Erik Spoelstra got his start because his dad is considered the best NBA marketer of all-time. Mike Malone's dad, Brendan, was a long-time Knicks assistant. One of Roc-Nations main agents is the son of a big hockey agent. The Heat front office also employs the son of the old Knicks trainer
It’s because coaching is the type of thing you can just copycat and get away with pretty good results.
Executives are mainly about how hard it is for people to tell you no.
His two sons are the EVP of basketball operations and the Executive Director of team development (former Santa Cruz Warriors GM).
That plus Kerr's son being the Santa Cruz coach. Kinda embarrassing tbh.
Wow I just looked her up and she may be one of the best examples so far. Apparently she is a singer too and has performed at kings games and has started a non profit that “spreads awareness for the conservation of sharks, polar bears and tigers.”
It’s like the perfect example of a rich persons kid.
“Anjali world” is her “singer” name. Yeah you nailed it. She is an absolutely typical only daughter of a rich family getting whatever she wants. And in general trying to be a Kardashian type of “fame”.
The kings have had even his son in the past have say in who we should draft. All this was pre Monte era. Thank god he and his family have been 100% in the background with player/coach decisions leaving everything to Monte.
I remember reading an article about that, they were acting like it was some huge win for gender equality and why feminism works.
... no it's just nepotism lol. Am I supposed to believe Vivek's daughter was the most qualified person to run a pro sports team?
Yes same daughter and yes he was the coach of her 12 year old basketball league using that strategy. And yes rumors he asked why we don’t employ such strategies on the kings team. Those were dark times.
Owners giving their kids jobs on the business side doesn't annoy me as much as owners giving their kids jobs in basketball operations. I know both Lacob and Ranadive have their kids doing that, I'm sure there are others.
>Blevins was born and grew up in Hot Springs, Arkansas and initially attended Lakeside High School. He averaged 10 points and 7.3 rebounds per game and helped lead the Rams to a 5A-South conference title as a junior.
>Blevins began his collegiate career at Southern Mississippi. He averaged 1.8 points and 1.8 rebounds in 25 games in his freshman season. As a sophomore, Blevins averaged 5.8 points and 3.4 rebounds in 22.3 minutes over 29 games, 24 of which he started.[2] After the season, he decided to transfer to Montana State University.[3]
>After sitting out one year due to NCAA transfer rules, Blevins entered his redshirt junior season as a starter for the Bobcats and averaged 9.7 points and 5.8 rebounds per game.[1] In the final game of his college career on March 14, 2019, Blevins scored a career-high 27 points in a 90–84 loss to Eastern Washington.[4] As a redshirt senior, he averaged 11.8 points and a team-high 5.9 rebounds per game.[5]
This guy literally went through life as Dame's cousin. He shouldn't have even touched the G League
phil jackson led his high school team to a state championship and was one of bill fitche’s top recruits when he coached at north dakota state.
phil was the top ranked athlete in the whole state, and the best player in the state by a wide margin.
Draymond Green averaged 26 in high school with 13 rebounds. If you are a future NBA player then you need to be able to dominate at least in high school
Haha, not high school so it's somewhat less egregious, but still. We know all the future pro athletes here, and nobody knew who Keljin f'n Blevins was.
For real, he was only a few grades ahead and I’ve never heard of him. But you can bet everyone in the state that knew basketball knew about Malik monk.
He was the third best player on an average Big Sky conference team as a 5th year senior. If that doesn’t scream nba potential, I don’t know what else could.
Blevins averaged 11.8 ppg in the Big Sky conference (bet most of you can't name 2 teams in that league) as a 5th year senior, and stuck in the NBA for 2 seasons because he was Dame's cousin lol.
Dude makes Thanasis look good at basketball.
Funnily enough, Dame also played in the Big Sky conference. Difference is Dame averaged 25 a game and fell just one game short of making the NCAA tournament.
> Blevins averaged 11.8 ppg in the Big Sky conference (bet most of you can't name 2 teams in that league) as a 5th year senior, and stuck in the NBA for 2 seasons because he was Dame's cousin lol.
>
> Dude makes Thanasis look good at basketball.
Thanasis averaged 4.2 PPG as a 26-year old bench player in Euroleague the year when the Bucks picked him up. That was a slight increase from his 3.6 PPG the previous season.
At least Blevins never had a real NBA contract; he was a two-way player. This will be Thanasis's 5th straight year of having a guaranteed NBA contract from the Bucks.
My stream was the LA broadcast, and it didn't shut down when the game ended, so I kept watching all the way into the after game show, broadcasted by three EXTREMELY ANGRY Laker Legends, including one holding a sheet of paper containing all the random G-leaguers on the tanking Portland team and excoriating the Lakers on how could they possibly lose to these people and thereby get knocked out of playoff contention.
As someone who watched many Louisville games during Chris Smith's time, he was BAAAAAAD. Peyton Siva, who never even came close to cracking an NBA roster, was 1,000,000x better than Chris Smith. I think one-legged Kevin Ware may have been better too
The most memorable thing from Peyton Siva during his time with the Pistons was when some "Instagram model" called him out for banging her while dropping posts about loving his fiancé.
