The NBA world is still trying to process the Denver Nuggets’ decision to fire head coach Michael Malone Tuesday.
Malone won 471 games and an NBA championship in 10 seasons with the Nuggets, so the decision to fire him with three games left in the regular season stunned many people around the league. Insiders have provided several factors that might have factored into his departure, including differences with general manager Calvin Booth over player usage (Booth also got fired Tuesday). However, other insiders believe some players were frustrated with Malone’s coaching style.
On FS1’s Speak Tuesday, Paul Pierce hit those rumors head-on. As the panel seemed to agree Malone is a good coach, they wondered why he’d been fired.
“‘Cause players get they feelings hurt in this generation!” Pierce said. “‘Oh, I don’t like him! He’s talking bad to me!’ Man, get on the line! You’re making $30 million a year! These players feelings get hurt! I’m telling you, he’s a great coach, he’s won a championship. Joker [Nikola Jokić] is playing the best basketball of his career, again.
“But now, because somebody’s feelings are hurt in the locker room, ‘Oh, we don’t like him, we don’t think we can win with him,’ it don’t matter — get over your feelings!”
.@paulpierce34 GOES OFF on the Nuggets for firing head coach Mike Malone 🔥
“Players get they feelings hurt in this generation!… He’s a great coach. He’s won a championship… Get over your feelings!” pic.twitter.com/AOX6xu5MKA
— Speak (@SpeakOnFS1) April 8, 2025
There’s no telling why Pierce got so worked up about Malone’s firing, but he kept his anger going.
“He’s a successful coach, who’s brought you to the mountaintop and now people’s feelings get hurt, and how he’s out of there,” Pierce concluded.
Malone would probably appreciate Pierce’s stance. The veteran coach had called his players out in late March after a loss to the Portland Trail Blazers. When asked how he thought the players would react, he said, “I don’t really care” (via The New York Post).
“It’s not my job to evaluate how they take things,” Malone continued. “My job is to be honest and sometimes brutally honest … The guys that are full of s***, won’t hear it. They’ll say, ‘Coach is tripping.’”
