Malone tabs Pinckney as top assistant

Yahoo Sports’ Adrian Wojnarowski is reporting that Denver Nuggets head coach Michael Malone has hired Ed Pinckney as his top assistant.

Pinckney, who enjoyed a 12-year career as a player with stops in Phoenix, Sacramento, Boston, Milwaukee, Toronto, Philadelphia and Miami was an assistant in Minnesota and most recently in Chicago as a part of Tom Thibodeau’s staff from 2010-15.

In Chicago, Pinckney gained a reputation as one of the top up-and-coming assistant coaches in the league because of his diverse background as a former player and seems like he’s on the fast-track towards eventually becoming a head coach.

Pinckney was a finalist for the Memphis Grizzlies head coaching vacancy in 2013, a job that wound up going to Dave Joerger and is credited by many of his former Bulls players (especially their big men) with enhancing and developing their games.

“That’s my guy. Ed is great, man. Ed was a dope big man as a player, great big-man coach. He’s helped me a lot—playing inside, looking at different aspects—because he sees the game from a coach’s perspective now, but also as a player,” said ex-Bulls power forward Carlos Boozer in an April 2014 interview to Aggrey Sam, formerly of CSN Chicago. “So he’s helped me a lot, especially with the system that Thibs (had) put in place. I love working with him.”

Pinckney is the first official hire Malone’s made since he was named the Nuggets head coach nearly one month ago. David Aldridge of Turner Sports reported in late June that Malone would bring Micah Nori, an assistant who served under him when he was the head coach in Sacramento, to Denver as well.