featured-image

Pistons tab a ‘basketball junkie’ in Rex Walters to coach D-League affiliate Drive

ORLANDO – Rex Walters has never been to Grand Rapids. So I told him about ArtPrize, its rise as a craft beer hub, all the new downtown construction that’s taken place and the general vibrancy of Michigan’s second-largest city.

And he smiled, very politely, because Rex Walters seems like a very genial, very nice guy, and said, “Well, I’ll be in the gym,” and shrugged.

The Pistons have hired a self-described “basketball junkie” as the new coach of the Grand Rapids Drive. Walters was a gifted college player, first at Northwestern and then at Kansas, and spent nine years in the NBA. The last three of those, 1997-2000, came in Miami, where he first crossed paths with Stan Van Gundy, then an assistant to Pat Riley. As dozens of others with similar stories have echoed, Walters found that a relationship with lasting benefits.

“I don’t know why he’s been so good to me, but he’s been really, really good to me along the way,” Walters said Wednesday after he helped coach a Summer League practice. “He knew after things went down at San Francisco I was trying to get into this level in any capacity. He knows I love coaching. I love that part of it. He asked me about it and I said I’d be more than interested.”

Walters spent eight years as the head coach at the University of San Francisco before being fired after last season. He went 127-127 at a school long removed from its 1950s Bill Russell glory days.

The Drive also named a new general manager, Jon Phelps, who’s served as their director of basketball operations for the past two seasons. Phelps is a graduate of Siena College in Michigan and has a law degree from Tulane with a certification in sports law. He’ll work with the Pistons’ front office, which has led the Drive from Auburn Hills under the hand of Andrew Loomis, recently promoted to Pistons chief of staff, working closely with general manager Jeff Bower.

Walters succeeds Otis Smith as Drive coach. Smith has been added to Van Gundy’s coaching staff while also serving as Pistons director of player development, a position he helped pioneer in the NBA as a means of helping young players acclimate to the league.

Walters talked to Smith at the NBA draft combine last month and got an inkling that Smith was about to join Van Gundy’s staff and create the D-League opening.

“You’re coaching the best players in the world, you’re competing against the best coaches in the world and it’s all basketball,” Walters said. “I’m a basketball junkie, so that definitely appealed to me. I didn’t know it would happen this quickly, especially after San Francisco, so I’m very appreciative of the opportunity.”

Walters is particularly enthused about his philosophical fit with the Pistons, too, from his familiarity with Van Gundy.

“I think there’s a definite synergy there, in terms of how they want things to be run,” he said. “They want it to reflect the things they’re doing each and every day. That appeals to me. This is a great job. The expectations are really clear for me on what we need to do with the players and what we’re going to run. I’m excited about learning that side and that’s why I’m here. The biggest thing for me is helping these guys get better and helping this organization in any way I can.”

As Walters walked through the team hotel lobby Wednesday morning on his way to the bus for practice – before news of his hiring had been released – a stranger approached him, seeing his Pistons gear, and told him he was a big fan of the team. Walters asked where he was from. “Grand Rapids – he said he loves it there.”

Walters expects he will, too – even if he doesn’t get to see much more than the Drive’s home gym.