When Jason Kidd coached the Milwaukee Bucks, he had a rule: if one player made a mistake during practice, he punished the whole team by making them do sprints while the erring player watched.
However, in the book “Giannis: The Improbable Rise of an NBA MVP,” Mirin Fade wrote that Kidd took that rule to another level, punishing the team in practice after center Thon Maker messed up their Apple iMessage Group by using an Android phone while chatting.
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“At one point center Thon Maker didn’t have an iPhone, messing up the team’s blue-bubble iPhone group chat,” the book excerpt read, via Business Insider. “Kidd was upset about it and made the team run because Kidd felt that Maker not getting an iPhone was an example of the team not being united.”
Kidd didn’t want to see green in the group chat
After his first season as head coach of the Brooklyn Nets, where he went 44–38, the Milwaukee Bucks traded two second-round picks to Brooklyn to hire Kidd as their head coach, a move that also led to the firing of Larry Drew.
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His time in Milwaukee is often cited as an example of how strongly he emphasized unity, even extending to how players communicated with one another.
A “blue bubble” group chat is an iMessage conversation in which all participants use iPhones. In these chats, messages appear in blue bubbles and features like read receipts and typing indicators are enabled because the conversation is fully within Apple’s system.
If even one participant uses a non-Apple device, the chat turns green, indicating SMS/MMS messaging instead, which lacks those advanced features.
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According to the book, Kidd believed team unity was affected by this, feeling that the group wasn’t fully connected until rookie Thon Maker got an iPhone (or another Apple device) and joined the team’s iMessage group chat.
Kidd’s 139-152 record with the Bucks
Maker was Milwaukee’s No. 10 overall pick in the 2016 NBA Draft, straight out of high school. He played two-plus seasons with the Bucks before he was traded to the Detroit Pistons in February 2019.
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The Bucks posted a record of 42-40 during Maker’s rookie season in 2016-17, and they made the playoffs after missing the postseason the previous year. Maker started 34 out of 57 games played during his rookie season, but averaged just 4.0 points and 2.0 rebounds per game in 9.9 minutes of playing time. In 2017-18, Kidd was fired after a 23-22 start and was replaced by Joe Prunty. He finished his Milwaukee tenure with a record of 139-152.
After Milwaukee, Kidd coached five seasons in Dallas, helping the Mavericks reach the 2024 NBA Finals, where they lost to the Boston Celtics. One year later, they missed the playoffs after controversially trading Luka Doncic. They missed the playoffs again this season, and following the hiring of Masai Ujiri as president, Kidd was fired so the team could start with a clean slate.
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This story was originally published by Basketball Network on May 30, 2026, where it first appeared in the Off The Court section. Add Basketball Network as a Preferred Source by clicking here.