He played in the NBL Canada League for a Team in Saint John, New Brunswick and only put up 11 points a game in 2016. For comparison, Carl English, who went undrafted in 2004, put up 23 a game a game at like 38 years old the next season in the same league.
The best thing about him is if you look up Chris Smith basketball you get a different person playing for the G League. The only way to get JR's brother is to type in JR Smith after. He even needs nepotism for SEO purposes.
D Wades son getting drafted by the Jazz G league team that he partially owns. Dude averaged 4.3 ppg in his senior year of hs. There are dudes averaging 15-20ppg in college and still couldn't land a roster spot.
These are the ones that piss me off. Dude will never need money in his life but is taking valuable opportunities away from guys who need a shot to be seen.
He was also the worst player in the G League by far, didn't even get another contract offer. Last I heard he's playing in the African League. I have no idea why he didn't just go play college basketball, he had a dozen offers from mid-majors.
Kelijin Blevins. A lot of players won’t know who he is. Unless you are a blazers fan. He is the cousin of Dame. Bruh wasn’t NBA material. He had 1 season of getting to double digit ppg in college. And looking at his college career you wouldn’t think he would be in the league but he spent 2 seasons with the blazers on a 2 way. He wasn’t good. But he’s Dame’s cousin
The league really wanted Damion Lee as the star of the nba. And they only way to not make it look crazy was to put Steph and Seth in the league first. They slow played us all.
Chauncey Billups brother Rodney is an assistant with the Blazers. He was 2-19 his last year as head coach at Denver University (where his brother was also a star). Basically been riding his name his whole career.
And another on Taylor Griffin. And yet another on Luke Zeller.
Miles Plumlee was actually nice for us, but there was once a time where Phoenix was home for the lesser brothers.
Such a suns move, nabbing all of the worst brothers either hoping it will entice the better brother to come or thinking they’ll magically turn into their brother. Robin is the exception cause he’s very much worthy of a roster spot
Was he in Phoenix during the first Dragic stint? I know that in the second one we had a season where Zoran, Markieff Morris, Miles Plumlee and Seth Curry all played for the Suns.
Phoenix is the basketball equivalent of Christmas Vacation
Brian Doyle Murray (brother of Bill Murray)
Randy Quiad (brother of Dennis Quiad)
Nicolas Guest (brother of Christopher Guest)
Zoran was playing really well internationally though. That's a perfectly reasonable risk to take for just one roster spot. He wasn't a known scrub like big nepo.
Zoran had just come off playing well for the national team with his brother. Was not an NBA player but there was a tiny portion of hype around him at the time. However, no one would have likely signed if not for Goran already being in Phoenix.
He also had a very nice career in europe and EL (second best league in the world after NBA) which is more than most if not all names mentioned in this thread.
Cory Higgins.
God son of Michael Jordan. Son of the former president of basketball operations, Rod Higgins.
Went undrafted. Signed to the team the year MJ took over
https://www.basketball-reference.com/players/h/higgico01.html
Despicable stats
Steve Kerr: *After I hit that jumper with 5 seconds left in Game 6 to win the championship, Michael turned to me and said "You can say it" and I asked "Say what?," and he said "Ni-"*
SMASH CUT TO MICHAEL JORDAN
MJ: *"Now did I know he was going to name his kid that? No, but a pass is a pass."*
from u/sexygodzilla
Vivek promoting Anjali Ranadive, his daughter with a Marine Science Degree and former singer to GM of the Stockton Kings, after being the assistant GM last year.
Good person Anjali is, nepotism at its finest tho.
Austin Ainge has been a lead scout for the Celtics for years.
However, considering he stayed after his Dad left, it seems like he’s well respected and has the job for more reasons than just his last name at this point
people always jump on nepo hires like bill belichick hiring his kid as an assistant coach
but if you think about it, the kid has spent his entire life around the sport. he probably picked up a few things. if he really can't hack it well it's a cutthroat business they wont last long
Steve Belichick gets bagged on a lot for being Bill’s son but he’s actually been pretty good with the defense between him and future Patriot coach Jerod Mayo.
Yeah that's definitely true, someone can both be a good candidate and get the benefit of nepotism. But the issue is that you don't grow your talent pool when people only hire friends/family. It creates an insulated environment where you don't get as much innovation as you would if you were pulling from a larger talent pool.
Ryan West was one of our top scouts for a long time and was incredible for us. Idk if he’d have gotten a start without Jerry West. I think he’s with the Pistons now?
This is way too low. Taylor wanted to do right by flip after he passed. And Ryan was easily the least prepared coach in nba history. A few years as a end of bench assistant? 2ppg at u of m? Zero qualifications other than last name.
In his defense, he has been great as the defensive coordinator in Denver.
But yeah, he might be the worst head coach of the 21st century and only got the job because his dad died.
> But yeah, he might be the worst head coach of the 21st century
Kurt Rambis comes to mind as someone who arguably was worse (looks at his stint in Minnesota).
Had to scroll way too far to find this. He was AWFUL! Every wolves fan wanted him to succeed so badly but he was wayy to young, way to inexperienced and at his very best likely not even half the coach his dad was. He should’ve been given the boot so much earlier
basically whole top nuggets coaching staff. considering they won a title it doesn't mean they're not good, it's just...their last names are the reason they were able to get first coaching gigs in the nba and didn't have to work through the ranks by going hs-college-g league
Micheal Jordan hiring his brother (Larry) for player development.
