George Karl, the coach who loves basketball too much, ambled slowly down a hallway, wearing a puffer coat. He basked in warm greetings from old friends at the Pepsi Center, where he led the Nuggets to a 57-win season, before Karl’s idea of hoops heaven blew up in his face.
Then Karl saw me. And the misty-colored memories of the way things were in Denver quickly evaporated into the thin Colorado air, replaced by a deep-seeded need to take a little jab at an old adversary.
“I’m not hugging him,” Karl loudly declared Tuesday, while looking directly at me, trying to make certain two dozen people within earshot could hear his displeasure.
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“Would’ve been shocked if you did hug me,” I replied, laughing at Karl, which rhymes with cantankerous.
So it always goes with Karl, the basketball coach who loves a crisis. He loves trouble so much, if there is none, he creates it. His current stint on the bench for Sacramento has turned into a soap opera. He will get fired, later if not sooner, because everywhere Karl works, he wins until his 30-grit sandpaper personality rubs everybody raw.
I love the feisty basketball curmudgeon always lurking near the surface with Karl, because it makes for lively debate. For the nine seasons he coached in Denver, we got along like matches and dynamite. I made sparks, then stood back and watched George go: Boom! Karl explodes, because he loves the game more than you, speaks with authoritarian certitude and views walking away from an argument as a sign of weakness.
Now you also know the No. 1 reason why Karl no longer coaches the Nuggets. In 2013, after getting upset in the first round of the playoffs by Golden State, Karl pushed a young, inexperienced basketball executive so hard for a contract extension Josh Kroenke not only pushed back, but shoved him out of town.
Karl is one of the most brilliant minds to sit on an NBA bench, as his 1,165 career victories attest. Karl is tough to live with under the same roof, especially in a sport whose season is six months of too many games on too many nights with too little sleep. Don’t believe me. Ask Ray Allen, Carmelo Anthony, DeMarcus Cousins or any player in the cavalcade of stars who has crossed Karl.
Nuggets coach Michael Malone and Karl traded dysfunctional basketball families. Just as Karl used to have a gig in Denver, Malone got broomed from Sacramento.
Minutes before Karl made a grand entrance that would do Kate Middleton proud, Malone commented with a sigh on the fuss that have made the recent meetings between the Nuggets and Kings as odd as passing a roasted turkey around the table at a Thanksgiving dinner hosted by ex-spouses for the benefit of the kids.
“Hugs, kisses and all that garbage,” Malone said. “Let’s get down to business.”
Malone is no-nonsense. Karl is all nonsense.
Malone got along with Cousins, who scored 39 points in Sacramento’s 114-110 victory but has clashed with Karl.
“I was real with him, I was honest with him, I coached him, I disciplined him, I held him accountable. I never tried to be his buddy. I never tried to coach around him,” Malone said. “And, at the end of the day, I am a competitor. I hate to lose. At the end of the day, DeMarcus is a competitor. He hates to lose. We had that in common.”
Karl believes I contributed to his departure from Denver, which mistakenly assigns an ink-stained wretch like me influence that solely belonged to Kroenke and Masai Ujiri, the former Nuggets general manger who wondered what the heck his coach was doing during that first-round loss to the Golden State Warriors.
Karl wallows in the inevitable suffering more than he enjoys the victories. He remembers every blown call by a ref, every act of disobedience by a player and every sin against the game he respects too much. Karl cannot let anything go. It’s a tough way to live.
Recall that awful day in April 2013 when forward Danilo Gallinari shredded a knee and Karl’s relationship with the Nuggets began to come undone as a 57-win season fell apart against Golden State.
“That was a series if we would’ve won, we might have a chance of still being here. I don’t know. I don’t know all that stuff,” Karl said. “I can’t deny that as some of our coaches and friends have gotten together, we’ve cussed that moment because of what transpired after it.”
Karl is a Hall of Fame basketball coach.
In 2016, the Nuggets are better off with Malone as their coach.
Mark Kiszla: mkiszla@denverpost.com or @markkiszla
