Tell me if this sounds familiar—Tom Thibodeau goes full throttle, grinds a team into playoff shape, wears out everyone in the room, and gets fired. Rinse and repeat. Surprised? Come on, you’ve seen this movie before.
This is Tom Thibodeau we’re talking about. The man is a defensive mastermind, one of the hardest-working, most detail-obsessed coaches in the league. He walks into chaos, demands discipline, and somehow makes the mess matter again. And yeah, it usually works… for a while. It worked in Chicago. It worked (sort of) in Minnesota. And yep, it worked in New York—for a time.
But then, as always, the same story unfolded. First it was the Bulls, who sent him packing in 2015. Then it was the Timberwolves in 2019. Now, here we are in 2025, and the Knicks have decided they’ve seen enough. If you’re shocked by this, you probably haven’t been paying attention.
Thibs got his first real shot with the Bulls after making a name for himself as a defensive guru in Boston. His fingerprints were all over that 2008 Celtics title team. When Chicago brought him in as head coach in 2010, he made an instant impact. That team won 62 games out of the gate, Derrick Rose became the youngest MVP in league history, and Thibodeau earned Coach of the Year honors. It was electric. The Bulls felt like they were back.
But his coaching style was… a lot. Short rotations, intense practices, no load management—just nonstop effort all the time. And it eventually broke guys down. Rose’s devastating ACL tear in the 2012 playoffs changed everything. The offense got stuck in the mud, injuries piled up, and by 2015, the front office had had enough. They moved on. Thibs didn’t exactly leave the building quietly.
After a short break, Minnesota gave him another shot—and even more power. He wasn’t just the head coach there; he ran the front office too. He brought in Jimmy Butler, thinking he could recreate the gritty, defensive identity from Chicago. And for a second, it actually looked like it might work. The Wolves snapped a 14-year playoff drought in 2018, and people started buying in.
But then, predictably, things got messy. Butler clashed with Karl-Anthony Towns and Andrew Wiggins. The vibe soured. And then there was that infamous practice—the one where Butler, reportedly furious and fed up, took the floor with third-stringers and torched the starters while trash-talking the whole front office. That was the beginning of the end. By early 2019, Thibodeau was out in St. Paul.
Then came New York. The Knicks, as usual, were floundering. They needed direction. They needed accountability. They needed someone like Thibodeau. And to his credit, he delivered. Year one was a dream. The Knicks finished fifth in the East and they had their eye on Julius Randle who had turned into an All-Star. In 2021, Thibodeau picked up his second Coach of the Year award and Madison Square Garden felt alive again. It was like someone lit a match in a dark room. The fan base dared to hope.
But hope doesn’t last long when the old habits creep in.
The next season? Big step back. No playoffs. Thibodeau stuck to his tight rotations, leaned way too hard on the vets, and let the young guys collect dust. Still, the team wasn’t awful. Then Jalen Brunson showed up for the 2022-23 season and changed the equation. By Thibs’ fourth year, the Knicks were back in the playoffs and even made it to the second round. It looked like he’d regained control.
Except… the same cracks started forming. Again.
This past season, things just felt off. Injuries were a factor, sure, but so was that stubborn refusal to adjust. The rotations still didn’t make much sense. The offense stalled out far too often. Even the defense—Thibodeau’s bread and butter—started slipping in big moments. You could feel the team’s energy fading. The Knicks weren’t collapsing, but they weren’t inspired either. They just looked… tired. And once the locker room stops responding, we all know what comes next.
Let’s be clear—Thibodeau is not a bad coach. Far from it. He’s one of the most respected minds in the NBA. He builds defenses, establishes culture, and gets buy-in early. But the issue has always been sustainability. His coaching style burns hot, but it burns fast. The long practices, the pressure to be perfect, the lack of flexibility—it just grinds players down over time. In today’s NBA, you can’t just be a tactician. You’ve got to be a communicator, a collaborator. You’ve got to adapt. And Thibodeau? He doesn’t really do that.
The Knicks, to their credit, are in a better place than they’ve been in years. They’ve got a real star in Brunson. They’ve got picks. They’ve got trade chips. The front office seems competent. This isn’t a total teardown—it’s a team that can keep building. Thibodeau helped lay that foundation. He took a punchline of a franchise and gave it structure. He got them believing in defense, in effort, in identity. But he wasn’t going to be the guy to take them to the finish line. That was never his role. He’s the reset button. The culture shock. The necessary dose of discipline. And once that job is done, his shelf life starts ticking.
Here’s the thing, folks: Will he get another shot? Maybe. He’s 67. He still has credibility. If a team needs a reset or a jolt of defensive intensity, someone might pick up the phone. But if Thibodeau wants one more real run, he’ll need to show he can evolve. Because this league doesn’t wait around for stubbornness anymore. The game has changed. The players have changed. The coaches who survive now are the ones who change with it.
With that… here we are again. Another Thibodeau tenure, another abrupt end. The guy brings order, brings energy, and brings belief. But eventually, the grind wears thin. And once the buy-in fades, so does the magic. He got the Knicks to the doorstep of contention. But just like in Chicago and Minnesota, he never got them through the door. And honestly? We all saw it coming.
If you cannot play with them, then root for them!