The list of NBA players and coaches over the course of history is a long one. Thousands have suited up in the world’s best professional league, hundreds have run the show from the sidelines. Multiple leaders have managed both in their basketball lifetime, but only a select few have filled both roles at the same time, a practice now forbidden by the league’s Collective Bargaining Agreement but more accepted in the wide-open 1970’s era.
Nigel Broadnax of The Ringer explored the history of the player-coach in the NBA in a recent and extensive feature.