Jerry West: 'I’ve never seen a better coach' than the Spurs' Gregg Popovich
Gregg Popovich has five NBA titles and six Western Conference titles since 1999, all with Tim Duncan on the team. (Brendan Smialowski/Getty Images)
Hall of Famer Jerry West, the man the NBA "logo" is modeled after, said on Wednesday's Colin Cowherd Show on ESPN that longtime Spurs head coach Gregg Popovich is the best he's ever seen.
The 76-year-old West, a 14-time All-Star who won an NBA championship as a player with the Lakers and another four as an executive, said Popovich does "less with more" -- likely meaning to say "more with less" -- and he praised San Antonio's recruiting and draft programs.
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“I’ve never seen a better coach than Gregg Popovich. He does less with more. But having said that, when he gets less, he develops it into something really good. They have a great development program down there.
“For a coach coming into this league, if they don’t hire people who are really competent, to take these young kids who haven’t made it somewhere but have talent and build a system they can prosper in, but more importantly to get these kids shoot the ball. When they got Kawhi Leonard, he was not a shooter. It tells you the significance of what they’ve done internally to improve their team.”
Popovich has been a coach with the Spurs for nearly 30 years, joining fellow Hall of Fame coach Larry Brown as an assistant coach with the team in 1986. Popovich later became head coach of the Spurs in 1996. He has five titles on his resume, winning all five during with Tim Duncan from 1999-2014. He is also a three-time NBA coach of the year, has coached the Western Conference All-Stars three times and led the Spurs to six Western Conference finals dating back to the first ring he and Duncan won in 1999.
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