The after less than two seasons and a 56-85 record as head coach. His tenure in Denver was his first head coaching job in the NBA. He was previously an assistant with the Los Angeles Lakers and Indiana Pacers before the Nuggets hired him to replace George Karl in June 2013. A capsule look at his time with the Nuggets:
June 25, 2013: Shaw is hired as a first-year head coach after working as an assistant with the Pacers and Lakers.
Oct. 1, 2013: During the , before the start of training camp, Shaw says competition for starting jobs will be open: “We don’t have any allegiance, really, to anybody on this team. So it’s an audition. It’s open competition.”
Jan. 1, 2014:Guard Andre Miller gets into a shouting match with Shaw when it becomes apparent he isn’t going to play against Philadelphia. Miller is suspended two games for the incident (which the team later rescinded) but Miller never again takes the court for the Nuggets. Denver trades Miller to Washington in February. “It was just an instance where I kind of lost my cool and was a little bit unprofessional and stepped out of character,” Miller says. “And I apologized to my teammates for what happened. That’s not me. That’s not what I’m about.”
April 16, 2014: With a loss to the Warriors, the Nuggets end their 2013-14 season with a 36-46 record, their worst in 11 years.
Sept. 29, 2014: Shaw and general manager Tim Connelly tell reporters at the team’s they have high expectations for the Nuggets and expect the team to compete for a playoff berth in the Western Conference. “This time, this year, I feel a lot calmer,” Shaw says. “I feel like I know our team now.”
Dec. 20, 2014: Forward Kenneth Faried and Shaw continue to have “communication issues” that seem to be affecting Faried’s on-court performance. meeting between the two clears the air for a bit and sparks some impressive showings by Faried, but the energy proves short-lived.
Jan. 20, 2015: With the Nuggets in the midst of a three-game losing streak ahead of the all-star break, Shaw tells reporters he has been toying with ways to spark a turnaround. But one comment catches many off-guard: “If I took Kenneth (Faried) out of the starting lineup, I’d probably get egged by all the fans around here because everybody is a big Manimal fan.”
Jan. 29, 2015: Shaw’s relationship with his players continues to deteriorate in public when he and point guard Jameer Nelson after a loss at Memphis. “I feel like I get thrown under the bus when we come out with performances like that,” Shaw says. Nelson responds: “We do have to take ownership of things that we need to do and get better at, individually and collectively. Everybody, coaches included. Nobody is exempt from this.”
Feb. 3, 2015: After the , a blowout to the Hornets in Denver, Shaw tells local media he is starting to question his players’ motives. “It just looks like you almost have to try to lose as bad, and in the way we’ve been losing,” he says.
Feb. 18, 2015: Shaw calls out point guard Ty Lawson after the Nuggets’ starting point guard after the all-star break. “We had a week off or nine days between games, and you expect everybody to be here,” Shaw says. “It disrupts the planning of everything, in terms of you count on somebody in practice. But he’s not here so we had to go without him.” Lawson is benched for the following game.
Feb. 27, 2015: A huddle late in the Nuggets’ loss to the Utah Jazz breaks with the chant ” ” Six weeks remain in the Nuggets’ season at the time, and the team is in the midst of a six-week home losing streak. the chant is in reference to snapping the losing streak, not when the offseason began, but says, no matter the reason, he wasn’t upset the players said it. “Whatever you have to use for motivation to try to change the results, I’m all for it,” he says.
March 3, 2015: The Nuggets fire Shaw and name assistant Melvin Hunt, below, interim coach for the rest of the season.
