Today brought an unexpected Woj-bomb for the Denver Nuggets, as ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski reports the Nuggets have hired David Adelman as an assistant coach.
David Adelman is the son of NBA coaching legend Rick Adelman, and got his start in the NBA as a player development coach for the Minnesota Timberwolves under his father in 2011, spending five years there. He was an assistant coach for the Orlando Magic in 2016, but there’s no immediate word as to his expected responsibilities in Denver. Rick Adelman was the head coach of the Sacramento Kings during the Chris Webber / Vlade Divac era and that style of play will be pretty similar to the Nuggets’, so at least it will look familiar to the younger Adelman.
Interestingly, Rick Adelman hadn’t been the head coach of those Kings for several years before Michael Malone got that job, but Adelman still reached out to Malone at that time:
Before the 2013-14 season tipped off, Adelman extended his hand to Sacramento Kings head coach Michael Malone. He made a conscious effort to offer advice and counsel to the man taking over the franchise he once captained.
“He was calling on behalf of some of the people he had worked with with the Kings,” Malone said of his talks with Adelman. “But we moved on and talked about basketball and life, if you will. I’ve always respected him from afar, but never gotten a real chance to know him. I enjoyed those conversations and he’s a hell of a coach.”
Perhaps this is simply Malone paying it forward for the younger Adelman. Adelman joins the other new assistant, NBA lifer Bob Weiss, as new hires this summer. We’ll know more about both of their expectations and responsibilities with this team when Media Day happens later this month.
