
He's going to be tough to work into the.
Speaker 2 (23:17):
I don't think so.
Speaker 3 (23:18):
I've done some research. There's some good flights. I think
you might be able to just do.
Speaker 2 (23:22):
A little quick, little poddle hopper.
Speaker 1 (23:24):
The jet lag it might be an issue later on
for reason, it may come back.
Speaker 2 (23:28):
Feel good about it.
Speaker 1 (23:29):
Yeah, no, I I yeah, I keep getting I have
some people I know in Australia that keep inviting me
out there and I'm like, wow, it's it's me.
Speaker 3 (23:38):
You can do the first road careno experience, all right
on Bondi Beach.
Speaker 1 (23:45):
Bondi Beach. So yeah, I just let's let's this is
like an aside. I like to go off on tangents
because I know that when you left Australia you said
one of the toughest things you had to do is
leave your surfboard. So is that a was that? Were
you a surfer an Austin?
Speaker 2 (24:03):
Hell?
Speaker 1 (24:04):
No, No, you.
Speaker 3 (24:05):
Learn that's one look at the set and you would
quickly be able to identify where the Texan is.
Speaker 1 (24:10):
So that was just a you were joking around about
the serpent.
Speaker 3 (24:14):
Hell I got obsessed. I serve every day of COVID.
I was in the water. Really, this was where in Sydney.
In Sydney, Yeah, after our season, they were there. I
started the I started from scratch and YouTube and got
a coach and went out there and struggled in the
wintertime and learned and just enough to be dangerous me
and all the Brazilian backpackers with twelve facts. You know,
(24:36):
there's Coach Weaver out there with his COVID beard and
looking like a drowned rat. But uh, it is about
a zen a sport.
Speaker 1 (24:46):
It seems to be a spiritual connection.
Speaker 3 (24:47):
That's incredible different, such a different experience up to that point. Truthfully,
the closest I'd been to it was at a mini
camp we hosted where we invited some of the players.
We took a class, so some Red Bull coaches who
taught us. They were you worked with big wig surfers
and real real athletes, and they took us out there
and the coaches had gone first, and then the players
(25:09):
were going to go, and most of the players didn't
want to do it. And the one of the exceptions
was Jared Allen from Round Rock, Texas. And even more,
if it can be more than Austin is certainly spiritually,
it's a pretty landlocked place.
Speaker 2 (25:23):
First wave.
Speaker 1 (25:26):
Jared six '.
Speaker 3 (25:27):
Ten going right like he's Hawaii five O, you know,
a throwback big Fro coming down the lineup like one
of those dudes is an athlete like that cat right there.
Speaker 2 (25:37):
Pretty impressive.
Speaker 1 (25:38):
But there's this spiritual thing you mentioned as zen like
thing about it, and I I think there's a more
holistic thing going on right now when it comes to
player development, when it comes to you know, professional athletes.
You know, we we just saw all this stuff about
you know, Aaron Rodgers going into a darkness retreat. I've
(25:59):
talked to young player like Noah Clowney who talked a
lot about mental health issues. And I know you go
to every arena now in the NBA and there's a
there's a quiet room that they can go to before games.
And I feel like, you know, there's that aspect that
(26:21):
maybe it's been embraced in years past, but I feel
like that's getting a little more at the forefront.
Speaker 2 (26:26):
I'm so lucky to be coaching in this era. I think,
like all of us, you know, there's.
Speaker 1 (26:32):
There's more room for a guy, an open minded guy
from Austin for sure learned how to He taught himself
to serve from Australia. That there's more of a function
now that might have been looked at sideways years ago
in the NBA, but now it's sort of like, well,
we're treating everything holistically and this is a part of
that now.
Speaker 3 (26:48):
Yeah, I think I think those people have always been
in the NBA. Like jacqu Vaughan didn't just wake up
in twenty twenty three as erudite and World League and
like int did curious in the broader world, I think, frankly,
like NBA basketball players have been stereotyped negatively over time.
(27:09):
You know, the whole shut up and dribble stuff is
anathema to how certainly this place operates and the people
that we want to work with and feel like we
can help the most. So I've always been drawn to
those kind of people. And that's part of what made
Jock somebody that I was so eager to work with
(27:29):
again and be a teammate of again.
Speaker 2 (27:31):
Is his.
Speaker 3 (27:34):
Clear eyed, relaxed, organized kind of brilliance. That is a
really incredible set of skills that he's cultivated in his career.
