The Good, the Bad, and the Doc: Tales From Doc Rivers’s 40 Years in and Around the NBA

Getty Images/Ringer illustration Ever since his rookie season with the Hawks, the player turned coach has been a fixture—and a fire starter—in the league. We chatted with some of the many people who have crossed paths with him over the years to gather stories about business cards, brutal losses, managing egos, and much more. Doc Rivers is the kind of guy who likes to say he saw things coming. On Tuesday night, after the injury-ravaged Milwaukee Bucks defeated the Indiana Pacers 115-92 in Game 5 of the first round of the NBA playoffs to stave off elimination, a reporter asked Rivers what he'd learned about his team from the performance. "It's a good question," the Bucks coach replied. "I believed in them anyway. I said that after the game last game." It was only a few months ago, at the end of January, that Rivers was unexpectedly hired to take over the Bucks, and if there's anything he didn't foresee, it was that he'd wind up in the playoffs without the team's two leading scorers, Giannis Antetokounmpo and Damian Lillard, on the floor. But "this team," Rivers said on Tuesday, "they're giving it to me. They're doing everything, they really are. They're playing together. They...