By Jordan Long
The San Antonio Spurs sit at 26-43, 12th in the Western Conference. The Spurs are 2.5 games back of the New Orleans Pelicans for 10th place which would get them into the NBA play-in round of the playoffs. The Spurs, though, know Head Coach Gregg Popovich isn’t going to coach forever. According to CBSsports.com, Marc Stein of ESPN mentioned Quinn Snyder as a possible replacement since he coached the Austin Toros, San Antonio’s G-League affiliate, from 2007 to 2010.
Popovich is coaching his 26th season, all with the Spurs. This is pretty impressive in itself. Franchises typically move on from a coach after a few years if they don’t win a playoff series. Popovich has been lucky to be with an ownership who has kept him this long. Popovich coached the Spurs to the playoffs an impressive 22 times while winning 5 NBA titles. Right now, Popovich has 1,336 wins which ranks number 1 in NBA history and just passed Don Nelson who finished with 1,335
Popovich could be done coaching soon. His contract runs out at the end of next year. Whenever he calls it a career, Popovich will go down as the winningest coach in NBA history plus he will have a place in the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame.
The coach rumored to be the next Head Coach of the Spurs is already coaching in the NBA, Quinn Snyder. Snyder is currently the Utah Jazz Head Coach. Snyder is in his 8th season with Utah. The Jazz have been a winning team under him. His record so far with the Jazz is 365-257, a winning percentage of .587. The Jazz have earned a playoff spot 5 times with him. The Jazz look like they will earn another playoff spot this year, standing at 42-26, 4th in the Western Conference.
Unfortunately, success in the regular season hasn’t carried to the postseason. The Jazz have been knocked out in the first round twice and 3 times in the second round. That would be a disappointment in San Antonio because the Spurs expect to advance to the Western Conference Finals. Of course the goal is to go to the NBA Finals.
Snyder could make a lot of sense for the Spurs. He has NBA Head Coaching experience and has been a winner in the NBA at least in the regular season. The big question though when it is time for Popovich to retire is why would Snyder take the job? The Jazz are a talented team. He has one of the top shooting guards in the NBA, Donovan Mitchell. Mitchell’s contract runs out at the end of the 2026 season. The Jazz also have a pretty good center and reigning NBA Defensive Player of the Year in Rudy Gobert whose contract ends at the same time. Then there is point guard Mike Conley who is going to be in Utah for the next two seasons. These are players the Jazz can form a championship caliber team around. It wouldn’t make sense for Snyder to leave. It seems Snyder is going to stay with the Jazz organization unless there are more playoff failures.
When the time comes, it couldn’t hurt for the Spurs to call Snyder. Maybe he will want a different challenge. Who knows, but for right now this is all speculation since Popovich is still coaching.
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