With alot of teams up in the air about where they rank and coaches being sought after and discarded like rag dolls.. I have a feeling a team will bring in Phil Jackson to help push a team from playoff team to contender. What teams seem the most ripe for Phil Jackson to step in and help them win alot of games and maybe a championship? in my opinion PJ is just sitting and watching .. waiting for a team to put all the pieces together then *bam* Phil comes in as the final piece. in no particular order of teams that could use Phil to take them to the next level. Meaning they have the talent, players just not the coaching.. Denver - I think the team is immensely talented but Jeff may not be the coach to bring them to the next level. Indiana - I admire what Rich has done in Indiana but they were already a strong team and they underacieved in my opinion.. I think with the right coaching in place and some luck (no injuries) they may have made the finals instead of Detriot. Grizzlies - I dont know if PJ would like to coach this type of team lots of talent no superstar but it is ripe with potential. Hubie is no longer there I heard he retired. I would also say Houston but I think JVG is doing a great job. where do you think Phil Jackson will land? J
Phil Jackson will jump in wherever some team was about to win a championship anyways, which means he won't be anywhere next year. He is the most overrated coach of all time. As if Jordan and Shaq would not have won champioships anyways. Get real.
As if Jordan and Shaq would not have won champioships anyways. Get real. I don't like Jackson either and it pains me to say this but ... Why didn't Shaq win any titles in LA before Jackson showed up? Jackson was the difference maker that pushed that team to greatness.
1) Because the teams he lost to were better than the squads he lost to during the 3-peat. 2) Because Kobe was not the player he was when they were losing. As great as Shaq is, he still needs his closer.
Seems odd we belittle Jackson for being 9-1 in the finals with two allstars yet consider Sloan a decent coach for having never won with two allstars? Nine rings! No more rationalization needed. Shaq, Kobe, Jordan and Pippen were not the only good players in the league these past years. Him good coach. I don't much like him...but him good coach.
Jackson is overrated. But that doesn't mean he's a bad coach. He might well be the difference maker that pushed the Lakers to the championship when he first came to LA--although I suspect it has something to do with Kobe coming to his own right at that time. Jackson is exposed the last two years. They got trashed by the Spurs a year ago. They got trashed by the Pistons this year. They did go down like the Kings losing by an unlucky bounce and going down fighting in 7-game series. If you can't win with Shaq and Kobe two years in a row (not to mention adding two other HOFers last year) and get trashed going down, you shouldn't be a candidate for the honor of "greatest ever" as so many people assume he is.
There were other good players in the leauge. But how many coaches have had two top 5 players on the same team? Yes, Sloan is the one coach that has never won a title with two great players on the same team for so many years. But they are the Jazz. They are cursed. Ring counting is one of the worst ways to measure greatness in team sports. With that logic, Horry is a better player than Bird, Hakeem, Barkley, etc.
Ring counting can be horribly overrated. But when you count to NINE... there is some relivance. And, as the coach selects what plays to run, he's inherently more instrumental in the success of a team than a role-player. If i had a highly talented team -- i'd want to consider Phil as a coach. I'm not suggesting he's half the man he thinks he is...but i think we have to acknowledge he's an excellent coach for the teams he chose to coach.
Carlisle took over a team having lost in the 1st round for three years in a row, an underachieving team just over 0.500. When he took over, they had just lost an all-star Center (Brad Miller) for nothing, and their second best player (Artest) was a walking time bomb who had missed a quarter of the season with league and team suspensions. Carlisle sat Tinsley on the pine until he could play without making turnovers, and demanded that the offense go through O'Neal and Artest, and demanded that Artest control himself OR ELSE. Result? 61-21, and injuries to O'Neal and Tinsley coupled with a void at SG (sorry Reggie) kept them from winning it all. RC is one of the top 3 coaches in the league. If you thing he underachieved, you must think Isiah Thomas was the worst coach in the history of mankind. Oh... you might be right about Isiah... Phil? No thanks.
He is a great coach...you don't win 9 titles if you are not a good coach. That is like faulting Rudy T because he had Hakeem. You still have to coach. DD
DD, did you mean he's a great coach or a good coach? Big difference. I don't think anybody is saying that he's a bad coach. Maybe he's even a great coach. But GREATEST EVER? Simply because he has nine rings?
First, Red has more rings and he actually built his teams rather than walking into a fabulous situation with no effort on his part. Second, Alex Hannum is the greatest NBA coach ever.
The difference between Phil and Sloan is that Sloan didn't run away when the talent was gone. He actually stayed in Utah and proved he could coach a squad without "stars". Phil ran...twice. Other teams had good players, but ALL of his teams had arguably the games best player, and definately two of the best at their respective positions. MJ was the best SG, Pip was the best SF, and Shaq was the best C. You can argue Kobe as the best SG for the past few seasons. You can argue for MJ and Shaq as the games best player in every title season. Sorry, but no other coach had a roster like that.
Stick to something you know, Juan, like Mexican rock music (thanks to Mulder for the idea). Phil is overrated. He is great at meshing egos and that is it. I never thought he was the greatest and that was confirmed when he turned down the Grizzlies several years ago when they were still in Vancouver. I guess he didn't want to have to work hard.
