Will Erik Spoelstra Stay As Heat's Coach?



When I heard that LeBron James bumped Erik Spoelstra in one of their regular season games of the recently concluded 2010-2011 NBA season, I knew right then and there if Spoelstra fails to win a championship this year, he'll be fired by the Heat. That act of LeBron says it all. I have been watching the NBA for quite a long time now and that was the first time that I saw a player bumping his own coach. That only means that there is a turmoil that's happening in the Miami Heat organization. That's the downside of having Erik Spoelstra as their coach. Let's make some parallelism. Let's imagine if Pat Riley was their coach during that time. Will LeBron James bump a coach like Pat Riley? I don't think so. Riley is old enough to be respected and to be followed fervently by his players. The Heat have 3 Big Superstars, namely, Wade, Bosh and James. I think those 3 players need a coach who's a disciplinarian type like Mike Krzyzewski and Pat Riley. Erik Spoelstra's relationship with LeBron and the Heat is already full of cracks and they won't be able to go the distance with those cracks. In short, there's a rift between them.
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True enough I got this interesting insight from ESPN's David Thorpe, with regard to Spoelstra's fragile relationship with the Heat after their Finals lost to the Mavericks. He said:

"I don't expect Erik Spoelstra to keep his job. I suspect they'll think they can't afford to wait another year to figure out if he's the right guy for them. If Miami does fire Spoelstra, he will be hired by another team immediately. He's a terrific young coach, and he'll get better and better. For Spoelstra to keep his job, the Miami players will have to come to his support."

Mr. David Thorpe is correct. But it's very clear that Spoelstra might not be able to get his players' support because they appeared to have some emotional problems with Spoelstra. Looking back at their lost against the Bulls in one of their regular season games, Spoeltra's players cried after that lost. Spoelstra himself was the one who revealed that his players cried in the press conference after that lost to the Bulls. The odds are really against Spoelstra. He may be out after this season.