Gregg Popovich steps down as Spurs coach: Best moments from Pop’s career at the helm in San Antonio

After 29 seasons as the head coach of the San Antonio Spurs, Gregg Popovich has stepped down from his post on the sidelines but will remain with the franchise as team president. Popovich took over as Spurs coach in 1996 and guided them to five NBA championships across one of the longest sustained runs of success for one franchise in league history. 

Along the way, Popovich became the winningest coach in NBA history (1,422), a Hall of Famer and cemented his place as one of the all-time greats in the coaching industry. However, Pop wasn’t just a great coach, he was also one of the best characters in the NBA. During his career, Pop became known to fans for his fiery ejections, hatred of in-game interviews, dry sense of humor and thoughtful responses on things happening beyond the world of basketball. 

While Popovich will remain part of the Spurs franchise as team president, we won’t see him as often in the public eye. So we wanted to look back at some of his best and funniest moments from his legendary tenure as Spurs head coach. 

Pop’s funniest mid-game interview moments

“Getting Pop’d” became something of a rite of passage for those in the NBA media, particularly national sideline reporters. Popovich was among the coaches who didn’t like the contractually forced mid-game interviews and would often do the bare minimum to get through the two questions and get back to his bench. However, as he got older, the routine became more elaborate as reporters began to sweat having to talk to Pop between quarters, and he delighted in messing with them — sometimes demanding they give him a second question if they tried to let him go after just one. 

Hack-a-Shaq foul five seconds into a game

For the most part, we got to see Pop’s sense of humor come out in those interviews and press conferences, but on opening night of the 2008-09 season, he had some fun with Shaquille O’Neal to open the game. After the Spurs beat the Suns in the first round of the 2008 playoffs, Shaq complained about their use of the Hack-a-Shaq strategy, so immediately after the opening tip in the season opener that fall, Pop trolled Shaq by having one of his guys foul him. That led to one of the all-time great camera cuts from a bewildered Shaq to Pop with two thumbs up, cackling on the sidelines with his assistants. 

Getting ejected 63 seconds into a game

Popovich was never shy about getting onto the officials, and in 2019, he got tossed barely a minute into a game in Denver for arguing an early call with the refs. They hit him with a quick T and then a second when he went off from there. 

Speech on gun violence after Uvalde shooting

There have been few figures in sports who have been more willing to speak out on social and political issues than Popovich, who never shied away from questions in press conferences about things going on in the world. That was often where he would offer his best answers, as he always offered strong, thoughtful responses and was never afraid to go after those in positions of power. 

While that typically happened in pre-game pressers, after the tragic shooting at Robb Elementary in Uvalde, Texas, in 2022, Popovich went and took the podium at a rally against gun violence to give an emotional speech about the lack of response to mass shootings. 

Pop tells Danny Green to “shut the f— up” 

Popovich was never afraid to get on his players and one of his best meltdowns came in a Spurs-Nets game in 2014. Danny Green committed an intentional foul late in the game after Pop had told him specifically not to. As Green came back to the sideline to try and explain why he did it, Popovich just screamed, “Shut the f– up!” at him. 

Pop counts the rings

After the Spurs won their fifth and final title under Pop, they took to the Riverwalk in San Antonio for their championship parade, during which Pop hilariously counted his rings for the fans.