The Scott Skiles Hire: The Undermining of The “Process”

The Best of Mediocre Choices

Looking past the circumstances of his hiring, what do the Magic get out of hiring Scott Skiles? What does Skiles bring to the table as a head coach?

The answer is mediocrity and a lack of long-term viability. Here are some facts about Scott Skiles

• Skiles has a career record of 443-433 as coach.
• Skiles has a record of 18-24 in the playoffs, making it in seven of his 13 seasons in the lead chair.
• Skiles has never reached the conference finals, winning just two Playoff series
• Skiles has never won his division.
• Skiles has accrued a winning record in only 5 of 12 seasons that he started as head coach.
• Skiles teams have finished in the bottom 10 of offenses seven times in his full seasons as coach.
• Skiles has been known to burn out his players at each stop.

Here are the pros Scott Skiles

• Of Skiles’ eight full seasons as coach, his team had a top 10 defensive rating in six of them.
• The lowest defensive rating a Skiles coached team has ever sported during a full season was 16th.
• Skiles holds every player accountable.

The Magic will win more games next season, I have no doubt about that. I fully believe Orlando’s defense will improve significantly.

However, I believe no matter who was coach the Magic were bound to improve. The majority of Orlando’s playing time goes to players who will improve through offseason work and natural maturing. Defense would mesh better under just about any coach who does not ask the Magic to play the pick and roll defense in a way that leaves Vucevic on an island.

Any experienced coach knows how to create an identity for a team, something Vaughn struggled to do.

Here is the issue with Skiles, the Magic hired him knowing full well they plan on moving on from him in a couple of years. His ceiling is completely set, it would seem.

While there are many people out there who claim coaches are hired to be fired, that could not be any further from the truth. Teams do not hire a coach with the intention of firing him a few years later. They hire a coach hoping he will be their Phil Jackson or their Gregg Popovich.

Is that unrealistic? Absolutely, but when you hire a new coach everything is supposed to be roses, and you believe that this is the one.

The Magic hired Skiles knowing good and well that with his track record this team is going to divorce with him sooner or later. The Magic hired Skiles knowing good and well his track record (13 seasons in as a head coach) that he does not have long-term viability.

Rob Hennigan has preached sustainability since day one on the job. The Scott Skiles hiring clearly contradicts Rob’s philosophy. It is a move to resolve a short-term problem in a nostalgic way rather than a long-term solution to bring the team a championship.

In the end, it appears that the Magic higher ups have decided that having a story to sell to nostalgic fans was more important than letting Rob Hennigan see his “process” through.

Only time will tell whether the team will be satisfied with this stepping stone or whether they will let the story dictate his tenure in Orlando.

Next: Scott Skiles' relationship with Tobias Harris murky, but promising