How Mike Brown’s coaching evolution can be traced back to Steve Kerr, Warriors

A few weeks after Warriors coach Steve Kerr hired Mike Brown as his top assistant in 2016, Brown and I spent about an hour talking inside an office off I-680 in San Jose. I had questions, primarily related to my skepticism about his role with Golden State.I wondered how someone with a reputation as a micromanaging defensive technician, would replace departing assistant Luke Walton, who focused on offense.“It’s the perception that’s out there,” Brown, grinning, said of his reputation. “It’s tough to fight. So, I just smile and go with the flow.”Brown made it clear, though, that he was developing a fondness for offense. Kerr later seconded that, citing it as a factor in making the hire.Ten years later, Brown is the head coach of the New York Knicks and clearly is better for his Golden State experience. The Knicks are in the NBA Finals for the first time in 27 years. Of the 16 teams to reach the NBA playoffs, New York is No. 1 in defensive rating (103.5). Brown’s prevailing aptitude remains.But the Knicks also are No. 1 in offensive rating (123.3) and scoring (119.9 points per game). That indicates growth as a coach – and an emphatic response to the curiosity I once expressed.Brown underwent an astonishing evolution, most of which can be attributed to his six seasons with Kerr and the Warriors. The businesslike coach loosened up, embracing the joyful aspects of day-to-day coaching at the root of Kerr’s essence. Brown retained some wonky characteristics – they are, after all, innate – but recognized the value of patience and establishing rapport with players, even trading jabs with them.More to the point, Brown came to better appreciate the beauty of ball movement on offense. He brought it to Sacramento in 2022, when he was hired to guide one of the league’s most forlorn franchises.In Year 1 with Sacramento, Brown was named NBA Coach of the Year, the only unanimous vote in the history of the award. The Kings led the league in offensive rating (118.6) and scoring (120.7 points per game), ranking third in assists after finishing 22nd the previous season. They reached the playoffs for the first time in 16 years.Coaching yet another franchise toward snapping its postseason futility might be even more impressive for Brown.In taking a job in New York, Brown was replacing Tom Thibodeau, who was dismissed after leading the Knicks to the Eastern Conference finals for the first time in 25 years. He was moving to a region that is the opposite of Sacramento. He was given the keys to a legacy franchise in America’s preeminent city, with a discerning and critical fan base.This was Brown challenging himself. When I asked him last summer if he knew what he was getting into, he said he had done his homework. Of course he had. He also said he believed the Knicks could reach another level.Well, they have. After some trying times in the first half of the 2025-26 NBA season – New York lost nine of 11 games from New Year’s Eve into mid-January – the Knicks and their coach harmonized. They posted two winning streaks of at least seven games and closed the season winning 12 of 16.“Our group is playing good basketball and they’re doing it in different ways,” Brown told reporters this week. “They’re doing it differently, depending on who our opponent is and when you show that type of versatility on both ends of the floor, it adds to your belief. “I’ve said it before, you use the regular season to get ready for the postseason and our guys did a hell of a job with that.”Deliberately and methodically, Brown has taken players to a place where they are singing hymns about their chemistry. There is give-and-take between players and Brown and an acceptance of altered roles. Star guard Jalen Brunson is less ball-dominant and more efficient, while Karl-Anthony Towns, given the latitude to expand his playmaking dimension, is thriving.New York’s offense is, to use Kerr’s favorite description, in a state of “flow.” The ball movement is two levels above where it was under Thibodeau. The Knicks averaged 19.8 assists per game last postseason, ranking 14th, but are first (26.7) this postseason.New Yorkers whose expressions of dissatisfaction can be loud and legendary have overcome the trepidation initially evident when Brown was hired and greeted as a retread.Brown has spent the past year reminding sports fans that a “retread” coach need not share the characteristics of the proverbial old dog. He was taught new tricks during his six seasons with the Warriors and Kerr, and they are being applied and amplified in New York.They want the spoils of an NBA championship, from a parade to rings to the license to be obnoxious in public. The Knicks last won it all in 1973, and the fans crave the catharsis that would come with beating the Oklahoma City Thunder or San Antonio Spurs, beginning with Game 1 next Wednesday.This is Brown’s fifth opportunity as an NBA head coach, if you count both terms with the Cavaliers, the first in 2005. There was a brutal 71-game stint with the Lakers, 195 games of reconstruction and deconstruction in Sacramento. He learned from each experience, none more than his time with the Warriors, his longest stay in one job since he began as an assistant with the Wizards in 1997.Brown could have hopped from job to job, fattening his financial worth. But, no, he adapted, adding layers upon layers, reshaping his approach, sharpening old skills and adding new ones.Not all retreads are so willing to rewrite their scripts as they go.Download and follow the Dubs Talk Podcast

How Mike Brown’s coaching evolution can be traced back to Steve Kerr, Warriors

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