Suns fire coach after three games

The Phoenix Suns have fired coach Earl Watson three games in to the NBA season.

The Suns announced the firing Sunday night after hours of meetings at the team’s headquarters.

Assistant coach Jay Triano, a former head coach of the Toronto Raptors, was named interim coach. Triano was an assistant at Portland before coming to Phoenix last year.

Watson was promoted from assistant to interim coach of the Suns after Jeff Hornacek was fired Feb. 1, 2016. The interim tag was removed on April 19 of that year. With an extremely young team, the Suns struggled under Watson. He compiled a 33-85 record. Watson’s only full season was 2016-17, when the team went 24-58.

The 38-year-old Watson played collegiately at UCLA and in the NBA for 10 seasons. He often spoke of his long talks with John Wooden, emphasized togetherness and a family atmosphere to nurture the young squad but wins were hard to come by.

And owner Robert Sarver apparently didn’t like what he saw. Phoenix is 0-3 and two of the losses were especially ugly. The Suns were blown out 124-76 by the Portland in their season opener Wednesday night, the most onesided loss in franchise history and the most one-sided season opener for any NBA team.

Phoenix was routed by the Clippers in Los Angeles 130-88 on Saturday night.

“I Dont wanna be here,” point guard Eric Bledsoe tweeted Sunday, just as the news of Watson’s firing surfaced. The tweet by Bledsoe, a former Clipper, was followed by one from the Clippers’ DeAndre Jordan saying “Come back home bro.”

Bledsoe has been rumored in possible trades for months.

Watson’s dismissal is the first NBA coaching change in well over a year. Hornacek’s hiring by the New York Knicks, which was finalized in June 2016, had been the most recent change — and the irony there is that Watson got the job in Phoenix with 33 games left in the 2015-16 season, after the Suns fired Hornacek.

Watson was the league’s second-youngest active coach behind the Lakers’ Luke Walton, and the Suns were tied with the Chicago Bulls as having the youngest opening-night roster in the NBA this season.

Baseball

RED SOX HIRE CORA » The Boston Red Sox hired Houston Astros bench coach Alex Cora as manager, turning to a player from their 2007 World Series championship roster to help the team out of its current playoff slump.

“Returning to the Red Sox and the city of Boston is a dream come true for me and my family,” Cora said in a statement released by the team. “I look forward to working towards the ultimate goal of winning another championship for this city and its great fans.”

The Red Sox announced the hire Sunday, a day after Cora’s Astros eliminated the New York Yankees in the AL Championship Series. With two days off before Houston opens the World Series against the Los Angeles Dodgers, Boston had a chance to hire Cora without running afoul of baseball’s ban on major moves during the Series.

Cora, 42, replaces John Farrell, who led the Red Sox to the 2013 title and in the last two years claimed the first backto-back AL East championships in franchise history. But Boston also finished last twice in Farrell’s tenure, and the ballclub has won just one playoff game since winning it all in his first season.

“In Alex, we have found a natural leader to guide our clubhouse,” Red Sox owner John Henry said. “His baseball acumen and his ability to think strategically are uncommon for someone his age. We could not have found a better match for our players, our front office and for where we intend to go over the coming years.”

NFL

TIMBERLAKE TO PERFORM

AT SUPER BOWL » Justin Timberlake has finally been invited back to the Super Bowl halftime show, 14 years after the “wardrobe malfunction” with Janet Jackson cause a national controversy.

The NFL announced Sunday night that Timberlake will headline the Super Bowl halftime show Feb. 4 in Minnesota.

This will be the third time for Timberlake to perform at halftime, the most for any entertainer. Timberlake performed at the 2001 Super Bowl with N’Sync, and he sang “Rock Your Body” with Jackson in 2004 in Houston. That performance concluded with Timberlake ripping her costume to reveal her right breast bare except for a nipple shield.

That drew CBS a $550,000 fine from the Federal Communications Commission that was later overturned.

Timberlake has won 10 Grammys, and the Tennessee native also has won four Emmys.