Jason Kidd Ranked Disrespectfully Low Among NBA Head Coaches

Kidd may not be the best coach in the NBA but he's better than this

Mar 17, 2024; Dallas, Texas, USA; Dallas Mavericks head coach Jason Kidd reacts during the second quarter against the Denver Nuggets at American Airlines Center. Mandatory Credit: Kevin Jairaj-Imagn Images / Kevin Jairaj-Imagn Images

While Dallas Mavericks fans haven't always been pleased with their current head coach, Jason Kidd has established himself as one of the better NBA head coaches. In three seasons in Dallas, he's led the Mavs to two Western Conference Finals appearances, including advancing to The Finals this past season. While some may hold his stints with the Milwaukee Bucks and Brooklyn Nets against him, he's evolved as a coach since then. Not everyone agrees, though.

CBS has released its ranking of active NBA coaches, putting each coach in one of nine different tiers. They said they based their rankings on track record, player development, performance against expectations, people management, and more.

Starting at the top in his own tier is Miami's Erik Spoelstra, which makes sense. Tier Two included Nick Nurse, Rick Carlisle, Steve Kerr, and Ty Lue. An argument can be made that Carlisle isn't the third-best NBA coach today, considering he just won a playoff series for the first time since the 2011 Championship this season.

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It's not until the sixth tier that Kidd appears, clocking in at 18th, placed in the same tier as Denver's Michael Malone, Atlanta's Quin Snyder, and Memphis' Taylor Jenkins. Malone and Kidd should be in the top 10, but they used some of those spots for Utah's Will Hardy (who is a great coach but hasn't made the playoffs yet), Phoenix's Mike Budenholzer (who was fired from the Bucks two years after winning a championship), and Sacramento's Mike Brown (a consistent playoff underachiever as LeBron James' head coach in the late 2000s in Cleveland).

The NBA is filled with great coaches now, arguably the most well-coached the NBA has ever been. To put Malone, who just won an NBA Championship two seasons ago in Denver and got great play out of DeMarcus Cousins in Sacramento, and Kidd below some unproven coaches is mind-boggling.

in their reasoning for Kidd's placement, CBS said, "Kidd appears to be the right coach for Dallas right now. He doesn't get in Doncic's way, and he's gotten far better at scheming up defenses, mixing in more traditional coverages with the more out-there concepts he ran in Milwaukee. But his track record remains too spotty for an especially high rank." It seems Malone and Kidd are being punished for having generational superstars in Nikola Jokic and Luka Doncic, while Steve Kerr, who has caught a lot of flack for his rotation management in recent years, is still in the Top 5.

Kidd may not be the greatest coach or even in the top five, but he's certainly better than 18th. Two of the three coaches ranked directly behind him are Kenny Atkinson and Willie Green. He's, respectfully, not in the same conversation as those coaches right now.

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