For the first time in his career, Tyus Jones enters the season as the starting point guard. He came to the Wizards from the Grizzlies in a three-team trade with the Celtics.
“I’m one of the older guys now, so it’s more on my plate from a teaching perspective. So it’s just trying to understand that, understanding that with the younger team, younger guys, there’s going to be days where certain things that you take for granted, they might not know yet or get or really realize that there’s a different way to do it,” Jones said, via Ava Wallace of the Washington Post. “. . . You know, you can’t talk too much in my shoes. The more I talk, the better. The more I’m communicating, the more I’m pulling the young guys aside and telling them what I see or what I want, the better.”
Departed assistant Terry Stotts reportedly left the Bucks because he wasn’t comfortable with his fit on new coach Adrian Griffin‘s staff. Stotts, 65, isn’t retiring, per Jim Owczarski of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.
He returned to Milwaukee just four months ago — or a few months before the team traded for Damian Lillard, who Stotts coached for eight years with the Trail Blazers.
“It caught all of us off guard, of course, but again, you just support him,” Griffin told reporters. “He was a terrific guy. I learned a lot from him in a very short time. He was really good at what he does. He made a decision — a personal decision — and we just have to respect that.”
Per Charania and Nehm, Stotts and Griffin didn’t always see eye-to-eye during their brief time together. One example was a shootaround incident in which Griffin yelled at Stotts to join the coaches’ huddle when Stotts was getting ready to have a conversation with the star players separately.
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