Isiah Thomas Forced Pistons GM To Reinstate Chuck Daly After Firing Him

The Detroit Pistons won back-to-back championships in 1989 and 1990 under head coach, Chuck Daly. But did you know that the Detroit front office had once fired Daly long before those title wins? Pistons legend Isiah Thomas opened up on the time he got his head coach reinstated after forcing the general manager’s hand back in 1986 while making an appearance on SiriusXM NBA Radio.

IT and the ‘Bad Boy’ Pistons often get credited for the team’s success in the 90s. But would the Pistons have won those back-to-back titles had Chuck not been the head coach of the team? Well, Thomas certainly wasn’t ready to take that chance back then.

“We had lost 15 out of 19 (games), and Jack fired Chuck. And that afternoon, after practice, I called Chuck up and I said, ‘Hey, you know this isn’t your fault. Our team, we’re just not good enough’. I went over to Mr. D’s house, talked to Mr. D and we hired Chuck back that night.”

Isiah Thomas tells us how he saved Chuck Daly’s job in 1986

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Charles Jerome Daly, better known as Chuck Daly took over the head coaching position for the Pistons in 1983. Under his helm, the Pistons never missed out on the playoffs. But after two seasons with the team, the Pistons underwent a few roster changes which resulted in the team going on a big losing streak.

Detroit’s start of the 1985-86 season saw the team at a 14-9 record in their first 23 games. But within a few weeks, the Pistons went from having a winning record to a losing one. The team lost 12 of their 14 regular season matchups, going from 14-9 to 16-21. No one would want to see their team go on such losing streaks. So, as a general manager, Jack McCloskey chose to make a head coaching change instead of shaking up the roster. 

What a lot of fans are unaware of is the fact that McCloskey was the brains behind that ‘Bad Boy’ Pistons squad. So, his judgment was impeccable, and rarely anyone questioned it. However, IT did not feel the same. Thomas was an All-Star right from his rookie year in 1981. He played under Scotty Robertson who was the team’s head coach before Daly.

Zeke felt that Daly was a better leader in the coaching position and chose to question McCloskey’s decision. It was a bold move by Thomas that eventually paid off for the team as the Pistons got better each year.

The team managed to gradually make more headway in the postseason year after year. Eventually, Detroit went on to take down powerhouse teams like the Boston Celtics and the Los Angeles Lakers to win back-to-back titles and etch their names in history.