Suns Coach Monty Williams Shares Love, Admiration for Mentor Gregg Popovich
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Phoenix Suns coach Monty Williams is well aware of what San Antonio Spurs coach Gregg Popovich brings to the table.
Even as a casual observer of the NBA, Popovich's five NBA titles with the Spurs on top of a stacked resume that includes multiple awards for Coach of the Year along with success for Team USA at the international level makes him one of the best basketball coaches of all time, and he'll surely be honored properly when he decides to hang it up.
However, Williams knows Popovich just a bit closer than the average fan thanks to their time spent together in San Antonio. Williams joined the Spurs as a player in 1996 (the same year Popovich took over as head coach) and spent three years before moving on in his career.
Williams later returned as a coaching staff intern under Popovich, winning the NBA championship in 2005 with San Antonio. Just a few months later, Williams was hired as an assistant in Portland, and his career took off from there.
There's an obvious amount of respect between the two, and that was reflected in pre-game comments from Williams before the Suns-Spurs battled last night:
(On how much he cherishes Gregg Popovich and these meetings with the Spurs...)
Williams: “I don’t think either one of us cherishes it because one of us has to lose. I just enjoy seeing him and I am grateful for the history I have with him. His impact on me and my family is something I don’t have enough time to talk about. I don’t have enough words to reflect about how I feel or how my family feels. He rarely sees my kids, but they know coach Pop as a granddad in so many ways. I am grateful to be able to tell people outside of basketball that I know Gregg Popovich as a man, mentor and a friend.
"He is also somebody who will tell me to shut up with a few more words added to it. I am just grateful that I have had the relationship that I have had with him outside of competing. I don’t think any one of us enjoys that because of the outcome. I would have no idea what it’d mean to me in the mid 90’s with that relationship to me, with me and my family. I am grateful for it.”
(On if Gregg Popovich still coaching and going strong is a surprise to him...)
Williams: “It is hard to say. I have been around him enough to know that he has a number of interests outside of basketball. I thought, like other people, when Tim (Duncan) was done, he was done. I think it speaks to how much he loves that organization. I think the thing that people don’t understand about Pop is that he really loves the game.
"When I was there for those two years in management, I would just take pictures of his notes. He would have the best notes of anyone I had been around. He would just come into the office and write notes. He would lay them out on the desk that was in the video room and I would just grab my phone and take pictures of all of these notes. If you went into his office and you saw the volume of notes and basketball ideas of books he has on the game, you would understand how much he loves basketball.
"Now, I am not as surprised as I reflect on what I have seen from him over the years as far as basketball is concerned. I just think that he has stuff you can make an encyclopedia on, in basketball. If I showed you my phone and all of the pictures of the notes I have, it would blow you guys away. That speaks to how much he loves the game.”
(On the best piece of advice Coach Pop gave him...)
Williams: “I think one time I said something in the media that was pretty self-deprecating about myself. He called me and said, “don’t you ever do that again.” He said that I was way better than that and that I didn’t need to do that. It was a really good piece of advice. I was trying to do something, but it probably didn’t come off the right way. He was a compass for me. He told me to ‘just coach your team, you’re doing a good job.’
"It was really encouraging. I was pretty down on myself about a couple of things and I didn’t know he was paying attention. He had enough care for me to call me and tell me to not do that. It gave me a ton of confidence to think he would do that for me but to also understand what he thought of me as a coach. That is just who he is.”
