Another Coached Canned

Monday morning, the NBA said good bye to another coach. This time, the Sacramento Kings cut ties with coach Reggie Theus. Theus is the sixth NBA coach to be fired before Christmas this season, along with Philadelphia's Maurice Cheeks, Minnesota's Randy Wittman, Toronto's Sam Mitchell, Washington's Eddie Jordan and Oklahoma City's P.J. Carlesimo. This is the most amount of coaches fired before Christmas than any other season. The previous record was three.

Assistant coach Kenny Natt has been promoted to interim coach. Natt is Sacramento's fourth coach in less than three years, following Theus, Eric Musselman and Rick Adelman, who left the club after the 2005-06 season.

"I had no idea [in advance]. We were just coming off our best win [over the Lakers] the past two years. We've had a lot of injuries. ... Everyone knew we were rebuilding and the projection was for 20-25 wins," Thues stated in an interview with ESPN.

Sacramento's victory over the Los Angeles Lakers last Tuesday night in perhaps the season's biggest upset to date appeared to ease the pressure on Theus. But the calm didn't last when the Kings surrendered 43 points to the Knicks in Saturday's first quarter and were rarely competitive in a 24-point defeat.

Natt is in his second season with the Kings after three years as an assistant with the Cleveland Cavaliers. He played three NBA seasons, including before moving up the coaching ranks in a path that included nine seasons as an assistant to Utah coach Jerry Sloan. Even though many people have not heard of him, why cant he get a chance just like the other 6 coaches who have never been heard of until being offered the position. We will soon find out.