Speaker 1 (27:45):
Man, it's just just such a positive energy totally. You know,
he's just some people are energy givers. I mean energy
giver used erudite and anathema in the last like two minutes,
which goes to why I call you the professor, So
you know this broad range it actually you could see why.
Now you were somebody who was eager to broaden his
(28:09):
horizons by going to Australia, and then from Australia you
end up in France last year coaching as a head coach.
But in between you had the assistant coach spot with
the rockets another I mean they must does the bat
signal go out? Like we're at the lowest of low's,
so let's go find Will Weaver. There Will Weaver bat
(28:30):
signal that goes out?
Speaker 3 (28:31):
I certainly feel like the luck that one has to have.
I'll tell a story about Brett. So when we were
in Philly, Brown, Brett Brown, maybe in the first week
or two, you know, he and I spent a lot
together time together. He said, Willie, we're never gonna get
to do this again, like we are at the top
(28:52):
of pro sport, one of the proud franchises, getting to
build it truly from scratch, Like who gets this chance,
which tells you a lot about him and how he's
wired and why he's so special. It turns out me
like I get that chance over and over eighty times. Yeah,
it's hard for me to know how much of those
experiences are baked into my worldview and how much I
(29:15):
would have been like this regardless. But I think that
if I was handed the keys to a team that
won the champion, I was coaching the Denver Nuggets this season,
I think I would take it the exact same approach,
which is, like, how can we augment our strengths and
(29:35):
mitigate our weaknesses.
Speaker 2 (29:36):
What systems can we put.
Speaker 3 (29:37):
In place to serve our players so that they can
improve and that they can feel ready to perform, And
how can we all fulfill our roles, the players, the coaches,
everybody in a way that we can all be proud
of and that we can enjoy the privilege of getting
to be around a part of the NBA. I truly
(30:00):
come at it from that sort of perspective, with a
lot of the other stuff being details that I think
are more or less interchangeable. You know, the specific play
names and ato's and coverages. They're important, but they pale
in comparison to the ability to scale your process.
Speaker 1 (30:22):
If you were coaching Denver, though, I don't think I
would advise you to change. Just get it to Yokic,
let him, let him go through.
Speaker 3 (30:28):
It turns out players like that. They makes all look
like good coaches.
Speaker 1 (30:33):
You know you mentioned I want to go back to
your days. You you're at Sam Houston State, you meet
Sam Hanky, you know, he goes on. People know Sam
Hanky as the GM in Philly, and the term the
process came out of that. It gets mocked a little bit. Now,
they just had a ton of draft picks and a
lot of them didn't work out for whatever reason. But
(30:57):
it was there. Was it a little simplistic to say
the process was just about let's lose so many games
so that we can get draft picks or yeah, yeah,
what was Yeah?
Speaker 3 (31:06):
I think that the thing that's often a lot of
times lost on people is process was not a word
we used in our office other than to talk about
are we doing things the right way in the hopes
that they give us the best chance to earn whatever
(31:28):
success we have. The only thing I can really speak
to is my experience, which was I learned an immeasurable
amount from Sam and Brett and the way they organize
things and the spirit more importantly that they brought to.
Speaker 2 (31:42):
The people.
Speaker 1 (31:43):
Do you sometimes do you sometimes just get overwhelmed by
a sense of gratitude for these people that you've had
in your life.
Speaker 2 (31:50):
It's all I think about. Yeah, all I think about
are it's how.
Speaker 3 (31:54):
Lucky I am and how I want to spend the
rest of my life around teammates that I can learn from.
Speaker 1 (32:04):
You ended up spending a year in France. We talked
about that last last year. What was what was that?
What did that experience, you know, not only being a
head coach again, but also being in a in a
in a country like France and where basketball is you know,
started to become incredibly and I was it was. There
(32:26):
was a lot of attention this year with Wembin Yama
coming out, but you leave, You went back to the NBA.
Speaker 2 (32:33):
You were close.
Speaker 1 (32:34):
I think that the Thunder considered you for a head
coaching job at one point. But now you leave again.
I mean, you know that has that's a courageous decision
again to leave the NBA and go go to Paris.
Speaker 2 (32:46):
Thank you.
