Golden State Warriors head coach Steve Kerr and San Antonio Spurs head coach Gregg Popovich meet after the game
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The Los Angeles Lakers have officially decided that Phil Jackson‘s place in franchise history deserves its respect. The Lakers announced that Jackson will receive a bronze statue outside Crypto.com Arena, with the unveiling scheduled for April 9, 2027.
Jackson’s statue joins Lakers legends including Kobe Bryant, Shaquille O’Neal, Jerry West, Magic Johnson, and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, among others. Lakers Governor Jeanie Buss announced:
“Phil Jackson defines championship basketball for a reason. His masterful approach to coaching brought out the best in some of the greatest athletes to ever play this game. After he accepted my dad’s invitation to join the Lakers, Phil’s unmatched creativity and commitment to excellence restored our championship legacy, bringing five titles and setting a standard of excellence for generations to come. It is a great joy to be able to mark that achievement with the statue he so richly deserves.”
It is a fitting tribute for the coach who won five championships and reached seven NBA Finals during his two stints in Los Angeles, adding another six titles with the Chicago Bulls. Jackson’s 11 championships as a head coach are the most in NBA history.
But Jackson isn’t the only coach whose career screams “statue.”
Coaches are often overlooked because the players are doing the heavy work on the court, but here are five coaches who have built cases for the same honor.
5. Larry Brown – Detroit Pistons
Mandatory Credit: Sam Sharpe-USA TODAY Sports
NBA Championships: 1
NBA Finals Appearances: 2*
Regular Season W/L Record: 108 – 56 (.659)*
Playoff W/L Record: 31 – 17 (.646)*
* Stats reflect Larry Brown’s stint with the Detroit Pistons only
Larry Brown’s career is one of the strangest in basketball history. He coached 22 NBA seasons, took multiple franchises from nowhere to relevance, and eventually captured the championship that had eluded him for decades.
His greatest accomplishment came with the 2003-04 Detroit Pistons, when he turned a defense-first group without a traditional superstar into NBA champions. Detroit defeated the heavily favored Shaq and Kobe Lakers in five games, and Brown’s ability to squeeze every ounce of basketball out of that roster was extraordinary.
He also led Philadelphia to the 2001 NBA Finals behind Allen Iverson, taking a team that was never supposed to go that far all the way to the championship series. His team won 56 games and reached the Finals, and he was also named Coach of the Year in 2001, giving him an individual award to go along with the championship that eventually followed.
But we feel Brown deserves a statue outside of Detroit because he ultimately fell short with the 76ers. His 2003-04 Pistons won 54 before going on that memorable playoff run and also made the Finals one season later but fell short against the San Antonio Spurs.
Overall, Brown’s teams were defined by discipline, defense, ball movement, and an obsessive attention to detail. He won 1,098 regular-season games over his career (31 with the Pistons in two seasons) and made the playoffs repeatedly with franchises that weren’t always loaded with talent.
And perhaps that’s the best argument for Brown: he was a basketball lifer who could walk into a situation and change the personality of a team. Brown is one of only a handful of coaches to win both an NBA championship and an NCAA championship, and his 2004 Pistons title is often remembered as the most unlikely to date.
A statue might be a stretch compared with the names above him, but Brown belongs in the conversation with the 76ers, but more likely, the Pistons.
4. Erik Spoelstra – Miami Heat
Mandatory Credit: Sam Navarro-Imagn Images
NBA Championships: 2
NBA Finals Appearances: 6
Regular Season W/L Record: 830 – 611 (.576)
Playoff W/L Record: 110 – 83 (.570)
Erik Spoelstra doesn’t have the ridiculous championship count of Jackson, Popovich, or Auerbach, but his longevity with the Miami Heat is almost as impressive in a different way. He became Miami’s head coach in 2008, replacing Pat Riley, and somehow turned from an assistant into one of the most respected coaches of his generation.
He has won two NBA championships, reached six NBA Finals, captured six Eastern Conference championships, and established himself as the winningest coach in Heat history.
The impressive part is how differently Spoelstra has won. He coached the famous LeBron James–Dwyane Wade–Chris Bosh superteam, winning back-to-back championships in 2012 and 2013. But he also took Miami to the Finals in 2020 with a completely different roster, built around Jimmy Butler, Bam Adebayo, and a collection of players who weren’t considered championship favorites entering the season.
That 2020 run inside the Orlando bubble was one of the best coaching achievements of his career. Spoelstra has consistently gotten teams to compete beyond expectations, regardless of whether Miami has been stacked with superstars or built around overlooked players.
And this is where Spoelstra’s statue case becomes particularly strong. He has spent his entire adult basketball life inside the Heat organization, working his way from video coordinator to head coach and then becoming the face of the franchise’s culture.
