Laimbeer Needs To Take His Coaching Career To The Next Level

I don't know that it's ever happened before, but it should.

Has a coach ever been "promoted" directly from the WNBA to the NBA?

I'm not sure what Bill Laimbeer's motivation is. I think it's admirable that he toils in the WNBA, coaching the Detroit Shock -- two league titles so far and maybe a third on the horizon. He seems to be, at least in the world of women's professional basketball, a master motivator. He's not shy to light into his players publicly -- not that THAT'S a good idea with NBA players.

Laimbeer has his ladies cruising again after a rocky period in June. The Shock have won 11 of 12, and not coincidentally, the hot streak came after another dose of brutal honesty to the media types. He benched his starting center -- who just happened to be the starter in the WNBA All-Star game -- Kara Braxton, and filleted her play. Last September, during the Finals -- his team down 2-1 in the best-of-five series -- Laimbeer turned the focus on the folks at ESPN and his perceived unfair coverage of the series. He called out Nancy Lieberman-Cline, for example, and banded his players together in an "us against the world" mentality. The Shock won a stunning Game 4 on the road at Sacramento before taking care of business at home in Game 5 to capture the championship.

I'm intrigued -- very much so -- at the prospects of Bill Laimbeer on an NBA sideline.



Laimbeer and some of his championship jewelry -- as player and coach

Not all of his tactics would be well-received -- especially the one about dumping on his players to the press. That I understand. But there surely must be a team in the league in which he once was the biggest villain that can use his services. That is, of course, if he's willing to give it a whirl. He seems happy with the Shock, and in the WNBA -- that summer option for those who need a basketball fix.

Katie Smith, the Shock leader in the backcourt, spoke these words about her boss to me last fall, when I asked her what Laimbeer's biggest negative was:

"He likes to hear himself talk," she said with a giggle. "He always has something to say."

Again, maybe not the best trait for an NBA coach who's in it for the long haul.

Still, should he want it, I think Laimbeer would make a marvelous NBA head coach. He played on teams that were nothing if not about teamwork and one player being no better than the other. He spent 10 years with Isiah Thomas, Joe Dumars, and Chuck Daly. I think he's learned a thing or two from that decade. Clearly he's showing as much directing the Shock -- the cream of the WNBA at the moment.

In February 1989, shortly after the Pistons acquired Mark Aguirre from Dallas for Adrian Dantley -- one of the most controversial trades in team history -- some Pistons took Aguirre out for dinner. The idea wasn't to nosh so much as it was to clue the new guy in about what it meant to be a Bad Boy -- especially since Aguirre's reputation preceded him as being, at times, selfish and boorish.

"Everything I've heard about you isn't good," Laimbeer snarled to Aguirre in that dinner, according to Jerry Green's book, The Detroit Pistons: Capturing A Remarkable Era. "But I'm willing to give you a chance because Isiah vouches for you."

Aguirre himself called the dinner significant and a powerful first impression as to life as a Piston. The Pistons cruised after the trade and went thru the NBA like a hot knife thru butter in the postseason (15-2), winning the title.

Bill Laimbeer is doing a terrific job in the WNBA. No disrespect to the ladies he coaches, or to the league in which he's doing it, but it's time that he graduate. Some NBA team could use him. It would be foolish to think that one couldn't.