Doc Rivers coached his final game for the Bucks and didn't even have the decency to tell his players goodbye. Bobby Portis found out their coach was gone the same way everyone else did: through breaking news on his phone while sitting on the team bus.
"About five minutes on the bus, the news came through. It was very shocking that it happened so fast. And we ain't even left Philly yet, you feel me? I don't even know where he was at. It was just kind of awkward. Obviously this end of the season has been up and down. We just lost, the season just ended, and most of the time, these things happen the next day," Portis said over Run it Back on FanDuel TV.
After an up-and-down season where so much could have gone better, Rivers exited with no goodbye speech. No closure. No acknowledgment of what they all just went through together. He was just gone while the team was sitting on a bus in Philadelphia learning about it through social media.
Doc Rivers left the Milwaukee Bucks quietly like a thief in the night
No matter which way you slice it, a coach leaving without even addressing the team after a season-ending loss is cowardly. Say what you want about Rivers' coaching failures (and there are plenty!), but at the end of the day, a head coach should at least have the professionalism and the spine to face your players one last time and tell them you're out.
The timing makes it worse, of course. Right after their final game, before they've even processed the season being over, their coach is already gone. No decompression period, no team meeting, just straight chaos while everyone's still in their game day mindset. He left without providing any of the leadership or culture-setting that he was hired for in the first place.
That's the level of disrespect Rivers showed his team on the way out. Treated them like they were getting traded via Twitter instead of like professionals who deserved a conversation after suffering through this disaster season together.
Rivers always talked about accountability and veteran leadership. Then he left without saying goodbye to the guys he preached those values to all season. That's hypocrisy that won't be forgotten by anyone who was on that bus. And that's likely why Giannis Antetokounmpo wants the next head coach to be as different from Rivers as possible.
Even if Rivers and the organization mutually agreed to part ways, you still address the team. You still give them closure, and you still show basic human decency to people you worked with for months. Rivers couldn't even do that, even if there were talks about him staying in town. That should tell fans all they need to know about whether or not Rivers staying in an advisory position would be a good idea.
Rivers' exit from the Bucks is proof enough that it was time for him to go
Being blindsided by your coach leaving without even a goodbye doesn't inspire confidence in organizational communication or stability. It reinforces that this franchise is chaos from top to bottom. And that should be the final blow for anyone who still thought the situation between him and his players was fixable. It was not, and it was truly time for him to go.
Doc Rivers' final act as Bucks coach was the most Rivers thing possible: avoiding accountability by disappearing before anyone could ask him about it. Can't be held responsible if you're already gone, right?
The players sitting on that bus finding out via social media won't forgive that. And they shouldn't have to.
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