Jeff Bzdelik somewhat surprisingly announced his retirement from coaching shortly before the start of training camp. Bzdelik was credited with turning around the defense of the Houston Rockets.

Mike D'Antoni was asked about Bzdelik's departure.

"No, Jeff is unbelievable," said D'Antoni. "Great guy. He enjoyed it. We’d talked about it before, and I’d seen even during the year where he’d say, ‘Oh man, I don’t know how much more I can do this.’ So you could kind of see the signs, but it came as a shock. I thought the summer would recharge him, and get him going, and maybe he thought the same thing and it just didn’t do it. I don’t think there’s any mystery."

D'Antoni was asked whether Bzdelik's history with Carmelo Anthony in Denver played a part.

"No. No. I’m almost 100 percent sure that’s not right. I’ve talked to him, and we even talked about it during the summer. I mean he likes ‘Melo. He’s like me. You’re fine. It’ll be good, it’d be interesting, it’d be fun. And he and ‘Melo had made up a couple years ago. They were fine, so no."