Quin Snyder fought emotion as he officially said goodbye to the Utah Jazz on Monday morning.
There were smiles and stories shared by team CEO Danny Ainge about first encounters. Former team owner Gail Miller waited with a hug at the end of a news conference that marked the end of an eight-year tenure.
Advertisement
And just like that, the Utah Jazz were officially looking for a new coach.
Dressed in a black blazer and a white button-down shirt, adorned initially by a cane protecting him from the grind of a recent hip replacement surgery, Snyder listed his reasons for his resignation from the team that’s defined his time as an NBA head coach. The prevailing reason? It was just time. He couldn’t see a way forward with a franchise that he had taken to the postseason for six consecutive years.
“It was just time,” Snyder said. “I tried to give a voice to that, but it really isn’t any more complicated than that. It was just time. This was something I labored over. I had thought about it for a period of weeks.”
Snyder said he came to that decision on Saturday night and informed his wife, Amy. He and his family then slept on it. And upon waking up Sunday, they were in the same place, which led to Snyder telling Ainge and team owner Ryan Smith that he planned on stepping down.
As Snyder reflected on eight years on Monday afternoon, there was understandable emotion. After all, he and the Jazz have built a foundation of being a postseason team, year in and year out. Snyder is the coach who unlocked Rudy Gobert, turning him from a mold of gangly shot-blocking clay into an All-NBA center, an All-Star and the best defensive player in basketball.
It was Snyder who gave Donovan Mitchell the runway to become who he currently is: a high-octane and dynamic combination guard and the owner of multiple great playoff performances. But, beyond Mitchell and Gobert were success stories. Joe Ingles was once cut by the LA Clippers at the end of training camp because the franchise chose Jared Cunningham. With the Jazz, Ingles became a starter, one of the best shooters in the league and one of the staples of the Snyder era. Royce O’Neale was once playing in obscurity overseas. He came to free-agent mini-camp, played well and, under Snyder, became one of the better wing defenders in basketball.
Advertisement
Snyder created a place in the league for Georges Niang. He, along with Johnnie Bryant, who is a candidate for his now-vacant seat, turned Gordon Hayward into an All-Star and one of the best small forwards in the league. Snyder’s first playoff team effectively ended the Chris Paul and Blake Griffin-led LA Clippers, with a Game 7 win at Staples Center to culminate a series most thought the Jazz had no business winning. Snyder’s teams were defined first by their defensive toughness and more recently by their ability to spread the floor and make 3-pointers.
“There’s a real sense of sadness and sorrow and loss,” Snyder said. “That’s to be expected. I gave this everything I had. You try to be introspective and you try to analyze. But, this was a decision to where I just kept coming back to the same place. It was time for me to move on.”
Snyder leaves as the second-winningest coach in franchise history. He took the Jazz to the postseason in six of eight years. He had one team that ascended to having the best regular-season record in the NBA in 2020-21. He defined the Jazz as a coach who took no quarter and gave none in return, a coach for whom his players continually played hard and a coach who was able to wear many hats, often in the same game.
Snyder doesn’t know what his immediate future holds, but he very likely will coach again, something Ainge and Smith acknowledge. The Jazz made a real effort to keep him, offering him a significant contract extension, then gave him the space to make his decision. Indeed, the franchise is late to the coaching carousel, starting the process on a Monday that’s two and a half weeks from draft night and less than a month from the start of free agency. Without a head coach in place, the Jazz will have to conduct their offseason business concurrent with a search.
At the same time, Ainge and Smith vowed not to rush the process.
Advertisement
“We are going to take our time with the coaching search,” Smith said. “We have to get it right.”
More than anything, Snyder said he will miss the relationships. It remains to be seen how long he is able to stay on the sidelines. Coaching has consumed most of his adult life. Talk to Snyder in the offseason, and he will rush you off the phone, citing the need to go through after timeout sets (ATOs) that he plans on using in the coming regular season. The gym has always been his home away from home, his refuge.
But his family means a lot to him, and it’s a balance he continually strives to achieve. He and his family had ingrained themselves within the Utah community. His players and coaching staff have meant the world to him. More than anything, those are what he and Amy will miss the most. Whenever Snyder decides he wants a job again, he will be a hot commodity. He established himself as one of the best coaches in the league during his time with the Jazz. Whenever he wants, he should have plenty of suitors.
“Two of my kids have lived here their whole lives,” Snyder said. “So, this is a special place, and that’s not going to change for us. What makes it difficult is there are a lot of people in this room that I will really miss. A silver lining is that I will get to go to Halloween with my daughter.”
Related reading
Jones: Who should replace Quin Snyder in Utah?
(Photo: Melissa Majchrzak / NBAE via Getty Images)
