The Golden State Warriors will lose former interim head coach and top assistant Luke Walton at the conclusion of the 2016 NBA Playoffs.
Walton’s focus after this run will be on to rebuild the Los Angeles Lakers after accepting the team’s head coaching job earlier this month.
It’s the second consecutive year that Warriors head coach Steve Kerr has lost a top assistant to a promotion. Alvin Gentry moved on from Golden State to the New Orleans Pelicans last spring.
While this definitely tells us a story of a coaching staff that’s respected around the Association, it’s not going to come without a bit of a shake up in Oakland.
In this, Kerr is already looking to replace Walton even before the team’s season has come to a conclusion.
Sources: Charlotte's Stephen Silas is flying to Oklahoma City to meet with Steve Kerr on Monday for Golden State's top assistant's job.
— Adrian Wojnarowski (@wojespn) May 22, 2016
Golden State received permission from the Charlotte Hornets to interview Stephen Silas over the weekend in hopes of nabbing him up before the Houston Rockets can offer the veteran assistant their head coaching job.
While most would conclude that a head coaching position in Houston is an upgrade over serving as an assistant in Oakland, there are more layers to this.
If Silas proves himself worthy as Kerr’s top assistant next season, he could have his pick of the litter in choosing a head coaching job following the 2016-17 campaign. We saw this with both Gentry and Walton over the past 13 months.
Silas began his coaching career with the Charlotte/New Orleans Hornets back in 2000. Since then, he’s served as an assistant for the Cleveland Cavaliers, Washington Wizards, Warriors and Hornets.
It would be a pretty big coup for the Warriors to grab a coach that’s one of the hottest commodities around the NBA.
If Silas were to take the Rockets job instead, there would still be some solid options for the Warriors.
That list would likely be head by former Cleveland Cavaliers coach David Blatt, who was close to joining Kerr’s staff prior to taking the job in Cleveland back in 2014.