Doc Rivers is back coaching in the NBA, but there’s one job he’s not interested in.
Typically, the head coaches of the teams with the top records in each conference are selected to coach the All-Star Game.
With a win on Saturday night, the Milwaukee Bucks improved to 33-16 on the season, giving them the second-best record in the Eastern Conference on Feb. 4, which is the cutoff the league uses to pick the coaches.
While the Boston Celtics are the No. 1 seed, at 37-12, head coach Joe Mazzulla coached in the game last year and is therefore ineligible to coach again this season.
That leaves Rivers, who has coached just three games with the Bucks after replacing Adrian Griffin, who went 30-13 before being fired, and Griffin’s replacement, Joe Prunty, who went 2-1 as the interim head coach.
“That is ridiculously bad,’’ Rivers said of getting the All-Star spot after just one win. “Adrian’s going to get some money, that’s for sure. And a ring. It’s one of these quirky things. I think there should be a rule somehow that someone else does it other than me.”
Even Rivers’ new players were surprised.
“He’s going to coach the game?” Giannis Antetokounmpo said when hearing the news following the victory.
“That’s pretty funny,” Damian Lillard said. “It definitely wasn’t a conversation in the locker room.”
But Antetokounmpo added he was pleased for the team’s assistant coaches, who will also get to coach in the game.
“I’m definitely happy for them,” he said. “It’s a lot of hard work that paid off.”
Rivers spent most of the season as an ESPN analyst before getting back on the sidelines following the dismissal of Griffin, who was in his first season as a head coach after replacing Mike Budenholzer.
Despite a solid start to the year, the Bucks opted to make a change and tabbed Rivers, who spent the prior three years as the head coach of the Philadelphia 76ers.
He coached the Celtics to the NBA title in 2007-08 and also coached the Los Angeles Clippers and Orlando Magic.
Rivers joked that he might skip the game and have his assistants go in his place.
“Maybe I’ll send my staff and I’ll go on vacation,” Rivers said. “I’m going to run that by [NBA commissioner] Adam Silver. I think Adam’s a good man. I think he’ll understand.”
