exactly why i've mentioned in the past, someone needs to forfeit their hottie for the team. send udoka a honeytrap get him suspended again and force stone's hand
I believe it's some combination of a lot of what has already been said. Ime is not a good offensive coach and there is a real lack of creativity in his offensive game plan. It's hard to run a successful offense though with such limited offensive talent on the roster and such poor 3-point shooting (and even free throw shooting). If we lose this series, Stone should make an effort to upgrade our shooting. Sengun and Amen are the future and we need better shooters around them. Ime is still a fairly young coach and can improve with experience just like players improve with experience. Saying that if he loses this series, it will be proven that he can never be a championship coach is not a good point. Only one coach gets to win a championship per year. Ime is a good coach and deserves several years to see how he can improve. A proven assistant/former head coach as an advisor might help. Mike Brown would make sense. I think we need to take advantage of our depth advantage and play our starters less minutes. I don't understand why FVV is playing 40 minutes every game. I like FVV and I think he's a winning player but Fred in his 40th minute of the game is not better than Aaron Holiday in his 6th minute of the game. More minutes for the bench and less minutes from the starters will allow our guys to play with better defensive intensity at the end of games. Finally, Jabari needs to get the ball more on offense. Jabari should be getting 15 shots per game. I'm ok with Amen starting but there needs to be some more lineups with Jabari at the 5 and then some lineups with Sengun and Jabari working together. I don't know how well this would work but what we're doing thus far isn't working on offense.
I wouldn't mess with the starting lineup. That part's fine. But the minutes? That's where you can shift things. Jabari's got to play more, and heavier minutes. Same with Steven Adams. In this series, Sengun probably needs to get scaled back a bit. And we're going to need something big from Tari Eason. Not just good minutes but real impact. The kind of plays that change the feel of a game.
On lack of self awareness: the Rockets are winning the following minutes: 1) starting lineup minutes 2) the Sengun minutes, 3) the Adams minutes, 4) the FVV minutes (barely) 5) the Brooks minutes Green is even. Rockets are losing the minutes with: 1) Amen in 2) when JSJ and Eason play together. I think the Rockets have to figure out how to win with Amen in.
I think Jabari needs more playing time. I wouldn’t be opposed to him starting…. However, it feels like we’ve been leading in the first quarters. I think the issue is more sustaining offense throughout the game.
He should make some changes to the lineup but will not and Fred will likely continue to play 40+ minutes for reasons only Ime apparently understands.
We probably need more context for this. e.g. What GS lineups do these lineups go against? Matchups might play a role. Maybe Amen should play with Tari rather than Jabari. I don't know why Amen-Jabari doesn't work. But Amen has been bad in general. I am surprised Amen has not been effective guarding Curry. Also, I thought I saw Curry guarding Brooks in several occasions. That could be Kerr's design, putting the weakest perimeter defender on our perimeter offensive player who has the weakest handles. Brooks can't get past Curry from outside. But he can punish Curry if he gets the ball near the basket.
I may have been a hyperbolic about Ime. Before the playoffs, I expressed the same sentiment that he is inexperienced as a head coach and didn’t want him fired. I am beyond frustrated with his intransigence when it comes to FVV. I think it shows a stubbornness that portends that he will be lacking like many similar coaches that can’t get over their egos to field a championship team. Thibodeaux, JVG, Mark Jackson, Dantoni, for example.
I mean... I kinda get what you're saying, but if you think Ime would have lost to the 8th seed Heat or wouldn't have won the title with the team they had last year, you're kidding yourself. If your point is that Ime shouldn't have too much control over personnel then I agree. Having the coach be the GM rarely works out.
One of my points is: Ime would never have gotten rid of his tough guys and last year's team never would have existed. They basically got rid of 3 of his favorite players. Further he wouldn't have taken the amount of 3's that are making the Celtics so dominant. The 8th seed in the East is typically a .500 or less team, that's nothing to write home about.
Some of yall are making this super personal and sound like scorned lovers. You are using literally his first season as head coach where he lost in the finals as some sort of proof that he's selfish, bumbling, can't win it all. Ime took the Warriors, who were favored to win the 2022 finals, to 6 games in the 2022 NBA finals. And you say he fumbled those finals? He got his ass handed to him by a dynastic coach with 4 rings from coaching?
Like @mfastx is saying.... no one wants or thinks Ime should be both the coach and the GM. So it's just not a good point. I'm not sure why you think someone like Derrick White isn't a Ime type of player?
May have been? Your sentiment is assuming that if Amen and Green were capable of consistently running an offense, Ime would still choose FVV. That's kinda crazy dude.
I’ve never liked the idea of the two big lineup, just because neither can shoot. So guys like Thompson, Jalen, Eason can’t drive because our bigs are just sitting down there trying to get offensive rebounds. Jabari is the perfect 4 IMO starting wise, and I’m sure it’ll come back in time.
Ime is a very "you win the possession count game, you win the game" type of coach. So he despises turnovers. Fred may go 3/17 but he'll do it on 2 turnovers. I think he is severely stunting the ceiling of this offense. Training wheels help stabilize and allow you to not fall but training wheels prevent you from riding bikes to their full capability with higher speed turns. Fred isn't allowing the full capabilities of the bike to be used.
