He is beloved in Dallas and is my all-time favorite Mavs coach. Nellie is one of the most authentic and perhaps the most open and accessible managers that any DFW team ever had. He was a jokester and always made it fun to watch. I still remember when Shaq called him a clown and he wore a clown nose to the next game when they played the Lakers. I remember Nellie blowing up on a ref and punting a basketball into the crowd. IDK why, but I LOL'ed to that and still do.
At first, I thought he was just another Mavericks failure when I saw him introduce dirk and Nash to the media. Nellie (combined with Cuban buying the team) completely changed the trajectory of the team. A man ahead of his time, always thinking ahead and outside of the box. When Nash left that was the beginning of the end in Dallas for Nellie. Nash was like a son to him. Nash aside from Nellie had a lot to do with Dirk adjusting to the USA culture, something that probably is overlooked for Dirk who was very reluctant early on to embrace Dallas. Then there's the 2007 Golden State Dallas Mavericks legendary series. Nelson systematically dismantled arguably the best team the mavericks ever had. Nelson knew how to neutralize Dirk and really got revenge on Cuban. Apparently Dirk put a hole in the wall at the old Oracle and they left it like that. Dirk said he autographed it later. I also forgot that Nelson drafted Steph Curry? I heard Steph made some comments about Nelson; I had no idea that Nelson was so impactful to Curry's career.