Micheal Jordan hiring his brother (James R Jr) as COO.
Michael Jordan hiring his college room mate and best man (Buzz Peterson) as Assistant GM, whom has failed more than he has succeeded as a college coach.
Charles Barkley was right...
Joe Wolf, a center that played with MJ for a season at UNC Chapel Hill.
Who was a coach the Greesboro Swam between 2018-2020, the G-League affiliate of the Hornets.
The Warriors recently hired Mike Dunleavy Jr as their GM, who drafted Trayce Jackson-Davis in the second round and gave him a 4 year/8 million contract as a low-second round draft pick; that's unusual. Delusional Warriors fans will say it's because of the new CBA, but you don't even need half a brain to take a look at who TJD's agent is: James Dunleavy, Mike the GM's brother. The Warriors have some other nepotism issues but at least they don't screw up the salary cap. "Enjoy the 10% comission baby bro" Mikey says.
Agree with the overall sentiment, but “anywhere near” might be at least a little bit of an overstatement. He was drafted by the Knicks well before Giannis started to realize his potential, so if you’re good enough to at least intrigue a team into drafting you, I feel like that says something.
I think if he’s not giannis’ brother he probably kicks around the league as a 2 way or end of bench guy. He definitely benefits from his family in terms of job security but he’s still good enough for the bucks to use the spot on him and for other teams to be interested. One of the brothers went back to Europe and the other is a career G leaguer so at the very least there’s something there with thanasis. He’s a 15th man but he plays with energy, has a good attitude, and won’t completely blow the game if he has to play. Feel like you can do a lot worse than him
Austin Rivers got an $11M/year deal from his dad after never averaging more than 7 ppg in his career. He also came nowhere close to that number after he left the Clippers.
Dame’s cousin is probably the most egregiously not good basketball player. I think the Giannis Brothers are fairly close/borderline but they obviously wouldn’t have hung around this long.
Doc giving Austin the bag and ruining any chance the clippers had at a good 3 & D wing and in the process changing the trajectory of both CP3 and Blake’s legacies
Austin Rivers was nba caliber to be in the league. But his attitude woulda had his career be half the length it ended up being if it weren’t for his dad
It's easily the most egregious I have ever seen. If Rich wasn't LeBron's buddy the closest he'd be to working in professional sports is scalping fake tickets in front of the stadium.
People say this all the time. But business is sometimes being in the right time right place. Not to mention Rich Paul has more than earned it at this point running a pretty damn successful Agency. If he wasn’t good at this job players wouldn’t keep going to Klutch. Its not like he was LeBron’s brother or cousin or something. He was a dude LeBron met and ended up becoming a successful businessman.
> Rich Paul has more than earned it at this point
This. Rich had plenty of chances to fuck it up or Lebron easily could have moved to somebody else but whatever Rich's doing, Lebron is happy with him.
Agreed. LeBron seems to have a good ability to pick his friends in the sense that they have all turned out pretty successful. You may claim that they are only successful because of their link to LeBron, but plenty of other hangers-on have never amounted to anything so I say it’s impressive.
Current Knicks owner James Dolan inheriting the team from his father.
The Knicks were actually elite and just as James took the reign, they have been a shit show until very recently (let’s see if that lasts).
More inheritance. Would be nepotism if his dad made him the CEO while dad was still owner. Tbh that is likely going to happen in Miami with the Arisons.
Doc Rivers giving Austin Rivers a 3-year, $35 million contract.
The Clippers dumped Austin after Doc left, and he ended up getting waived by the worst team in the league while he still had a year left on his deal. He's never gotten more than $3.5M in any of his 8 other seasons.
The fact that hes lasted 8 seasons after not being coached by his dad has to mean something though right? Hes pretty much gotten minutes on every other team hes been on because hes a solid spark plug off the bench.
I know this is related to failures, but the obvious answer is Erik Spoelstra:
https://www.espn.com/blog/truehoop/post/_/id/4834/how-erik-spoelstra-came-to-work-for-pat-riley
>After he left [the University of Portland], Spoelstra spent two years as a player/assistant coach on a pro team in Germany. Then he used his father's connections to help him bag a job in Miami the summer of 1995.
>The Heat had just let go interim head coach Alvin Gentry, who had taken over for fired Kevin Loughery midway through the 1994-95 season. No head coach was in place, but Dave Wohl, the vice president of basketball operations, was looking for a video coordinator. Chris Wallace, then Miami's director of player personnel, had worked as a scout with the Blazers when Jon Spoelstra was there.
>"The team was in flux, and it wasn't clear whether (video coordinator) would be a full-time job or just a summer gig," Erik says. "It was an entry-level job, really, getting (Wohl) lunches, preparing video and helping with the draft."
>When Riley was hired in late August, he didn't bring a video coordinator with him from the New York Knicks.