Speaker 3 (32:47):
I didn't think of it in those terms, but I
was very focused on the chance to learn again, not
only basketball, but all the things that come along with
a new country, new continent, a new league, new staff,
and I was really drawn to the ownership. Eric Schwartz
and David Kahn were super clear minded about what they
(33:09):
were trying to do where their team was at the
stage of their franchise, and I love working with people
who have a clear goal in mind and are rational
enough to say, look, we're willing to accept these kinds
of risks. These are risks that we want to stay
away from. So they were in a transition. They had
(33:30):
just started four seasons ago. There was still a new
club with big ambition and I believe that will be
realized very soon to play at the highest level of
European basketball. But they were entering into their first season
of international competition. So in Europe, you play one day
a week in your domestic league and only if you're
(33:50):
selected you get to play an international competition that increases
your games to two.
Speaker 2 (33:54):
Days a week.
Speaker 3 (33:54):
So after coming down to the last game and almost
getting relegated the season before, they were really focused on
not only not getting relegated, but also representing themselves well
in international competition for the first time. So I was
lucky that they identified me as somebody that they were
targeting to come help them, And in the meantime, I'm
(34:16):
the one that benefited because I got to coach some
amazing players that had NBA experience, as well as some
rising stars that will play in the NBA that had
been drafted by Boston and Denver and stashed with them.
Speaker 1 (34:28):
I want to get to Paris in a second. But
you you didn't directly work with the Spurs. But like
we said, you grew up in Austin and you've worked
for all these guys who were from the Spurs tree,
so you don't you don't have the direct experience. You've
got sort of secondhand experienced. But that seems to be
the secret sauce in the NBA. Right Whatever they started there,
(34:49):
it's branched out incredible.
Speaker 3 (34:50):
What do you feel is yeah, yeah, I mean the ingredient,
because that's always the ingredient, But it's how do you
identify those people, how do you train those people? How
do you retain those people? You know, whether it's Sam
Presty or Quinn Snyder or you know, folks that I've
gotten to know over the years that I haven't worked
(35:11):
with for a season. There's a lot of the same
traits that I talked about with Jocked, a curiosity, a
deeply competitive nature. The respect I have for all those
folks is immense. And you know, growing up in Austin,
the Spurs were also basically our pro team, and so
(35:32):
when I worked at the University of Texas, Quinn and
those guys were using our gym for practices sometimes when
their building was busy. So I certainly have a longstanding
love and appreciation for a lot of those people.
Speaker 1 (35:43):
Had a holistic thing, like you know, Greg Popovich is
known for just being so focused on everything in my
life is about basketball, that's right. Yeah, I'm sure that
adventurous spirit helped you out in Paris. What was were
you in Paris coaching? So what was what? What do
they think of basketball in Paris?
Speaker 2 (36:04):
Like?
Speaker 1 (36:05):
Is it is it? Is it? A? Is it a?
Speaker 2 (36:08):
Like?
Speaker 1 (36:08):
Maybe soccer is here.
Speaker 3 (36:10):
It reminded me a lot of what yeah, people think
of basketball in Texas, which is that it sometimes conflicts
with football, albeit a different code of football or spring foketball.
Speaker 1 (36:20):
Now, there's a.
Speaker 3 (36:20):
Super passionate set of fans throughout France for basketball, but
it exists mostly sort of like college towns, and so
you go to Cholet or you know, Graveling, Dunkirk and
you find incredible fan bases that have been going to
games their whole lives and care deeply about those teams.
The cities are oftentimes sort of not thought of as
(36:45):
places for basketball, you know, maybe like la is sometimes stereotyped,
or New York is like they've come late crowds and
you know, there's been.
Speaker 2 (36:54):
That sort of going on.
Speaker 3 (36:55):
There's other things going on, and it's also a place
that doesn't have annuity over decades. People come and live
there for a period of time and may not stay
there for fifty sixty years as often as they do
in these smaller towns. But I found such love for
the sport and such appreciation for where they're where the
sport is going, with the talent and really exciting things
(37:22):
that you see represented by the number of French players.
They're playing at really high levels all over the world.
Speaker 1 (37:28):
So the team is going over there in January, what
is something having spent a year. I know you haven't
spent your lifetime there, but a year and knowing you.
You probably really immersed yourself in Paris and the culture.
What's something that you would want your players when they
(37:49):
go over there to experience.
Speaker 2 (37:53):
That's a great question. It's certainly food related.
Speaker 1 (37:58):
I think they have good French.
Speaker 3 (38:00):
The simple pleasure of a unstructured walk with some croissant,
a coffee, get lost for a minute or two, even
if it's just that brief, that to me is is
quintessentially Parisian. And I know because of this organization and
(38:20):
having done an international trip with them before in Mexico City,
that we will we won't let anybody miss out on
the chance to soak up what it means to get
to represent our entire league in a place like that.
