Former Sacramento Kings general manager Monte McNair has a new job.
ESPN’s Shams Charania reported Monday that McNair is joining the Los Angeles Clippers as an adviser. The move comes two months after McNair and the Kings agreed to part ways following a disappointing 2024-25 season.
McNair was named the 2023 NBA Executive of the Year after overseeing a remarkable turnaround in Sacramento. The Kings won 48 games under former coach Mike Brown to secure the No. 3 seed in the Western Conference, ending the longest playoff drought in NBA history after 16 consecutive losing seasons.
The Kings failed to build on that success, missing the playoffs the past two season after losing in the play-in tournament. McNair and Kings owner Vivek Ranadive agreed to part ways April 16, less than an hour after the Kings suffered a season-ending 120-106 play-in loss to the Dallas Mavericks at Golden 1 Center in Sacramento.
The Kings recently hired longtime NBA executive Scott Perry to replace McNair as the team’s general manager.
McNair spent five seasons in Sacramento, amassing a 195-205 (.488) record after being hired in 2020 to change the fortunes of a wayward franchise. The Kings reached the 40-win mark each of the past three seasons, but they had higher expectations this season after adding DeMar DeRozan to a core that already included De’Aaron Fox, Malik Monk, Kevin Huerter, Keegan Murray and Domantas Sabonis.
The Kings fired coach Mike Brown on Dec. 27 after going 13-18 to start the season. A midseason trade sent Fox to the San Antonio Spurs and Huerter to the Chicago Bulls while bringing Zach LaVine to Sacramento. There was more change late in the season when assistant general manager Wes Wilcox quit to become general manager of the University of Utah men’s basketball team and assistant coach Luke Loucks left to become head coach at Florida State.
McNair and Wilcox worked together to transform the Kings’ roster during their time in Sacramento. They re-signed Fox, drafted Murray and Tyrese Haliburton, and then traded Haliburton to the Indiana Pacers in a blockbuster deal for Sabonis.
The team’s talent improved dramatically, but there were always questions about the roster construction with a lack of size, length, defense and depth. The midseason additions of Jake LaRavia and Jonas Valanciunas addressed some of those concerns, but by then Fox had been traded, setting the stage for additional changes over the past four months.
This story was originally published June 16, 2025 at 1:18 PM.