Pistons situation shows danger of signing coaches before bosses

After five years working as general manager of the New Orleans Pelicans under team president David Griffin, Trajan Langdon is the new boss of the Detroit Pistons. This means he's inherited two important underlings that he didn't hire himself: General manager Troy Weaver and head coach Monty Williams, both of whom are on long-term deals.

Less than two years ago, Weaver signed a contract extension, which wasn't revealed until December 2022. It reportedly extended his contract through the 2027-28 season.

Williams signed to be the Pistons head coach last summer for a then-record six years and $78.5M, plus team options for the seventh and eighth years that could make the deal worth over $100M. Detroit had to pay a premium to convince Williams to take the job since the Phoenix Suns still owed him $21M after firing him earlier in the summer.

But after the Pistons finished with the NBA's worst record (14-68), three games worse than when they also had the worst record in 2022-23, The Athletic reported that Langdon is allowed to fire Weaver and Williams, despite the tens of millions it would cost.

At the time, it seemed premature to give out a record-breaking contract to coach the worst team in the league. Williams was hired by owner Tom Gores after Gores rejected the front office's far cheaper head coach options, assistant coaches Charles Lee and Kevin Ollie. Gores' decision to extend Weaver also appears to have been rash, part of why it wasn't revealed for months.

It's always dangerous to lock in a coach or a GM before deciding who their boss will be. Phoenix may face a similar situation. New owner Mat Ishbia has only been in charge of the team for a little over a year, and he's already on his third head coach, with Mike Budenholzer succeeding Frank Vogel, who succeeded Williams. But with front office changes reportedly coming, it appears hired the coach before hiring his boss.

Perhaps Ishbia and Gores are wealthy enough that eating salaries of coaches and executives doesn't matter to them. But the turnover shows that the team president should be the first hire, not the last one. It also indicates that the true bosses aren't the team presidents, but the owners.