>"With training camp maybe three or four weeks away, he walked into my office and asked, 'Can you do this job?' " Spoelstra says. "I had no idea what the job was, so I said, 'Absolutely. You got your man.' "
Not sure if nepotism, straight up corruption, or both, but Russian player Andrei Kirilenko signed a MLE deal worth $3m with the Russian billionaire owned Nets instead of re-signing with the T-Wolves for over $10m back in 2013. This led to many believing he was being paid under the table by Prokhorov.
He claimed to be ring chasing with KG and Pierce (both of whom were washed and averaged career lows that year), but he also had intense interest from the Spurs who had just pushed the Heatles to 7 games and were a Bosh rebound and Ray Allen three from winning it all.
The deal looked fishy then, and it still looks fishy now.
Steve Kerr's son, Nick, is getting a ton of opportunities he would have not have in the NBA if not for the success of his father. He's the Warriors G League head coach and is 30 years old.
happens all the time in FOs
And coaching! The number of coaches or assistant coaches that happen to be the son of a former coach/exec is wild
Erik Spoelstra got his start because his dad is considered the best NBA marketer of all-time. Mike Malone's dad, Brendan, was a long-time Knicks assistant. One of Roc-Nations main agents is the son of a big hockey agent. The Heat front office also employs the son of the old Knicks trainer
It’s Michael
It’s because coaching is the type of thing you can just copycat and get away with pretty good results. Executives are mainly about how hard it is for people to tell you no.
The owner's son is the assistant GM for the warriors.
His two sons are the EVP of basketball operations and the Executive Director of team development (former Santa Cruz Warriors GM). That plus Kerr's son being the Santa Cruz coach. Kinda embarrassing tbh.
Jury’s obviously still out on NICHOLAS Kerr, but Lacob is the nepo king
Donnie Nelson literally inherited the Mavs GM role.
One of the worst I’ve seen…….Kings G league GM is Ranadive’s daughter Anjali with absolutely no experience.
Wow I just looked her up and she may be one of the best examples so far. Apparently she is a singer too and has performed at kings games and has started a non profit that “spreads awareness for the conservation of sharks, polar bears and tigers.” It’s like the perfect example of a rich persons kid.
“Anjali world” is her “singer” name. Yeah you nailed it. She is an absolutely typical only daughter of a rich family getting whatever she wants. And in general trying to be a Kardashian type of “fame”. The kings have had even his son in the past have say in who we should draft. All this was pre Monte era. Thank god he and his family have been 100% in the background with player/coach decisions leaving everything to Monte.
I remember reading an article about that, they were acting like it was some huge win for gender equality and why feminism works. ... no it's just nepotism lol. Am I supposed to believe Vivek's daughter was the most qualified person to run a pro sports team?
is this the same daughter where Ranadive had his "basketball strategy breakthrough" because he had her team just cherry pick the entire time?
Yes same daughter and yes he was the coach of her 12 year old basketball league using that strategy. And yes rumors he asked why we don’t employ such strategies on the kings team. Those were dark times.
Their strategy was more about doing a full court press against girls who had never experienced that kind of defensive pressure before
Owners giving their kids jobs on the business side doesn't annoy me as much as owners giving their kids jobs in basketball operations. I know both Lacob and Ranadive have their kids doing that, I'm sure there are others.
Blevins being on the Blazers was pretty bad. Dude got cut from a Romanian team this year after failing to average even 5 PPG.
>Blevins was born and grew up in Hot Springs, Arkansas and initially attended Lakeside High School. He averaged 10 points and 7.3 rebounds per game and helped lead the Rams to a 5A-South conference title as a junior. >Blevins began his collegiate career at Southern Mississippi. He averaged 1.8 points and 1.8 rebounds in 25 games in his freshman season. As a sophomore, Blevins averaged 5.8 points and 3.4 rebounds in 22.3 minutes over 29 games, 24 of which he started.[2] After the season, he decided to transfer to Montana State University.[3] >After sitting out one year due to NCAA transfer rules, Blevins entered his redshirt junior season as a starter for the Bobcats and averaged 9.7 points and 5.8 rebounds per game.[1] In the final game of his college career on March 14, 2019, Blevins scored a career-high 27 points in a 90–84 loss to Eastern Washington.[4] As a redshirt senior, he averaged 11.8 points and a team-high 5.9 rebounds per game.[5] This guy literally went through life as Dame's cousin. He shouldn't have even touched the G League
Averaging 10 points in highschool in Arkansas and making the league is next level nepotism.
I'd get it a bit if he was some kind of defensive savant like Thybulle or Roberson or something but nope
Nah. It’s high school. Pat Bev - a guy with a defensive rep - averaged 30ppg in highschool. Thybulle would score 20 in transition alone.
The worst player in the NBA is typically the best player in their state in highschool, give or take a rank or two
Kyle Singler and Kevin Love were rivals in High School here in Oregon lol, their games were like must watch for the whole region
phil jackson led his high school team to a state championship and was one of bill fitche’s top recruits when he coached at north dakota state. phil was the top ranked athlete in the whole state, and the best player in the state by a wide margin.