The Heat have gone 830-611 in the regular season and 110-83 in the playoffs under his leadership, with 12 playoff appearances and 23 playoff series victories. That kind of consistency is rare in professional sports.
Spoelstra doesn’t need another championship to validate his career. Another title would make the statue inevitable, but even now, his body of work already makes him one of the greatest coaches of the 21st century.
3. Steve Kerr – Golden State Warriors
Mandatory Credit: Jayne Kamin-Oncea-Imagn Images
NBA Championships: 4
NBA Finals Appearances: 6
Regular Season W/L Record: 604 – 353 (.631)
Playoff W/L Record: 104 – 48 (.684)
Steve Kerr walked into Golden State in 2014 and changed the NBA. His first season as head coach ended with a championship, and that was only the beginning. Kerr led the Warriors to four NBA championships during the dynasty’s defining run, including the 2015, 2017, 2018, and 2022 titles.
He also coached the Warriors to the historic 73-9 regular season in 2015-16, a record that stood as the league’s best regular-season mark until the Warriors themselves pushed the boundaries of modern basketball.
Kerr deserves enormous credit for understanding what Golden State could become. With Stephen Curry and Klay Thompson providing shooting, Kerr embraced pace, ball movement, and spacing in ways that forced the rest of the league to adjust. The Warriors were changing what NBA offense looked like.
Then came Kevin Durant, and Kerr successfully managed a roster overflowing with superstar talent without allowing the team to completely lose its identity. The Warriors became a dynasty, and Kerr’s fingerprints were all over that transformation.
There is also something important about Kerr’s longevity. The Warriors went from revolutionary to vulnerable, suffered injuries, and eventually fell out of contention, only to climb back to the top in 2022. That fourth championship mattered because it proved Kerr wasn’t simply the beneficiary of the original Curry-Thompson machine.
He could adapt as the roster changed and keep Golden State competitive across different eras of its dynasty. If the Warriors eventually put his face in bronze next to Curry, nobody should be surprised.
2. Gregg Popovich – San Antonio Spurs
Mandatory Credit: Rob Gray-Imagn Images
NBA Championships: 5
NBA Finals Appearances: 6
Regular Season W/L Record: 1,390 – 824 (.628)
Playoff W/L Record: 170 – 114 (.599)
Gregg Popovich‘s case might be the strongest example of a coach becoming synonymous with an entire franchise. He took over the San Antonio Spurs in 1996 and remained in charge for nearly three decades, guiding the franchise through multiple generations of players.
David Robinson, Tim Duncan, Tony Parker, Manu Ginobili, and eventually Kawhi Leonard all became central figures in a Spurs culture built around Popovich’s principles.
The result was five NBA championships, won in 1999, 2003, 2005, 2007, and 2014.
The Spurs kept reinventing themselves behind Pop’s leadership. They won their first title with Robinson and Duncan, continued winning with Duncan, Parker and Ginobili, then eventually found another championship-level formula with Leonard.
Popovich also became the NBA’s all-time leader in regular-season coaching victories, surpassing Don Nelson, while his teams became famous for unselfish basketball and purity of the game.
Popovich also left an enormous influence on the coaching profession. Steve Kerr, Mike Budenholzer, Mike Brown, Ime Udoka, and numerous other coaches came through the Spurs system or were influenced by it.
His five championships span three different decades, which tells you everything about his ability to evolve. Popovich eventually stepped away from coaching after health issues, but his legacy was already secure.
1. Red Auerbach – Boston Celtics
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NBA Championships: 9
NBA Finals Appearances: 11
Regular Season W/L Record: 938 – 481 (.661)
Playoff W/L Record: 99 – 69 (.589)
If we’re handing out coaching statues, Red Auerbach should probably be first in line. He didn’t just coach the Boston Celtics to countless championship wins; he helped create the Celtics as we know them.
From 1951 through 1966, Auerbach coached 1,192 games in Boston and led the franchise to nine NBA championships in 16 seasons. Even more absurdly, the Celtics won the championship in each of his final eight seasons as head coach.
Auerbach was a basketball innovator, a master motivator, and one of the first coaches to fully understand the importance of the fast break. His Celtics teams became synonymous with fast breaks, passing, and unselfish basketball.
He also helped break barriers, famously selecting Chuck Cooper as the first Black player drafted in the NBA in 1950. Then there’s the trophy case.
Nine championships as a head coach put Auerbach second only to Phil Jackson’s 11, and he was the architect of the Celtics dynasty that defined the league in the 1950s and 1960s.
Jackson may now have his statue in Los Angeles, but Auerbach’s place in Boston is arguably even more important. He established the Celtics culture, built the dynasty, and became one of the most influential figures in NBA history.
If Phil Jackson deserves bronze in Los Angeles, Red Auerbach deserves bronze in Boston without question.