Former Warriors big man David West took to Twitter over the weekend to voice his displeasure with the news that the New York Knicks were close to hiring Tom Thibodeau as the franchise's next head coach.
But there's only so much you can express in a tweet (or several).
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So the two-time NBA champion detailed his thoughts in a conversation with The Athletic's Sam Amick on the "Tampering" podcast.
“My thing with the Knicks hire is I saw competing against the [Minnesota] Timberwolves (when Thibodeau was their coach), anybody that’s honest with you, they saw the way that that situation had deteriorated," West explained. "And the optics of that situation, in my opinion, were like, ‘Oh yeah, it’s over over there. Like, they’re done.’ We went to China with that crew (during the 2017 preseason), and played two games against them, and it’s like, ‘Yo.’ The guys weren’t responding, and I’m like, ‘Man, this is preseason. We ain’t even got to the league yet, and these guys aren’t responding.’
"So from that perspective, and then looking at what the Knicks are -- that’s a young team, they’ve got a lot of young (players) who I feel, (are) young, talented guys there. I just wasn’t a fan of bringing in that style for them. I thought that there are coaches who haven’t gotten these types of opportunities.
"And the Knicks job, I think, is a big job, regardless of the state of the franchise. It’s still the Knicks. I just thought that they could have gone in a ... different direction and brought in somebody young who could probably relate to the players better. You can ask guys. Anybody who witnessed that mess at Minnesota will tell you ... it wasn’t on the players. That’s all I’ll say.”
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West -- who is very active in the fight for racial justice and carries an extremely important voice -- wants to see more Black men receive head-coach opportunities in the NBA.
He is using his platform in the attempt to enact real, meaningful change.
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"I got a bunch of texts from Black coaches over the last couple of days saying, ‘Man, thank you for what you said on Twitter,' " West told Amick. "Obviously some of those guys aren’t in a position to articulate things that I can say, but I know that that sentiment exists amongst them.
"The opportunities to fail, and then get another chance, are few and far between for Black coaches. And we know that if you’re an executive, you’ve got to be damn near perfect, right?”
Ex-Warriors head coach Mark Jackson is somebody West believes deserves another gig. Andre Iguodala is of the belief that his former coach has been blackballed by the NBA, but Jackson is confident he will be an NBA head coach again.