Brown was sacked just six months after signing a contract extension and less than two years after winning Coach of the Year
The Sacramento Kings have fired head coach Mike Brown, ending his tenure amid his third season with the club, multiple media outlets reported Friday.
The decision came after the Kings’ 114-113 loss to the Detroit Pistons on Thursday, Sacramento’s fifth loss in a row as they fell to 13-18 on the season.
Brown signed a contract extension in June, paying him through the 2026-27 season.
Brown led practice Friday afternoon and even spoke to the media after the session, but he did not join the team on their flight to Los Angeles ahead of Saturday’s game against the Lakers.
It is not clear if Brown knew he was being fired when he spoke to reporters.
“When you go through adverse times, you know who was truly there for you, because people will jump off the bandwagon quick,” Brown said to reporters Friday. “But that’s part of what I have to deal with, not just for myself, but holding everybody together.
“That’s what I’m going to do, and I’m okay with anybody criticising me.”
Brown finishes his Kings tenure with a .549 win percentage (107-88), and helped the 2022-23 team end a 16-season play-off drought.
Brown was named the NBA’s Coach of the Year in 2023, but the Kings finished last season ninth in the Western Conference and failed to make it out of the play-in tournament.
This year, Sacramento have slipped to 12th in the West and are just 6-12 at home.
The Kings entered the season with hopes of taking the next step after retaining Malik Monk and adding DeMar DeRozan in the offseason. After a decent start, they dropped 12 of their last 17 games.
De’Aaron Fox and Domantas Sabonis remain a very productive duo, but Keegan Murray’s development has seemingly stalled after he was drafted fourth overall in 2022.
Brown led the Kings, who were once the laughingstock of the NBA, back to the playoffs, but it will now be someone else’s responsibility to keep the franchise from returning the league’s basement.