What I'm hearing about the Trail Blazers, Tom Thibodeau, lottery reform and more

Tom Dundon must be devastated.Everywhere the new Portland Trail Blazers owner looks these days, his NBA contemporaries are cutting massive checks like drunken sailors and making it that much harder for him to justify the penny-pinching ways that have defined his early tenure.The Milwaukee Bucks, who continue to navigate the Giannis Antetokounmpo situation that will be front and center for the entire summer, wasted no time or money in replacing Doc Rivers with one of the top available coaches on the market. Per league sources, new Bucks coach Taylor Jenkins signed a long-term deal with a salary that is well north of $10 million annually. Jenkins isn’t the highest-paid coach in the league, as that honor goes to Golden State’s Steve Kerr at $17.5 million annually (for now, as he continues to contemplate whether to return). Miami’s Erik Spoelstra is second (approximately $15 million). And Jenkins, the former Memphis Grizzlies coach who was once a Bucks assistant in Antetokounmpo’s early days, is up there now.Advertisement