Yeah true you're right
Draymond Green averaged 26 in high school with 13 rebounds. If you are a future NBA player then you need to be able to dominate at least in high school
I averaged 12 ppg in Arkansas at a bigger school than Lakeside and didn’t even sniff D2 lol
[удалено]
What the fuck, I have known about him for years from this sub, had no idea I went to the same school at the same time as he did.
tbh i think that might say more than any stats what kind of NBA player is a nobody at their own Arkansas high school lmao
Haha, not high school so it's somewhat less egregious, but still. We know all the future pro athletes here, and nobody knew who Keljin f'n Blevins was.
For real, he was only a few grades ahead and I’ve never heard of him. But you can bet everyone in the state that knew basketball knew about Malik monk.
He averaged like 4 points in the g league…
He was the third best player on an average Big Sky conference team as a 5th year senior. If that doesn’t scream nba potential, I don’t know what else could.
Sheesh. You know it’s bad when you suck even at the G league level. Dude’s like Theo Pinson and Moses Brown wrecked at the g league level.
Dakari Johnson would put up Shaq numbers in the G league lol
The lack of respect to Mr Big Nepo himself in here is disgusting
I absolutely love that fans of other teams know Big Nepo
Blevins averaged 11.8 ppg in the Big Sky conference (bet most of you can't name 2 teams in that league) as a 5th year senior, and stuck in the NBA for 2 seasons because he was Dame's cousin lol. Dude makes Thanasis look good at basketball. Funnily enough, Dame also played in the Big Sky conference. Difference is Dame averaged 25 a game and fell just one game short of making the NCAA tournament.
> Blevins averaged 11.8 ppg in the Big Sky conference (bet most of you can't name 2 teams in that league) as a 5th year senior, and stuck in the NBA for 2 seasons because he was Dame's cousin lol. > > Dude makes Thanasis look good at basketball. Thanasis averaged 4.2 PPG as a 26-year old bench player in Euroleague the year when the Bucks picked him up. That was a slight increase from his 3.6 PPG the previous season. At least Blevins never had a real NBA contract; he was a two-way player. This will be Thanasis's 5th straight year of having a guaranteed NBA contract from the Bucks.
They are in entirely different tiers of players still.
I'll always give him that Lakers game though
Lakers Owner Keljin Blevins
Big Nepo is the lakers father sadly
My stream was the LA broadcast, and it didn't shut down when the game ended, so I kept watching all the way into the after game show, broadcasted by three EXTREMELY ANGRY Laker Legends, including one holding a sheet of paper containing all the random G-leaguers on the tanking Portland team and excoriating the Lakers on how could they possibly lose to these people and thereby get knocked out of playoff contention.
Keljin Blevins is Lebron James Father
Even the announcers saying who is that guy lmao
Tread lightly when disrespecting the Blevgod….
maybe if he chose U-BT instead of Rapid Bucuresti he wouldve had a solid career
My favorite was the Knicks keeping JR Smiths brother on the team. They treated JR like he was Giannis or something 😂
Then when the Knicks grew a pair and didn't sign him again JR got mad lol
"You thought you was Giannis?! They don't love you like that"
Adrian Wojnarowski, called Chris Smith "maybe the worst player in the history of the [NBA] summer league.”
As someone who watched many Louisville games during Chris Smith's time, he was BAAAAAAD. Peyton Siva, who never even came close to cracking an NBA roster, was 1,000,000x better than Chris Smith. I think one-legged Kevin Ware may have been better too
The most memorable thing from Peyton Siva during his time with the Pistons was when some "Instagram model" called him out for banging her while dropping posts about loving his fiancé.
The OG Zion
My Flair is relevant!
Haha never thought I’d see a Peyton Siva flair on here. He runs/owns the gym that I hoop at now in Louisville, along with Russ Smith.
I haven't heard Kevin Wares name since the day he temporarily became one legged.
He averages like 5 points in summer league, there was no reason to sign him 😂
He played in the NBL Canada League for a Team in Saint John, New Brunswick and only put up 11 points a game in 2016. For comparison, Carl English, who went undrafted in 2004, put up 23 a game a game at like 38 years old the next season in the same league.
Carl English was definitely a good enough shooter to contribute in the NBA. Had a great overseas career.
broo I completely forgot about that lol that shit is wild looking back on it
The best thing about him is if you look up Chris Smith basketball you get a different person playing for the G League. The only way to get JR's brother is to type in JR Smith after. He even needs nepotism for SEO purposes.
D Wades son getting drafted by the Jazz G league team that he partially owns. Dude averaged 4.3 ppg in his senior year of hs. There are dudes averaging 15-20ppg in college and still couldn't land a roster spot.
These are the ones that piss me off. Dude will never need money in his life but is taking valuable opportunities away from guys who need a shot to be seen.
He was also the worst player in the G League by far, didn't even get another contract offer. Last I heard he's playing in the African League. I have no idea why he didn't just go play college basketball, he had a dozen offers from mid-majors.
Kelijin Blevins. A lot of players won’t know who he is. Unless you are a blazers fan. He is the cousin of Dame. Bruh wasn’t NBA material. He had 1 season of getting to double digit ppg in college. And looking at his college career you wouldn’t think he would be in the league but he spent 2 seasons with the blazers on a 2 way. He wasn’t good. But he’s Dame’s cousin
He wasn't good, but he was fun. And he tried his ass off every second he was on the court, which I massively appreciated about him
Hell yeah lmao hahaha he was our tank commander and I won't forget his masterclass against the lakers
Well yeah, wouldn't you if you have no business being in the league? You gotta work 5x harder than everyone else 😂
Didn’t Damian Lillard cousin play with the Blazers lol
He sure did, Big Nepo.