Speaker 1 (38:33):
Yeah, it's a it's a great opportunity for guys to
to experience that and go through that. A couple of
things just before we before we wrap things up here
with you, and I really appreciate you spending the time
with us.
Speaker 2 (38:45):
It's been a real bird enjoyed.
Speaker 1 (38:49):
You're you're a guy from Austin. I always think of
Austin as a music city, So are you a music
fan deeply?
Speaker 2 (38:59):
Yeah? It's a problem.
Speaker 1 (39:00):
Is there is there a specific type? But you. You
would seem to me to be the kind of guy
that would listen to, like, you know, country music as
well as like Brazilian folk music or something like that.
Speaker 3 (39:10):
My tastes are wide. One of the earliest connections Jack
and I had was I think, besides me, he might
have the widest musical taste of any of my colleagues.
But we've already had some great staff conversations about West
Coast hip hop, the Sun City era of record labels,
and what Motown represented and how that culture has spread
(39:35):
all across the world. I'm surrounded on this staff by
audio files, so it's gonna be It's gonna be a
fun year.
Speaker 1 (39:42):
Have you been to Austin City Limits.
Speaker 2 (39:45):
Festival many times?
Speaker 1 (39:46):
What was the best set that you remember? Was the
most fun you had there?
Speaker 3 (39:52):
That's a good question. You know, my brother has written
and produced electronic dance music, and he's exposed me to
a whole world of producers and DJs and performers that
I haven't So I saw bass Nectar there and really
liked that set.
Speaker 1 (40:06):
Base Nectar, I don't know them. Yeah, that's an e
d M. There's time, Okay, we.
Speaker 2 (40:11):
Can dub out on a later date.
Speaker 1 (40:13):
You know, I'm more of a like a Pearl jam
sure even you know a Jason Isbell, Frank Turner, people
like that that. I'm sure all come through Austin.
Speaker 2 (40:24):
And I'm pretty sure Eddie Veder and I would get
along great.
Speaker 1 (40:26):
I feel like there's an Eddie Vedder kind of vibe
from you.
Speaker 2 (40:29):
Thank you.
Speaker 1 (40:30):
Yeah, this is something I see. This is something I
should have known about you being from Austin, that it's
like kind of in your blood music. But now we
can talk about stuff. It's the I want you to
give me stuff, and I'll give you stuff. I'm ready
to Yeah, when when we wrap these things up. I
always talk about Barkley Center has this oculus, you know,
(40:52):
this video board outside right, and if if Will Weaver
was going to be somehow occupying Barkley Center and you
could put something up on that board as sort of
your personal mantra or something you want, a message or
an image, something you'd want to put up there that
(41:12):
represents you. What do you think it might be? Wow?
Speaker 2 (41:16):
A heavy question. I think.
Speaker 3 (41:23):
What I love about New York is that it's a
hard place to live, that it's filled with people who
are all trying to do hard stuff and this is
the only place that they can do it, and so
it's filled with that kind of energy of people that
have chosen to be here and are energetically pursuing things.
(41:48):
And so I think back about the tradition of basketball
in the.
Speaker 2 (41:52):
City and the.
Speaker 3 (41:57):
Way that people play on playgrounds in this region of
the country has reverberated out over time and space and
change the world in meaningful ways. And so rather than
a specific person, I think the image of an outdoor
basketball court in New York in Brooklyn, whether it was
(42:21):
the Cagers you know, many many many years ago, with
the chain on the hundred percent lou Alsender will change,
like all.
Speaker 1 (42:29):
That's kind of the spirit behind the gray floor that
right barkly center right to represent that.
Speaker 3 (42:34):
That a zoomed out picture of that with people surrounding
the court. That to me is New York basketball.
Speaker 1 (42:40):
Yeah, or alternatively, be proud of doing hard stuff. Yeah yeah,
not be afraid of it.
Speaker 2 (42:47):
Good for all of us.
Speaker 1 (42:48):
Yeah, that's been Uh, that kind of sums it up, right.
We've just talked about the whole time. Is you going
into situations that are not easy.
Speaker 3 (42:57):
I've got a five year old that's not in school
right now, waiting on me at home. I'll be plowing
into that hard stuff here pretty quick.
Speaker 1 (43:03):
Yeah yeah, Will Weaver always great to talk to you.
Welcome back to Brooklyn.
