Terry Porter Out As Sun’s Coach

It was being talked about “unofficially” yesterday during the ASG, but today the official announcement came down that Terry Porter was fired by the Phoenix Suns — his second firing as an NBA head coach — and assistant coach Alvin Gentry will take over the reigns for the remainder of the season. After only 4 months on the job, it was obvious that chemistry and coaching styles were an issue with this team.

The Suns were used to playing an up-tempo, free flowing style of basketball but under Porter it was more of a slowed down, half court style. Nobody suffered more under this playing style than Steve Nash who’s numbers are nowhere near where they’ve been the past few years which is evidenced by him not being selected as an All-Star this year in his hometown of Phoenix after a 4 year run of playing in the game.

Alvin Gentry being named interim coach almost assures that the team will go back to its run-and-gun style that it’s been known for the past few years as he was a part of Mike D’Antoni’s staff. Right now the Suns are in 9th place in the west and we’ll see if they can make a strong push for the playoffs with Gentry at the helm. However, if they’re still considering trading Amare Stoudamire, they can forget about making the playoffs at all.