Dallas Mavericks head coach Jason Kidd has faced a lot of scrutiny during his tenure. Despite two trips to the Western Conference Finals, including the NBA Finals this season, missing the playoffs in the 2022-23 season left Kidd facing a lot of heat from Mavs fans.
Kidd redeemed himself by leading the Mavs to the Finals this year, transforming Dallas into a suffocating team defensively and powered by the superstar duo of Kyrie Irving and Luka Doncic on offense. This leaves fans feeling much better about the man at the helm of the Mavs.
The Athletic conducts an annual poll every year with Mavericks fans asking about a variety of topics, one of them being their confidence in Kidd as Dallas’ head coach. They answered with extreme positivity, with 68.8% giving Kidd a 4 or 5 (out of 5) rating. Compared to last year when 55% chose a 1 or 2 and just 5% did so this year, that’s a drastic change.
According to another poll, 81.1% of Mavericks fans said they were either “more confident” or “much more confident” in Kidd than the year prior. This looks like a natural case of winning solving a lot of issues.
This is what The Atheltic’s Tim Cato had to say about the change: “Kidd received a more measured confidence bump after last summer, when 55 percent of respondents chose 1s or 2s. It seems the fanbase is largely back in favor of Kidd as the head coach but hasn’t totally forgotten last season’s catastrophic results, for which he received much of the blame.”
As long as the Mavericks are contending for championships, the fans will come around on Jason Kidd. He had some bad moments at his previous stops with the Brooklyn Nets and Milwaukee Bucks but he’s had a lot of success in his short time as the Mavs’ coach. The Mavericks rewarded his successes with a contract extension during the playoffs.