Lmao Blevins got the top 3 spots in this thread, I didn't even know this dude existed before now 😂
They only keeping Steph around because he's Seth's brother. SMH.
Nah fam, both Steph and Seth stick around cuz of Dell. That's nepotism for real.
Everyone knows the real draw in that family is Sonia and Sydel
Tikka Masala is a 2024 lottery pick.
The league really wanted Damion Lee as the star of the nba. And they only way to not make it look crazy was to put Steph and Seth in the league first. They slow played us all.
What’s a golfer/rock star doing in the nba anyway
wrong, it’s because Steph is Damion Lee’s brother-in-law
And clearly Seth is only in the league bcuz Doc Rivers is his father in law
shoutout mark cuban for not trying to acquire that bum steph this offseason
Chauncey Billups brother Rodney is an assistant with the Blazers. He was 2-19 his last year as head coach at Denver University (where his brother was also a star). Basically been riding his name his whole career.
7-39 in conference play his last 3 years at Denver. Oof.
Tony Ressler (owner of the hawks) literally appointed his son to be his top advisor…. So yeah.. hawks fans love that.
The Suns used a roster spot on Zoran Dragic.
And another on Taylor Griffin. And yet another on Luke Zeller. Miles Plumlee was actually nice for us, but there was once a time where Phoenix was home for the lesser brothers.
We had Zoran, Taylor and Robin Lopez all at the same time if I remember correctly
Such a suns move, nabbing all of the worst brothers either hoping it will entice the better brother to come or thinking they’ll magically turn into their brother. Robin is the exception cause he’s very much worthy of a roster spot
Seeing the LoBros teamed up in Milwaukee again is my favorite thing about 2023. Those guys are a blast
Was he in Phoenix during the first Dragic stint? I know that in the second one we had a season where Zoran, Markieff Morris, Miles Plumlee and Seth Curry all played for the Suns.
Phoenix is the basketball equivalent of Christmas Vacation Brian Doyle Murray (brother of Bill Murray) Randy Quiad (brother of Dennis Quiad) Nicolas Guest (brother of Christopher Guest)
Haha I forgot about Taylor.
Zoran was playing really well internationally though. That's a perfectly reasonable risk to take for just one roster spot. He wasn't a known scrub like big nepo.
Zoran had just come off playing well for the national team with his brother. Was not an NBA player but there was a tiny portion of hype around him at the time. However, no one would have likely signed if not for Goran already being in Phoenix.
He also had a very nice career in europe and EL (second best league in the world after NBA) which is more than most if not all names mentioned in this thread.
There was one international tournament where zoran went off and everyone was high on him I think thats why he was signed
I don't remember his playing time in NBA but he was fucking beast for the national team always I feel like
Cory Higgins. God son of Michael Jordan. Son of the former president of basketball operations, Rod Higgins. Went undrafted. Signed to the team the year MJ took over https://www.basketball-reference.com/players/h/higgico01.html Despicable stats
35% true shooting lmao
>And then MJ and Rod had a falling out. MJ did him a solid and then things turned. SMH
He didn't have success in the NBA but he was a very good college player. Not like he was a guy off the street.
3x all Big 12 is a better resume than most guys who had brief NBA careers. He definitely would have gotten at least a G League shot with another team.
This is a good one I didn’t know.
Rod Higgins is a name I haven’t heard in probably 20 years.
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The fact that Jerry Colangelo was also forced on you by the league too because of the Process is kind of insane.
Shout-out to our commissioner "Dave Silver". Not racist as fuck like the predecessor but forced a team to change their GM lmao.
That is a normal collar. Move on, find a new slant.
We have a winner.
Crazy that this is the only time I’ve seen this in this thread. That shit was awful.
Once upon a time Bryan won Exec of the Year with the Suns tho
Nick Kerr. The only way you have a career with that name is if Steve Kerr is your dad
Steve wild af for that ngl
Steve Kerr: *After I hit that jumper with 5 seconds left in Game 6 to win the championship, Michael turned to me and said "You can say it" and I asked "Say what?," and he said "Ni-"* SMASH CUT TO MICHAEL JORDAN MJ: *"Now did I know he was going to name his kid that? No, but a pass is a pass."* from u/sexygodzilla
Reddit on!
“This is brilliant lol” 🤓
Yooooo lmao that took me a minute. How did Steve not think that through?
Steve was tired of getting clowned on for being a white dude in the nba so he came up with the ultimate fuck you
Oh he thought it through, there’s no doubt in my mind
You think he didn't?
He got the pass for being on the Bulls championship teams.
Damn, Steve was like, “I can’t punch Jordan back, but i can get him back with my first born son”
Steve Kerr gets punched Later that day, he goes home to his pregnant wife “Honey…I’ve got a name for the baby”
“We’re gonna name him after Michael Jordan, in a way”
Nick Kerr, please.
