Is there an NBA coach better than Erik Spoelstra?

There seems to be a general consensus that, in spite of disappointing team results the past two seasons, Erik Spoelstra remains the top coach in the NBA.

With Gregg Popovich reliquishing coaching duties in San Antonio due to health issues, Spoelstra is now the longest-tenured coach in the league, having taken over the Miami Heat in 2008. He was again named the best coach by league executives in their annual survey. And he was just elevated to US men's national team coach, after serving a tenure as an assistant.

But a new CBSSports.com ranking has Spoelstra behind a long-time nemesis.

That's Rick Carlisle, who is ranked in Tier 1 by himself (out of eight Tiers) with Spoelstra settling into Tier 2 at No. 2 overall.

Spoelstra is still classified as "elite," but here's the explanation for why he slightly slipped:

Erik Spoelstra has been the consensus best coach in the NBA for years now. When we started these rankings a season ago, I never for a moment believed he'd fall off his perch in future installments. The resume speaks for itself. Six Finals trips in the past 15 years. A seemingly endless supply of second-round picks and undrafted free agents developing into legitimate NBA players under his watch. An offense that, for years, balanced the talent of his stars with the need to keep the whole roster engaged. A defense that almost always overperformed. A culture so renowned that they put it on the jerseys. There's no such thing as a perfect coach, but if you let every fanbase pick one to lead their team, for the past half-decade or so, the universal answer would have been Spoelstra.

It still could be. Miami's roster has been a mess lately. But last year was probably the first true disappointment a Spoelstra team has experienced since the 2011 Finals. He's far from the only person in Miami culpable for the embarrassing Jimmy Butler saga, but it's ultimately the coach's job to keep locker room peace. From Feb. 1 on, only the Hornets were worse in fourth quarters as the Heat posted a staggeringly poor -12 net rating in final frames. Miami's conditioning and strategic brilliance have historically made them a great end-of-game team. Last year, they choked away game after game after game in the second half. The offense got stale. Was that the result of Butler's absence, or have the Heat gotten a bit complacent? There were even small game-management mistakes that you never used to see in Miami. Spoelstra cost the Heat a game against the Pistons by pulling a Chris Webber and calling a timeout he didn't have.

If your team hired Erik Spoelstra tomorrow, you'd still feel great about it. He's just not quite as bulletproof as he has been in years past. By his lofty standards, he just had a down year. Meanwhile, our No. 1 coach is coming off one of the best years of his career.Sam Quinn, CBSSports.com

Quinn is correct to note that Spoelstra did some uncharacteristic things last season, that timeout in Detroit sticking out. And it's no shame to be behind Carlisle. Heat fans well remember Carlisle's work from times before his latest Indiana Pacers stint. In the 2011 NBA Finals, Carlisle outmaneuvered a much less experienced Spoelstra, though Spoelstra being saddled with an oddly disengaged LeBron James also played a role.

Then Carlisle got the Pacers to the NBA Finals this past season, without a noted superstar and with a completely different play-style than he'd deployed in prior stops.

While Carlisle has had some great ones over the years, he's never been blessed with the sort of obvious juggernauts that his more famous counterparts like Pat Riley or Phil Jackson had. That's probably why he's rarely been a part of the discussion when it comes to the greatest coaches in NBA history. But after what we just witnessed, we really can't deny him his place in that group anymore. All Carlisle has done for the past two-and-a-half decades is exceed expectations. His teams win more than they should. His players grow beyond who we thought they could be. If there was any doubt, last spring punched Carlisle's ticket to the Hall of Fame, and it assured him the top spot among the league's current crop of coaches.Quinn

So it's a worthy choice.

But if Spoelstra can get the current, young Heat roster back into the top-4 in the East, there may be some reconsideration.

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