Deron Williams on rumored coach conflicts during his Nets run: "Me and Donald Trump don't agree on anything except fake news"
Donald Trump has never been a fan of what he calls fake news. And while the POTUS and Deron Williams share little else, the retired point guard once admitted they do agree on that point.
In November 2017, D-Will made that clear during an interview. Back then, he addressed the steady buzz about alleged clashes with his coaches during his Brooklyn Nets years.
To him, most of it sounded like talk, not truth. He didn't hold back either. Williams' response came with a grin and a jab at the media industry itself.
"Me and Donald Trump don't agree on anything except fake news," he said , per Bleacher Report.
Clashes with coaches
In the NBA there's an old tag. "Coach killer."
They say it about players who slowly but surely make sure the head coach gets axed when things don't go their way. Williams's name? It pops up on those lists plenty.
That doesn't mean he actively clashed with every coach. Still, his Nets years brought plenty of stories suggesting exactly that.
D-Will arrived in Brooklyn in 2011 as the franchise centerpiece. He and his head coach, Avery Johnson, however, never seemed to mesh. The Nets hit a 14-14 start. Ownership eased Johnson out midseason. Reporters pinned it on Williams' griping about an offense that didn't suit him. Just one more of the many reasons he seemingly clashed with the 2006 NBA Coach of the Year.
Williams, for his part, denied any hand in it. The West Virginia native said as soon as he heard, he knew the blame was coming. Everyone would point at him again, thanks to that old "coach killer" label from the Jerry Sloan days with the Utah Jazz .
Meanwhile, Brook Lopez had his back. His old Nets teammate called it "unfair assumptions that were created by the media." Big-market beat writers, Lopez figured, were always hunting a story. Williams just made an easy target.
Williams' media frustration
Still, despite Lopez's backing, those coach‑conflict narratives didn't go away.
Just rewind to when Jason Kidd took over as head coach in June 2013. Reports soon popped up about heated practice exchanges between him and the 6'3" point guard. The Daily News even had one story. J-Kidd was said to have stepped onto the court to call out D-Will during a rough drill.
Then came the Lionel Hollins episode. Late in his Nets run, word got out that tensions boiled over in a team meeting. Teammates and staff supposedly had to hold Williams back from going after coach Hollins.
As for the three-time All-Star, he called most of it fabricated. The kind of stories he'd put up with was too long. Especially once he got to the "Big Apple." D-Will said the press burned him plenty there. Without a real reason, of course.
The 2005 NBA Draft pick pointed to one example. He'd praised living in New York City in a Resident magazine interview. D-Will only mentioned the challenges of finding schools for his four young kids.
However, that was then turned into a headline claiming he didn't like New York at all.
Still, that many stories about clashing with the boss? Most fans would start to wonder. One story, maybe fine. A pile of them? That's a different matter.
Williams saw it differently, though. He framed it all as part of the fake news media machine — the same kind Trump has called evil and corrupt and in his view, unlikely to ever change .
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This story was originally published by Basketball Network on Mar 30, 2026, where it first appeared in the Off The Court section. Add Basketball Network as a Preferred Source by clicking here.
