Former Lakers coach Frank Vogel will be among the candidates to interview for the vacant Jazz coaching job, according to ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski.
Vogel joins a lengthy list of names who are expected to interview for the position following the resignation of longtime coach Quin Snyder earlier this week. Jazz assistants Alex Jensen and Lamar Skeeter, Knicks assistant Johnnie Bryant, Celtics assistants Will Hardy and Joe Mazzulla, Bucks assistant Charles Lee and former Trail Blazers head coach Terry Stotts are also on the early list of candidates, per Wojnarowski.
Vogel is out of a job after being fired by the Lakers earlier this offseason following a dismal 2021–22 campaign. Los Angeles posted a record of 33–49, its worst season since 2016–17, and finished the year one game behind the Spurs for 10th place in the Western Conference and the final spot in the play-in tournament.
Although the end of his tenure with the storied franchise didn’t go according to plan, Vogel concluded his time with the Lakers with a 127–98 record. In his first season with the team, he guided Los Angeles to a championship in the COVID-19 bubble in Orlando during the 2019–20 campaign.
Whether it’s Vogel or one of the aforementioned names on the interview list, the new Jazz coach will face a tall task in taking over the team. Utah finished this past season at 49–33 and were knocked out of the first round of the playoffs. The franchise has made the postseason six years in a row but has never made it past the second round in that span.
On top of the team struggling to get over the hump in the Western Conference, a new coach may have to deal with an increasingly disgruntled star in Donovan Mitchell. According to Wojnarowski, the 25-year-old guard was left “surprised and disappointed,” by Snyder’s resignation and is described to be “unsettled, unnerved and wondering what it means for the franchise’s future.”
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For more on the Utah Jazz, go to Frozen Rope: Inside The Jazz.
