New York Knicks and Los Angeles Lakers fans may have a hard time being convinced, but Steve Nash says coach Mike D'Antoni's basketball innovation helped bring out the best in the two-time NBA MVP point guard.
Nash, the former Dallas Mavericks and Phoenix Suns star whose career ended unceremoniously with the Los Angeles Lakers, wrote about his retirement on theplayerstribune.com and thanked several people for helping him achieve as much as he did in the game of basketball.
Nash first thanked his former coach with the Mavericks, Don Nelson, for turning him into an aggressive player, but the second thank you went out to D'Antoni, who had a lot of success with Nash in Phoenix but then had spectacular flameouts trying to coach the Knicks and Lakers.
"Mike D'Antoni changed the game of basketball," Nash said. "There's not many people you can say that about. No wonder I had my best years playing for him. His intelligence guided him to never over-coach, complicate or hide behind the game's traditions. He deserves a championship."
Nash also thanked former Mavericks teammate Dirk Nowitzki and talked about how happy he was for Nowitzki and the Mavericks for winning the NBA championship in 2011.
Nash also thanked former Mavericks teammate Michael Finley, calling him a "true friend and teammate," and he thanked Alvin Gentry, who succeeded D'Antoni as coach of the Suns when D'Antoni left to become the Knicks coach.
His family also earned his praise, as did other various coaches that helped with his development as a player.
But the other revelation of Nash's first-person account came at the beginning of his article when he mentioned Isiah Thomas as his role model when he was growing up playing basketball.
"I looked at my hero, Isiah Thomas, and thought to myself, " 'OK, I'm nowhere near the player he is but if I get better every day for 5 or 10 years, why can't I be as good as him?' "
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