NEWS: Donnie out | Nico Harrison (Nike) as Pres/GM | Fin as VP | Dirk as Advisor

[sterlingmallory]

If anyone is curious about Nico's actual job title, especially because of what it means for Finley's role moving forward, Nico has "GM and President of Basketball Operations" as his title on Twitter. I believe that was Donnie's former title, so I guess this means Finley is staying in his role as VP of Basketball Ops.

https://twitter.com/NicoHarrison_

[Kammrath]

Will better (or at least different) people whispering into Cuban's ear result in superior management of the roster and overall team-building strategy?

Yep, this is the only way forward. Trying to get better people in Cuban's ears.

[Kammrath]

If Mark is clearly objectively one of the most player-friendly owners in the league, it is all the more strange that he has had such a hard time attracting guys here.

My speculation is that RC and Donnie were actually huge obstacles to this reality. That's my current guess, because I DO believe Cuban has been doing everything in his power to BE player friendly. Shoot, he constantly talks about how the NBA is about the players and they are the face of everything, unlike the NFL for instance.

[Kammrath]

I think you probably know that the discussion isn't about Cuban having final say, like any owner has. The discussion is about whether or not Cuban limits the effectiveness of his basketball people by doing too much.

I do know that is the discussion for some. 

On the other hand, at least a few of us think Cuban was actually doing too LITTLE in the last few years and not being focused enough on the team and helping make sure everything was running cleanly and smoothly. 

My two hopes:

1) Cuban is MORE involved and connected to the pulse of this organization, making sure there is no brewing dysfunction.

2) Cuban is LISTENING to the right people and trusting their judgments and expertise. 


I don't want Cuban less involved, I want him more involved in the right ways, submitting to the wisdom in the room.

[KillerLeft]

I DO believe Cuban has been doing everything in his power to BE player friendly. Shoot, he constantly talks about how the NBA is about the players and they are the face of everything, unlike the NFL for instance.

Totally agree, only...he's just not very likable, imo. I believe that he believes he's doing everything he can, and I hope he gets it all done.

[Jommybone]

Plainly I don’t know. I’m not an insider. But . . . 

1. I find it hard to believe hiring Ford was a PR stunt.

2. I find it easy to believe Cuban hired Ford months ago.

3. I find it easy to believe Harrison was Ford’s recommendation and Kidd was Harrison’s pick.

4. I find it hard to believe Cato has reliable inside sources after Donnie’s ouster.

[Kammrath]

1. I find it hard to believe hiring Ford was a PR stunt.

2. I find it easy to believe Cuban hired Ford months ago.

3. I find it easy to believe Harrison was Ford’s recommendation and Kidd was Harrison’s pick.

100% in lock step with you on these. I have seen no convincing evidence that these are false.

[chaparral]

100% in lock step with you on these. I have seen no convincing evidence that these are false.

Then why didn't Cuban take control of the situation right after the playoffs ended and say the club would be moving in a different direction.  Giving both Donnie and Rick the option to resign before Cato's 1st article.

[mavsluvr]

Plainly I don’t know. I’m not an insider. But . . . 

1. I find it hard to believe hiring Ford was a PR stunt.

2. I find it easy to believe Cuban hired Ford months ago.

3. I find it easy to believe Harrison was Ford’s recommendation and Kidd was Harrison’s pick.

4. I find it hard to believe Cato has reliable inside sources after Donnie’s ouster.

Cuban devotes a lot of resources to his PR team, who ceaselessly strive to make it easy to believe that he's the smartest guy in the room and hard to believe that anyone he challenges might be right. He has a history of making splashy announcements (like the Ford hire) and then quietly not following through. 

Not saying you're wrong, of course. But you are finding it easy to believe items 2 and 3, which have never been reported to be the case afaik, and are essentially just extrapolations in our imaginations from the fact that Cuban announced he hired Ford.

However it all happened, we have Harrison now, which seems like it might well have some real positives.

[jesusshuttlesworth82]

Cuban’s restructuring of his surrounding influences unsurprisingly leaves him, once again, with ultimate authority. It’s why the team never held serious discussions with established front office candidates, both vaunted ones like Toronto’s Masai Ujiri but also rising candidates with clear expectations of control. Cuban did solicit lists of promising executives around the league, sources say, which were indeed sent to Mike Forde’s consulting firm Sportsology. But league sources always viewed the firm’s involvement as a public relations ploy more than Cuban seriously considering any concession of decision-making influence.

