The Toronto Raptors are adding Patrick Mutombo to their coaching staff, Raptors Republic has learned.
Mutombo is a familiar name to president Masai Ujiri and Raptors 905 general manager Dan Tolzman, as he was a member of the Denver Nuggets coaching staff as a player development coordinator in 2011. He was then bumped to assistant coach with the Nuggets, where he continued to focus on player development while adding opponent game-planning to his role. The Austin Spurs then nabbed him as an assistant coach at the D-League level ahead of the 2015-16 season. Austin has churned out some impressive coaching talent (including current NBA head coaches Earl Watson and Quin Snyder), and the familiarity with a few names in the front office will surely help get Mutombo up to speed quickly.
Ujiri and Mutombo also have a relationship through their work with Ujiri’s Giants of Africa program. Born in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Mutombo is one of the central figures in the documentary of the same name that aired at TIFF this week (and that William Lou reviewed here). He has long been active in the NBA’s Basketball Without Borders program, as well. This seems like a great fit from an organizational culture standpoint, and Mutombo also fills a need as a player development specialist.
Prior to his coaching career, the 36-year-old was a two-time NCAA D-II champion at Metro State, where he’d later work as an assistant coach. He then spent several years in Italy, Brazil, and Greece, before closing out his pro career in the D-League in 2009-10.
The addition of Mutombo is aimed to help ease the loss of Andy Greer at the front of the bench and of Jesse Mermuys from the 905 to the Lakers, which necessitated the loss of Jerry Stackhouse at the NBA level. While some have wondered if the Raptors will bring in a “defensive coordinator” of sorts to replace Greer, that’s unlikely to be the case – Rex Kalamian and Nick Nurse will take on a larger role as head coach Dwane Casey’s leads, Jama Mahlalela is expected to move up to the front row of the bench, and Mutombo and one other addition still to come will join Alex McKechnie in the second row. Casey is a defensive specialist originally, and it’s not as if Greer took the team’s new scheme with him when he left, so the Raptors will hope the new additions and collaborative knowledge can help make up for the loss of a defensive ace like Greer.
