Just like last season, we're not going to win anything. Why not just let him play so he can develop and by the time we're competitive he'll be "up to speed".
That's basically what they have been doing with Jabari and Jalen who both have more severe deficiencies to their games than Alpi. It's a total double standard, and the one who has been improving and who tries hard every game gets singled out for criticism nonstop, while the other two can play like ass the entire time, and, in Jabari's case, on top of that, get allowed to bark at the teammate who actually plays much better than he does. That's how you create a toxic culture - by only selectively holding people accountable (and actually punishing the performers, but not the non-performers), by allowing non-performers to bark at performers, by pointing fingers at the ones who try. I no longer think that Silas is a "nice guy". He feels under pressure, and he is lashing out at a kid who is actually trying really hard and who has been the lone bright spot in our rotation.
He doesn't need the instinct for self preservation. Teams will have an assistant spot for him until retirement. As long as he is contained and doesn't have to be responsible for a team, all is dandy.
I have no evidence of this, just wild speculation. But I think that Silas doesn't have the green light to bench players like KPJ, Green, and Jabari...even when they play awful. But Sengun is unprotected, so Silas will hold him accountable when necessary. My perception of Stone is that he's a snake. In his interviews, he's been sure to distance himself from the coaching decisions, rotations, etc. He's just the idea guy. I don't buy that BS. Silas is probably going to be fired, but if so it solidifies my view that Stone and the front-office are dysfunctional.
It's odd that a team's best player would be unprotected. If anyone is protected from consequences, it should be the guy playing the best. IMO none of them are star players, so no one should be protected from accountability, but protecting players based on hype and draft position is absurd.
This isn't the first time. He claimed Giannis was cooking him last year as a reason for benching him when it wasn't true. Note, there may be truth to Sengun not giving the effort the coach wants. Perhaps he's become the focal point for the frustration Silas feels and he can't get get passed that.
It's baffling honestly. I don't know what it is about Sengun. Honestly. I don't know if he's a dick, loafs in practice, is white, etc. Like maybe it's his fault and we don't see it. I won't rule it out. Maybe the coach has a problem with him because of a personality issue. But it's wild AF. I don't believe Sengun has superstar potential, so it's not franchise wrecking most likely, but it's still crazy that your best player, with probably the most upside and the one who is improving the most gets treated the worst.
After these 3 seasons, I will question the sanity of any coach or player who will choose to work with or respect any input by Tapeworm.
I think it's time. I'd rather just get a jump on potential candidates instead of waiting for the offseason where candidates will have many more choices. Nothing will be lost if we go with Lucas in the interim.
Why do you think Sengun doesn't have superstar potential? He was MVP in the second best international league at age 18, became the youngest center ever in the NBA to post a triple double, his basketball IQ is off the charts, and both his basic and advanced stats are comparable to players who became superstars. And he achieved all of that even though his coaching staff actively tried to NOT feature him, yanks him all the time, singles him out for criticism, etc. I respect you very much as a poster, so I am interested in why you think so. Do you think he lacks athleticism? Do you think his defensive issues are impossible to overcome? May I ask you for a favour? Can you look at this thread and choose the players you would NOT build around? He is obviously one of the players listed there, but you would be surprised who the others are.
I agree but you conveniently forget to mention KPj who has been pampered and rewarded since before the locker room he trashed in Cleveland was even cleaned up. Fact is all should have seen tough coaching/mental tests/accountability..not just the ones you pick on, but all. Fact is only Alpi has faced any.
Here is my attempt at playing amateur psychologist when it comes to Silas: I am sure there must have been voices internally who said "let's feature Alpi - give him the ball, give him the minutes, let him play" - even when Silas was still pushing the KPJ/Green dribble dribble dribble offense. Silas always actively resisted that. Then KPJ and Green both got hurt, Alpi got an opportunity, and he delivered like crazy - triple doubles, getting his teammates involved, basically it became fun again to watch the Rockets, even though we were losing. This was basically proof that Silas had been wrong all along. But rather than admitting that to himself, and finally building around Alpi, and continuing to feature him, he dug in and stubbornly found excuses to yank him, and to make sure Alpi would not continue to make him look like even more of a fool than he already is. That's what he is doing now. He knows his time is up soon, but rather than being smart and letting Alpi develop, he actively tries to "prove he was right". Every other player could be injured, he would still rather give the ball to Nix, give Nix more minutes and shots, claim Alpi doesn't play defense - ANYTHING to prevent admitting that he was wrong all along about Alpi. And he tells his coaching staff the same thing. The young black assistant coach, when interviewed at halftime by Vanessa, gave a really weird response when asked about Alpi's first half performance. He pulled a face and said something about him needing to play better defense. That's the official party line by Silas. But I'm sure there are dissenting opinions internally already, and there must have been for a while. And that's why Silas gets so defensive and annoyed when Alpi does well, and he tries everything to hold him down.
He's the team's second best player, I'm not for shielding any of these guys, but if you are going to do it, you'd do it for the best performing players right? I think it's MUCH more relevant that the worst 2 performing players on the team, Green and Smith, are being pampered and rewarded than crying about things KPJ did years ago. By all means though, bench ANY poor performers....we'll almost never see Jalen or Jabari if they do.
I think ultimately his defensive limitations are too much for a team to overcome if he is your best player because of the position he plays. I'm not in concrete on that opinion and I hope to be wrong obviously, it's just what I think at this point. He's still the best prospect they have right now so they should be focusing on that.
Exactly - I don’t have a problem with Silas pulling Alpi if he’s truly making defensive mistakes and/or willfully ignoring the defensive game plan. If it’s the former, it’s OK to pull him for a few possessions and give him some mentoring. If it’s the latter, then yeah, bench him until he buys in. But if Alpi is going to get pulled every time someone gets by him, then the same should happen every time Jalen and KPJ allow their man to leak out for an easy bucket/fast break after a Rockets miss and the same should go for Jabari every time he gets blown by or fails to block out. Nothing kills morale faster than having one person be punished and another rewarded (with the reward/punishment being minutes in this case) for the same mistakes. Equal treatment (or at least a good faith attempt at equal treatment) is leadership 101. Eventually, as players move on and/or retire, we may get the full story of what drove Silas to treat Sengun so differently than the rest of the team.
Silas did not like Alpi from the very beginning. He always had the very short leash. In his first year, he always got less minutes than deserved. We had posters making up reasons, fouls, turnovers, stamina, etc. While these reasonings had some truth in them, they were remotely close to explaining the situation. His passing was good. Silas spoke about them in a condescending tone referring to them as 'fancy passes' as if they were not effective. And later in the season Sengun was more of a screener for the guards and occasional post ups. His assist numbers decreased significantly. Come 2nd season and Sengun looked motivated to improve his shooting, to be more aggresive in the preseason. Only to be replaced by the athletic Bruno Fernando(there are the two articles that accompanied that move, that's another layer to the story) in the starting line-up. And he was always the only player that was called for his defense explicitly. No matter how horrible our perimeter defense was, how the guards cannot handle basic switches, it was always Sengun's name being mentioned. The Sengun hub thing kind of happened organically because KPJ got injured in the game. I highly suspect Sengun would get the go from Silas, if KPJ was injured before the game. The Nix&Tate show would be running instead. And since it worked like a charm(surprise, surprise!), he couldn't just cut it right away. I am sure he was just waiting(sad to say it but probably hoping) for sengun to fail. I said it many times. It is impossible to know what lies behind this but this is one of the weirdest episodes in basketball history.
