It seems to me like every now and then a star guard will get in trouble with the coach. (It rarely happens with big guys, either because they are gentler, or because the coaches fear them more.) Some of them end well, some of them.. well not so well. 1. Micheal Jordan- Doug Collins. MJ drives Doug Crybaby out of town. 2. Larry Brown - AI. Rocky coexistence for awhile then LB gets fed up and leaves.wants to come to Houston, but Cheap b*stard Alexander won't doll out the dough and ends up in Detroit 3. Byron Scott - Jason Kidd. Kidd behaves like a passive-aggressive manipulator and drives Byron out of town and somehow manages to make it look like it's not his fault. JVG goes nuts in the media over Scott's firing, now we maybe getting a clue as of why. 4. Phil Jackson-Kobe Bryant. Major disagreements over playing style. Handled masterfully by the Zen Master, any disruption is channeled into motivation. 5. P.J. Carlessimo - Latrel Spreewell. Spree chokes P.J and is shown the door. Later joins the Knicks and gets them to the NBA finals under caoch van Gundy. What conclusion can be drawn here: A. The best thing for a team is to have a Phil Jakson type of coach who can manage these types of friction and turn them into positives. B. In the two cases where the coach was fired the team does better afterwards. Chicago goes on to win 6 titles. Nets are unbeaten after Scott got fired. C. In the one case where the star player was let go, it turned out to be a terrible move for the franchise. And finally, a little bit of Rockets history: On media day before the 1992-93 season Hakeem the Dream calls coach Rudy a "coward". Dream proceeds to have the three best seasons of his career and Rockets win they only two titles in two of them.
1. Francis isn't Jordan. 2. Francis isn't Kobe. (and they had Shaq to carry them anyway) 3. Latrell didn't "lead" the Knicks to the finals. Allan Houston, Larry Johnson and Patrick Ewing had equal roles in taking that team to the Finals. (and come on, it's Golden State we're talking about. They've pretty much always sucked and would have continued to suck regardless of whether Latrell stayed or went) 4. In your conclusions you failed to mention how terrible the Sixers organization has been with out the leadership of Larry Brown.
Here's what I believe about Phil....He the greatest coach of the greatest talent. Here's what I believe about Rudy...He was the greatest coach of the least amount of talent (anyone remember the Olympics of CBA?). Give Phil bad talent and he will flounder in mediocrity (he will over-use them; expect them to do too much). Give Rudy great talent and he will squander in mediocrity (under-use them; simpleton ball).
Ya, Francis isn't Jordan or Kobe, but like them and the others on that list, he is the best player and captain of this team. Just like with any organization, when things go wrong, you look at the leader/captain. And since they are the ones that take the most heat, they are usually the ones that defend themselves or the team. I'm not saying who's right and who's wrong, I'm just saying that confrontations between player/coach are going to happen, and for the most part, it usually helps the relationship. They have to let each other know how they feel, I would be more scared if they just stopped talking overall.
You are honestly going to consider a minor wining streak as "better" than back to back Finals appearances? Isn;t that just a tad premature?
Robert Horry (a big guy) and the coach during the time he used to play for the Suns.. forgot his name..
Shoot, how about Webber and Wes Unseld. Slightly different situation, but similar struggle between rigth and wrong, and Washington has never been the same.
dude, Rudy had Olajuwon. Rudy had Drexler. I think he is exactly like Phil Jackson. He took great talent the distance. All of houston's Roll players have been all stars or damn near all star status.
Phil = 9 rings Rudy = 2 Think if of it as Rudy had a nack of getting average players to play at a higher potential rather than Rudy had zero talent (I'm not saying that). "All of houston's Roll players have been all stars or damn near all star status." Rudy did more with less. Look at it that way. Phil does more with more. He wont take the risk of doing more with less. To him, it's not worth the risk/time/effort.
