6 Is the highest figure for an active coach. only Phil Jackson (13) Red Auerbach (11) and Pat Riley (9) made the NBA finals as coaches more than 6 times.
Doc Rivers, a top-15 coach of all time, made the finals twice, which is less than Tyronn Lue.
Coach Spoelstra is 52 years old.
EDIT: some people think i value Doc Rivers as a top-15 coach, i wouldn’t let this idiot coach my kid’s school team. I wrote he is a top-15 coach of all time because the league had him on this [list](https://www.nba.com/news/nba-75-top-15-coaches-league-history) for the 75th anniversary.
by Mulubrhan_
18 Comments
Realistically he has another 15-20 years of coaching left in him if he wanted too. Sometimes they’re right under your nose the whole time.
Why is Doc Rivers a top-15 coach of all time?
Pop 5-1
Kerr 4-2
Spo 2-4
Pat Riley and Erik Spoelstra… I really should not be this surprised Miami is still doing so well.
At this rate, Spoelstra will be still coaching the Heat until the 2040s or the early 2050s.
Doc probably still gonna get another gig
Spo should’ve really 3 peated in 11/12/13 but 11 was a uber LeBron choke.
He probably will be 2/6 finals records after this one.
The most baffling shit in all this is Spo being 52… dude has the skin and look of a 30 year old gigachad.
So Doc hasn’t coached a Finals since that game 7 in 2010. Kobe and Pau were still playing. Yep, that long ago.
Damn I know he’s been around for awhile but Spo is 52? I hope I look like that when I’m 52 lmao
Not saying Eric isn’t a great one. He obviously is. But, a large percentage of this credit should also go to Pat Riley as well. He created the Heat culture of hard nosed basketball.
I think it’s fair to say after this season Spoelstra should be viewed as a top 5 coach in the league, easily. That notion that LeBron carried Spoelstra in now dead and buried.
Spoelstra, yer’ an elite coach!
Doc Rivers is not a top 15 coach of all time.
The thing that stands out to me is that among all the great and most elite coaches mentioned on this thread – only one coach has taken an 8 seed to the Finals.
And with a hodge-podge team full of role-player-esque stars, afterthoughts, and undrafted players. A team banged up and undermanned too. By the first and only Asian-American head coach who started out as a video coordinator and has had to overcome many criticisms and doubts throughout his career.
It’s a huge exaggeration and unfair to their true talent – but there are some parallels to this Heat team being the Mighty Ducks or Bad News Bears of the NBA.
Biggest underdogs in the history of the NBA…. and they are playing for a chip.
Bravo Coach Spo! You’re among the “Mount Rushmore of Coaches” and you earned it in some of the hardest ways!
Doc at top 15 feels wrong but I am too lazy to investigate this argument.
And still hasn’t won COTY. Just crazy.
Doc Rivers, a top-15 coach of all time.
lol
Doc Rivers needed 7 games to advanced pass the first round against a 37-win Hawks team during his lone championship season (2008) where he had Pierce, KG, Allen and a rookie Rondo.