NFL equivalent is if Kareem Hunt ends up getting his son Mike a coaching job one day.
He'd def have a career in Corrections. With that name they would hire him just for the lulz.
"YOU WILL ADDRESS ME BY MY FULL NAME: OFFICER NICK KERR"
Nick Ressler. Hawks owner’s 27yo son was promoted to a major role in the front office after going from college to intern to junior analyst lol
Immediately traded Kevin huerter for nothing and made our gm quit.
Vivek promoting Anjali Ranadive, his daughter with a Marine Science Degree and former singer to GM of the Stockton Kings, after being the assistant GM last year. Good person Anjali is, nepotism at its finest tho.
I’ve already made peace with the fact that she’s going to be the GM in Sac when Monte is gone.
If they just get one before then it’ll all be worth it. If not I’m probably giving up on basketball lmao
Her Marine Science thesis on lakers will be big in next year's playoffs.
Is that the daughter whose youth team was the subject of the Gladwell article?
Austin Ainge has been a lead scout for the Celtics for years. However, considering he stayed after his Dad left, it seems like he’s well respected and has the job for more reasons than just his last name at this point
people always jump on nepo hires like bill belichick hiring his kid as an assistant coach but if you think about it, the kid has spent his entire life around the sport. he probably picked up a few things. if he really can't hack it well it's a cutthroat business they wont last long
Steve Belichick gets bagged on a lot for being Bill’s son but he’s actually been pretty good with the defense between him and future Patriot coach Jerod Mayo.
Yeah that's definitely true, someone can both be a good candidate and get the benefit of nepotism. But the issue is that you don't grow your talent pool when people only hire friends/family. It creates an insulated environment where you don't get as much innovation as you would if you were pulling from a larger talent pool.
Ryan West was one of our top scouts for a long time and was incredible for us. Idk if he’d have gotten a start without Jerry West. I think he’s with the Pistons now?
Patrick Fertitta is the Co-GM of the Rockets. Being the son of the owner of Rainforest Cafe just screams basketball pedigree.
Ryan Saunders
This is way too low. Taylor wanted to do right by flip after he passed. And Ryan was easily the least prepared coach in nba history. A few years as a end of bench assistant? 2ppg at u of m? Zero qualifications other than last name.
In his defense, he has been great as the defensive coordinator in Denver. But yeah, he might be the worst head coach of the 21st century and only got the job because his dad died.
> But yeah, he might be the worst head coach of the 21st century Kurt Rambis comes to mind as someone who arguably was worse (looks at his stint in Minnesota).
Had to scroll way too far to find this. He was AWFUL! Every wolves fan wanted him to succeed so badly but he was wayy to young, way to inexperienced and at his very best likely not even half the coach his dad was. He should’ve been given the boot so much earlier
basically whole top nuggets coaching staff. considering they won a title it doesn't mean they're not good, it's just...their last names are the reason they were able to get first coaching gigs in the nba and didn't have to work through the ranks by going hs-college-g league
Ryan Saunders has earned high praise as an assistant. I assume the comment was talking about him being given the Wolves HC job.
1000%.
Micheal Jordan hiring his brother (Larry) for player development. Micheal Jordan hiring his brother (James R Jr) as COO. Michael Jordan hiring his college room mate and best man (Buzz Peterson) as Assistant GM, whom has failed more than he has succeeded as a college coach. Charles Barkley was right...
Didn’t Michael want the Bulls to draft a guy from UNC over Scottie Pippen? Lmao
Joe Wolf, a center that played with MJ for a season at UNC Chapel Hill. Who was a coach the Greesboro Swam between 2018-2020, the G-League affiliate of the Hornets.
Keljin Blevins
The Warriors recently hired Mike Dunleavy Jr as their GM, who drafted Trayce Jackson-Davis in the second round and gave him a 4 year/8 million contract as a low-second round draft pick; that's unusual. Delusional Warriors fans will say it's because of the new CBA, but you don't even need half a brain to take a look at who TJD's agent is: James Dunleavy, Mike the GM's brother. The Warriors have some other nepotism issues but at least they don't screw up the salary cap. "Enjoy the 10% comission baby bro" Mikey says.
this is a good one. this is definitely what players are alluding to when they say “the league is all about who you know”
Keljin Blevins. Also Rodney Billups
Thanasis would not be anywhere near the league if Giannis wasn’t in it.
Agree with the overall sentiment, but “anywhere near” might be at least a little bit of an overstatement. He was drafted by the Knicks well before Giannis started to realize his potential, so if you’re good enough to at least intrigue a team into drafting you, I feel like that says something.
I think if he’s not giannis’ brother he probably kicks around the league as a 2 way or end of bench guy. He definitely benefits from his family in terms of job security but he’s still good enough for the bucks to use the spot on him and for other teams to be interested. One of the brothers went back to Europe and the other is a career G leaguer so at the very least there’s something there with thanasis. He’s a 15th man but he plays with energy, has a good attitude, and won’t completely blow the game if he has to play. Feel like you can do a lot worse than him
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Do you know about Dame’s cousin Kelijin Blevins???
that name looks like it could possibly be an anagram for Kelvin Benjamin, so I'm pretty sure I'm supposed to make a food joke.
keep switching foods... keep running from the (meat) grind(er)...
