Odds Are Against Donovan Making a Smooth Transition

Jun 01, 12:20 AM

Current Headlines: MIAMI _ Any opinion on Billy Donovan's decision to go pro is made with one giant assumption already in place: That he'll fail.

The NBA is a graveyard for college coaches who tried to make the jump. In it lie Mike Montgomery, Lon Kruger, Tim Floyd, Leonard Hamilton, John Calipari, Rick Pitino and Jerry Tarkanian _ all great college coaches who found the game just doesn't translate as easily for the clipboard holders as it does for the athletes who play it.

So the idea of Donovan going from the highest level of success with the Florida Gators to the absolute mediocrity of the Orlando Magic comes with a feeling of inevitable failure _ the only hope being that the gigantic bags of money thrown at the coach somehow soften the blow.

It would seem unfair to make that deduction before the ink on his new contract is even dry. Donovan, after all, is a two-time national champion who reached three NCAA title games in seven years, which none of the previous coaches who attempted the switch can claim.

NEW CHALLENGES

Unfortunately for Billy the Kid, it's not unfair at all. Because it's true. The NBA is no place for college coaches with no previous training. And not even Donovan, a formerly pudgy Providence point guard who has seemed to overcome long odds at every level of his basketball career, is suited for success.

If it's the endless cycle of recruiting that was tiring Donovan at the collegiate level, he just replaced that with the near-impossible task of managing professional egos, the inevitable clash with his front office about personnel decisions and the immense pressure to win right away and win regularly. That doesn't even include the fact that the intricacies of the NBA and college games are so distinct that it takes more than just an offseason to adjust.

If it's the enthusiasm that Donovan loved about the college game, he will quickly learn how a few years and hundreds of games often suck much of the passion out of NBA players.

Donovan's most charismatic, crazed, manic player of the past three years, Joakim Noah, believes his college coach will make it in the league. His reasoning, however, only supports the idea that Donovan might be ill equipped for the transition.

"I'll think he'll be successful wherever he goes because he's so passionate about the game, and his love for the game will help him throughout," Noah said Thursday.

Passion and love won't be enough to make up for the fact that Donovan will be asked to make a contender out of a Magic team with only one good player and questionable decision-makers in the front office.

To call Donovan's 115-mile move from Gainesville to Orlando a mistake is excessive, because any job decision that includes doubling your salary and the chance to prove yourself at the highest level of your profession has its obvious benefits. But it doesn't mean Donovan won't eventually regret it.

If legacy is at all important to Donovan, 42, he might have blown his chance to eventually become a basketball coaching legend.

Duke's Mike Krzyzewski is on that path. Coach K has ignored overtures from the NBA and has stuck to the challenge of perfecting his craft at the college level.

His reward? He is considered one of the best basketball coaches at any level, and was even bestowed the privilege/challenge of rebuilding the U.S. Olympic basketball team. He's this century's John Wooden.

College lifers Jim Boeheim, Roy Williams, Lute Olsen and Jim Calhoun, they're all right there with Krzyzewski, respected and admired and blessed with the type of job security that doesn't exist in the NBA.

TARNISHED IMAGE

Pitino, meanwhile, lost some of that shine when he failed miserably with the Celtics. He has landed on his feet with Louisville but has been knocked down a peg or two on the coaching hierarchy by the cruel judge that is public perception.

Unless Donovan defies all the odds and becomes the first college-turned-pro coach to even make the second round of the playoffs, he's doomed to suffer the same fate. Rather than be loved for repeating as a national champion, he will be judged by whether he can bring the Orlando Magic back to respectability.

So someone might want to remind Donovan that Shaquille O'Neal is not walking through that door _ unless it's to hand him one of the many losses that are going to pile up pretty quickly.

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BILLY DONOVAN

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