[dirkfansince1998]

100% in lock step with you on these. I have seen no convincing evidence that these are false.

RC and Donnie were scheduled to join Luka in Slovenia. Cuban himself mentioned that he wanted to keep RC (at least try it one more time). That´s certainly some evidence that it wasn´t a planned move. To me it still looks like years of tension in the front office lead to a power struggle that ended with Donnie´s firing. Situation exploded after the exit interviews. Donnnie went all in and lost. Donnie was done. Cato published his first article on the topic. Nailed it.  Cuban went into scramble mode and tried to save face.

[mavsluvr]

My speculation is that RC and Donnie were actually huge obstacles to this reality.

Somehow, I thought that would be your speculation, lol. Nice, positive, hopeful, homer take!


Do you have reason to believe that other players around the league had a huge problem with Donnie? I didn't even think they knew him very well, but I could have missed something. 

Anyway, maybe Harrison can at least get some of these Rick and Donnie haters to the table now!

[Arioch]

Cuban’s restructuring of his surrounding influences unsurprisingly leaves him, once again, with ultimate authority.

It's not just unsurprising but inevitable, and the fact that the writer implies there is any universe in which that might not be the case implies this is a person who doesn't actually understand business of any kind (the NBA included). Even for a billionaire, the hundreds of millions of dollars spent (and brought in) by an NBA franchise are not chump change. The idea that *anyone* with that level of investment would not ALWAYS be the ultimate authority is simply ludicrous. It's a free country and an entertainment business, so we as fans are free to like or dislike Cuban, to think he's doing a good job or a bad job. We're also free to critique his hires and hope he gets and listens to good advice but at the end of the day, he's the one with actual skin in the game, and the only way he (or Balmer or Dolan or Fertita or Buss or JOrdan) is not going to be the ultimate authority about how his money gets spent is if someone else ponies up the money to buy the franchise from him.

Or to put it more bluntly, when a writer starts off whining that we don't live in fantasy land, I don't put much stock in his ability to tell the difference between delusion and reality on any other point.

[Tyler]

Cuban’s restructuring of his surrounding influences unsurprisingly leaves him, once again, with ultimate authority. It’s why the team never held serious discussions with established front office candidates, both vaunted ones like Toronto’s Masai Ujiri but also rising candidates with clear expectations of control. Cuban did solicit lists of promising executives around the league, sources say, which were indeed sent to Mike Forde’s consulting firm Sportsology. But league sources always viewed the firm’s involvement as a public relations ploy more than Cuban seriously considering any concession of decision-making influence.

I feel like Cato is letting his personal opinion of Cuban shade his reporting. He notes that Cuban hired Sportsology to help with the search and confirms that they did in fact collect names of various candidates around the league. He also never claims that Sportsology didn't recommend Nico. So the line about it being a PR ploy rather than a genuine effort to give up control makes no sense. Cuban never said he planned to give up control, and it sounds to me like Sportsology helped him find a well-respected candidate perfectly willing to work with him on his terms. Which was exactly what he hired them to do.

[KillerLeft]

The idea that *anyone* with that level of investment would not ALWAYS be the ultimate authority is simply ludicrous.

This, and the rest of your post, is objectively true. It's his money and his toy. 

However, some owners are better at this dance than others. There are even some who don't appear on television, in print or make news of any kind for years at a time. 

If Cuban's franchise was run better, I don't think anyone would look for these kinds of issues or complain about anything, really. For his sake (and ours, as fans) I hope the changes made this week are the start of a journey towards that end.

[dirkfansince1998]

It's not just unsurprising but inevitable, and the fact that the writer implies there is any universe in which that might not be the case implies this is a person who doesn't actually understand business of any kind (the NBA included). Even for a billionaire, the hundreds of millions of dollars spent (and brought in) by an NBA franchise are not chump change. The idea that *anyone* with that level of investment would not ALWAYS be the ultimate authority is simply ludicrous. It's a free country and an entertainment business, so we as fans are free to like or dislike Cuban, to think he's doing a good job or a bad job. We're also free to critique his hires and hope he gets and listens to good advice but at the end of the day, he's the one with actual skin in the game, and the only way he (or Balmer or Dolan or Fertita or Buss or JOrdan) is not going to be the ultimate authority about how his money gets spent is if someone else ponies up the money to buy the franchise from him.