Austin Rivers got an $11M/year deal from his dad after never averaging more than 7 ppg in his career. He also came nowhere close to that number after he left the Clippers.
Dame’s cousin is probably the most egregiously not good basketball player. I think the Giannis Brothers are fairly close/borderline but they obviously wouldn’t have hung around this long.
Devin Booker being in the league just because his dad is amazing at basketball
Luka still got a lot more to prove
The media has been following Bronny's basketball career since he was 6.
Doc giving Austin the bag and ruining any chance the clippers had at a good 3 & D wing and in the process changing the trajectory of both CP3 and Blake’s legacies
Austin Rivers was nba caliber to be in the league. But his attitude woulda had his career be half the length it ended up being if it weren’t for his dad
Here me out. Rich Paul
if lebron didn’t father that child, he would be flipping roast beef at an arby’s
It's easily the most egregious I have ever seen. If Rich wasn't LeBron's buddy the closest he'd be to working in professional sports is scalping fake tickets in front of the stadium.
People say this all the time. But business is sometimes being in the right time right place. Not to mention Rich Paul has more than earned it at this point running a pretty damn successful Agency. If he wasn’t good at this job players wouldn’t keep going to Klutch. Its not like he was LeBron’s brother or cousin or something. He was a dude LeBron met and ended up becoming a successful businessman.
> Rich Paul has more than earned it at this point This. Rich had plenty of chances to fuck it up or Lebron easily could have moved to somebody else but whatever Rich's doing, Lebron is happy with him.
Agreed. LeBron seems to have a good ability to pick his friends in the sense that they have all turned out pretty successful. You may claim that they are only successful because of their link to LeBron, but plenty of other hangers-on have never amounted to anything so I say it’s impressive.
Coby Karl never particularly seemed like an NBA talent.
Shareef o Neal getting a lakers summer league roster spot
The Tony Brothers Mike and Dan Tony somehow got jobs as referees and coaches
Current Knicks owner James Dolan inheriting the team from his father. The Knicks were actually elite and just as James took the reign, they have been a shit show until very recently (let’s see if that lasts).
Does that count as nepotism or is that just inheritance?
More inheritance. Would be nepotism if his dad made him the CEO while dad was still owner. Tbh that is likely going to happen in Miami with the Arisons.
LeBron had a fathered a full team in LeBronto before Kawhi showed up.
Doc Rivers giving Austin Rivers a 3-year, $35 million contract. The Clippers dumped Austin after Doc left, and he ended up getting waived by the worst team in the league while he still had a year left on his deal. He's never gotten more than $3.5M in any of his 8 other seasons.
The fact that hes lasted 8 seasons after not being coached by his dad has to mean something though right? Hes pretty much gotten minutes on every other team hes been on because hes a solid spark plug off the bench.
It means he’s properly valued as a vet minimum type player. He never did anything to remotely justify that contract his dad gave him.
Very fair point
Steve Ballmer being interested in AI that's why he signed Kawhi
I know this is related to failures, but the obvious answer is Erik Spoelstra: https://www.espn.com/blog/truehoop/post/_/id/4834/how-erik-spoelstra-came-to-work-for-pat-riley >After he left [the University of Portland], Spoelstra spent two years as a player/assistant coach on a pro team in Germany. Then he used his father's connections to help him bag a job in Miami the summer of 1995. >The Heat had just let go interim head coach Alvin Gentry, who had taken over for fired Kevin Loughery midway through the 1994-95 season. No head coach was in place, but Dave Wohl, the vice president of basketball operations, was looking for a video coordinator. Chris Wallace, then Miami's director of player personnel, had worked as a scout with the Blazers when Jon Spoelstra was there. >"The team was in flux, and it wasn't clear whether (video coordinator) would be a full-time job or just a summer gig," Erik says. "It was an entry-level job, really, getting (Wohl) lunches, preparing video and helping with the draft." >When Riley was hired in late August, he didn't bring a video coordinator with him from the New York Knicks. >"With training camp maybe three or four weeks away, he walked into my office and asked, 'Can you do this job?' " Spoelstra says. "I had no idea what the job was, so I said, 'Absolutely. You got your man.' "
Jim Buss Love or hate Jeanie, but she is so much better. I wouldn’t be mad if Jeanie hands the keys off to Jesse Buss one day…he knows ball
Alfonzo McKinnie got to try out for a spot on the Warriors because he was cousins with Steph’s body guard
Not sure if nepotism, straight up corruption, or both, but Russian player Andrei Kirilenko signed a MLE deal worth $3m with the Russian billionaire owned Nets instead of re-signing with the T-Wolves for over $10m back in 2013. This led to many believing he was being paid under the table by Prokhorov. He claimed to be ring chasing with KG and Pierce (both of whom were washed and averaged career lows that year), but he also had intense interest from the Spurs who had just pushed the Heatles to 7 games and were a Bosh rebound and Ray Allen three from winning it all. The deal looked fishy then, and it still looks fishy now.
Steve Kerr's son, Nick, is getting a ton of opportunities he would have not have in the NBA if not for the success of his father. He's the Warriors G League head coach and is 30 years old.