Speaker 2 (43:07):
Cheers buddy.
Speaker 1 (43:10):
All right, my thanks to Will Weaver, one of Jacques
Baughn's top assistants this year. I mentioned that Will has
kind of a professorial vibe. I was thinking about that
when I was watching the HBO show Winning Time, which
has abruptly come to an end. It was a fun watch.
(43:33):
It chronicled, you know, the rise of the Lakers, dramatized
the rivalry with the Celtics in the eighties, the rival
between Magic Johnson and Larry Bird, but was canceled after
two seasons, so it never got to tell the whole story.
But one of the stories it did tell early on
(43:53):
there in the early eighties, Magic first got to LA
was Paul west Ed, who had gotten the job and
was trying to put in his system clash with Magic
Johnson ended up being fired even though he had won
a championship with the Lakers. But they called Paul Westead
the professor.
Speaker 2 (44:11):
You know.
Speaker 1 (44:11):
He was fond of quoting the literary giants in the
locker room to his team. There was a famous you know,
magazine cover with him in a classroom with the Lakers,
and they called him the Professor. And eventually, you know,
Paul westad played brilliantly by Jason Siegel. And if you
(44:34):
remember our Jason Collins episode, Jason tells the story about
Jason Siegel was his backup center in his high school.
But Jason Siegele kind of, you know, he looks at
at some point he kind of played it like a
bit of a goof there at the end when he
comes to his Laker tenure. But Paul west Head aka
the Professor, went on to really have incredible success in
(44:58):
college that loyal and Merrimack re membery coach, those Hank
Gathers bo kimball teams that used to you know, play
this fast pace that was unheard of. They would put
up one hundred and forty one hundred and fifty points
in NCAA tournament games against some of the best teams
in the country. But certainly that vibe made me think
(45:21):
of when I was talking about Will Weaver being like
a professor. You'd be on the sidelines with a tweet
jacket and you know, patches on the elbows smoking a pipe.
What was funny though about the way they ended winning
Time is that they knew that they weren't going to
be renewed for a third season. But they'd only gotten
around to the point eighty four when the Lakers lose
(45:42):
to the Celtics, So they had built up this, this
whole story in the drama of the rivalry, and you
never get to see the Lakers win. They add a
shot of Jerry Buss and Jeanie Buss at the end
to kind of because they knew they weren't coming back,
they kind of added a shot at the end of
them laying on the floor at the full and saying,
look what we did, Look what we accomplished. But the
(46:03):
last scene you see of Magic Johnson is he's in
the fetal position in a shower with the water coing
all over him because they just lost to the Celtics
in Game seventh at Boston Garden. And then they kind
of just throw up a graphic at the end that
the Lakers would go on to win, you know, win
the Finals twice over the Celtics, and Larry Bird and
Magic Johnson would become close and all that kind of stuff.
(46:26):
But you never get to see it. Unfortunately, it'd be
kind of like if you if you knew the story
of Rocky Balboa, if it was a real person, and
they and they're then gonna make the Rocky sequels. But
they ended it about three quarters of the way through
Rocky two, Like they get to the point where Rocky
is praying in the chapel at the hospital when Adrian
is giving birth and is in you know, we don't
(46:49):
know if she's gonna make it, if the child's gonna
make it, and we just end it there and we
just put up a graphic that you know, Rocky would
go on to defeat Apollo Creed in the rematch and
all that kind of stuff that happened later. It was
kind of weird. So if you haven't taken the Winning
Time Journey yet, I mean, it was fun. It was
I enjoyed it, and I know, you know, the parts
(47:11):
are they're caricatures. I mean, it's it's a dramedy, but
the way it kind of is cut off at the
end is very disappointing. So I don't know if you
want to take the whole ride if you haven't already
done it. But if you've already done it certainly go
all the way through. Curious to see what's gonna happen
with the Nets coming up. Training camp starts very soon,
about a week from when this is coming out, and
(47:33):
we will have you covered talk about training camp the
upcoming season. Incredibly curious to see what's gonna become of
this Net team this year, and I'm excited about it.
I really like the individuals involved, and I'm really curious
to see where it's going to go. So we're just
getting going here and we will chronicle it all right
here on the Voice of the Nets. And want to
(47:53):
thanks Steve Goldberg, our producer. Thanks to Chelsea Jenkins, our engineer.
I'm Chris Carrino. Thank you so much for subscribing, listening
and giving us a good rating. Really appreciated. Talk to
you again next time right here on the Voice of
the next song.