Or to put it more bluntly, when a writer starts off whining that we don't live in fantasy land, I don't put much stock in his ability to tell the difference between delusion and reality on any other point.

Some teams don´t have one billionaire owner. They have ownership groups. Meaning that the one person in power dynamic doesn´t exist. They have to find someone that runs the franchise. Otherwise you would have multiple Cubans clashing over every single decision. That´s how you end up with powerful GMs like Ainge in Boston or Myers with the Warriors.

[dirkfansince1998]

Also pretty sure that the entire drama isn´t over. What happens with the staff. Most of them are "Donnie´s and RC´s" guys. Cannot replace all of them. We just saw the first example. Former headcoach RC already knew about Kidd. How many people inside the organization knew it? Who leaked it?
Wouldn´t be suprised if some of the "loyalists" in the coaching or scouting department aren´t happy with the current situation.

[fifteenth]

It's not just unsurprising but inevitable, and the fact that the writer implies there is any universe in which that might not be the case implies this is a person who doesn't actually understand business of any kind (the NBA included). Even for a billionaire, the hundreds of millions of dollars spent (and brought in) by an NBA franchise are not chump change. The idea that *anyone* with that level of investment would not ALWAYS be the ultimate authority is simply ludicrous. It's a free country and an entertainment business, so we as fans are free to like or dislike Cuban, to think he's doing a good job or a bad job. We're also free to critique his hires and hope he gets and listens to good advice but at the end of the day, he's the one with actual skin in the game, and the only way he (or Balmer or Dolan or Fertita or Buss or JOrdan) is not going to be the ultimate authority about how his money gets spent is if someone else ponies up the money to buy the franchise from him.

Or to put it more bluntly, when a writer starts off whining that we don't live in fantasy land, I don't put much stock in his ability to tell the difference between delusion and reality on any other point.

I don't think Cato's most recent is great, but also don't buy that the way Cuban does business is the way everyone does it.

An owner may be the ultimate authority,  but they don't all wield that authority in the same way. Cuban plays a more hands on role than most. Not sure how that's even debatable,  no matter how many "duh, he's the owner" posts we get.

Also note: I believe that many of your readers here are not ignorant of how businesses operate.

[mavsluvr]

I feel like Cato is letting his personal opinion of Cuban shade his reporting. He notes that Cuban hired Sportsology to help with the search and that they did in fact collect names of various candidates around the league. Actually, he says that the team furnished Forde a list of executives (which wouldn't be unusual, for that type of position).

He also never claims that Sportsology didn't recommend Nico. So the line about it being a PR ploy rather than a genuine effort to give up control makes no sense. I think the line was "rather than any concession of decision-making influence.  Cuban never said he planned to give up control, and it sounds to me like Sportsology helped him find a well-respected candidate perfectly willing to work with him on his terms. Which was exactly what he hired them to do. It's cool that you think that, but there is plenty of evidence for other points of view, as well. 

I am not particularly defending Cato's piece, but I am bemused by the resistance to believe anything in it. I view his piece as primarily reportorial, not editorial, summarizing what his sources were telling him, as opposed to offering his own viewpoints. Maybe his sources are well-informed, maybe they're not, but I don't think he's just making all that stuff up. 

Suppose the idea to hire Harrison really was internal, and not sourced by Forde. Would that particularly bother you? It doesn't bother me. The mention-worthy part of it, I think, is just the announcement that a search firm was going to be retained to look for a candidate, and then hiring someone they were apparently already talking to like a week later. I find it interesting that people are bent on insisting that Forde was responsible for finding the candidate, as if that matters.

[Jommybone]

RC and Donnie were scheduled to join Luka in Slovenia. Cuban himself mentioned that he wanted to keep RC (at least try it one more time). That´s certainly some evidence that it wasn´t a planned move. To me it still looks like years of tension in the front office lead to a power struggle that ended with Donnie´s firing. Situation exploded after the exit interviews. Donnnie went all in and lost. Donnie was done. Cato published his first article on the topic. Nailed it.  Cuban went into scramble mode and tried to save face.

This reasoning seems flawed. Sure, the scheduled trips seem to indicate that Donnie and Rick didn’t know there was a planned move. But they don’t indicate there was no planned move.