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WASHINGTON — Lauri Markkanen has an idea of what the Washington Wizards went through Thursday.
On December 3, 2018, Markkanen walked into the Chicago Bulls' practice facility and heard some shocking news: He suddenly had a new coach.
Fred Hoiberg had been fired and replaced by Jim Boylen after the Bulls' slow start.
"That was after my first game of the year because I was hurt the early part of the year," Markkanen said. "It was kind of a surprise because at that time I wasn't on social media."
He missed the Twitter talk. No one bothered to send him a text.
"The timing of it was pretty bad," he said.
At least some of the Wizards can relate.
On Thursday morning, Washington decided to fire Wes Unseld Jr. (or at least move him into a front-office role) and roll with interim coach Brian Keefe.
"It was just, we had a conversation last night, which we do often, and it was just one of those where it was like, man, how are we going to get better?" Wizards president Michael Winger said. "How are we going to sort of, ratchet up the dial on competitiveness? And we came to the conclusion that the fellas just need to hear a new voice."
It, after all, is easier to fire a coach than to fix a bad roster.
No word on whether they are looking for yet another voice after the Jazz rolled to a 123-108 win over Washington Thursday.
It was the second midseason coaching change this week in the NBA after the Bucks fired Adrian Griffin and hired Doc Rivers.
As many Jazz players know that type of experience can be quite the whiplash.
"It's not easy," said John Collins, who has dealt with two such coaching moves, including when former Utah Jazz coach Quin Snyder took over in Atlanta last season. "You definitely just start thinking a lot about minutes, players, this, that, coaching, what we're going to run, practice — all the stuff that you were used to during a season, you sort of just have to throw it all away and readjust it to a new coach."
Collins said it took him until the next morning for the moves to fully register, which made Washington's decision to make the move in the middle of a back-to-back even more confusing.
"The first day my mind is just racing, thinking and reading Twitter, reading whatever," Collins said. "Just trying to adjust my mindset, the reality of a new coach. It's definitely a little weird. This league throws a lot of new things; a lot of things I've never seen in my life."
But as strange as it is, it can also produce some good results.
Kris Dunn pointed out when the Hawks (who do seem to like the midseason replacement) went from Lloyd Pierce to Nate McMillan and ended up in the Eastern Conference Finals.
"It's just a different emotion and chemistry to the team," he said.
So what did he see from the Wizards?
"I think they all did a good job, especially in the first game," Dunn said. "They played hard. You can tell that no one felt any type of way."
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