This. Thibodeau has all the good things of JVG but has a more flexible mentality. He is like an improved version of JVG.
Let me also add that he has Ron Adams on his staff, which is huge. They stole him from OKC. This guy is a true defensive guru and stays on players throughout the game, during timeouts, etc, reminding them of their assignments and rotations. I don't think he's getting enough (or any) credit, which is too bad. He and Thibs on the same team is clearly unfair to the rest of the NBA. I was very sad when he left OKC but glad he went to the Bulls. It took dumping Jeff Green and getting Perkins to put some mojo back into OKC's defense. If the Bulls get a starting SG that can score some, their offense will take jump. Bogans is a major liability and Ronnie Brewer will always be limited. Korver is good off the bench but they need a starter that can hold his own.
Thibs must have learned something about resting his players from his time in Boston. I am certain that he will have them primed and ready for the playoffs. He keeps the Bulls focused entirely on the present and gives them the blueprint to win each game. Like Battier used to say about the Rockets when he was still wearing red, the Bulls never get too high and never get too low. Sidenote: How weird is it that the Celtics lost their ferocity and the Bulls seem to have inherited it? How much of Boston's success can you attribute to Thibs? My thinking is that Doc may be a great motivational tool for Boston, but a lot of their success came from Thibs. They sorely miss him.
Would have been but his big mouth wouldn't fit through the door. It's good that it turned out that way because the last thing the Bulls needed was a selfish diva that wouldn't have completely sold himself out for Thibs' philosophy. In the long term, Thibs might need to take a page from Pops playbook and only sign guys that will totally get with the program with no dissent allowed
After last night's win, Tom Thibodeau is the fastest coach to 100 wins in NBA history. http://news.bostonherald.com/sports...as_bulls_rout_magic/srvc=home&position=recent [rquoter] ORLANDO, Fla. — Tom Thibodeau doesn’t do reflection. So when history happens, the Bulls coach harrumphs. Thibodeau broke Avery Johnson’s NBA record for the fastest coach to 100 victories thanks to the Bulls’ 85-59 victory over the Magic on Monday night at Amway Center. That ran Thibodeau’s mark to 100-30, eclipsing Johnson’s record set with the 2006 Mavericks by one game. The Bulls also improved to 19-6 on the road and 10-4 without Derrick Rose, who sat again with a strained groin. They did so with a team effort that featured 24 points from Carlos Boozer, 20 from John Lucas III and defense that forced 19 turnovers and 35.3 percent shooting. Instead of records, those are the details on which Thibodeau focuses. Then again, that’s the fewest points allowed in franchise history, besting the 62 points the Bucks scored on Dec. 5, 1997. There’s a record Thibodeau likes. "I want to beat Orlando," Thibodeau said. "That’s the only thing that matters. All that other stuff, meaningless. Stuff like that, it’s more a reflection of the team and organization. We have good players, great management, great ownership." Whether Thibodeau admits it or not, the Bulls have a great coach too. Just ask Magic coach Stan Van Gundy. "There are a lot of great coaches in this league and a lot of people have done great jobs both last year and this year," Van Gundy said. "But nobody — nobody — has done a better job than Tom has. And he’s probably doing even a better job this year than he did a year ago. "With all the injuries they’ve had, they just keep rolling along. I said to my assistants the other day, they could probably have all five starters out and they’d still beat everybody. It just seems like they win no matter what. "To me, they’re the best team in the league as far as a team collectively playing together, being unselfish, being committed defensively." Lucas jump-started a sluggish affair by burying three 3-pointers in 51 seconds late in the first quarter. He again got hot in the fourth. Meanwhile, the Magic posted just nine assists and the Bulls scored 25 points off turnovers. No coach in NBA history has won consecutive Coach of the Year awards. Thibodeau will draw serious consideration to be the first. Not that he cares about such details. [/rquoter] http://espn.go.com/chicago/nba/stor...ibodeau-records-100th-win-fastest-nba-history [rquoter] ORLANDO, Fla. -- With the Chicago Bulls' 85-59 win over the Orlando Magic on Monday night, Tom Thibodeau became the fastest head coach in NBA history to reach 100 regular-season victories. It was a record he tried to take in stride. "I'm just glad we won," he said. "When you look at stuff like that, it says that you have good players. We have great guys, too. They're not only good players, but they're great players. I'm very fortunate to be coaching this team." While Thibodeau tried to downplay his accomplishment, his players went out of their way to praise the achievement. "I know he's going to say it doesn't mean anything, but I think it's a great accomplishment," Bulls center Joakim Noah said. "He's the hardest working guy I've ever been around and he deserves it." Luol Deng echoed those sentiments. "I'm glad it's him because he works so hard," Deng said. "He really deserves it. I've never seen anyone work as hard as he does. We all believe in him. As hard as he works and whenever he comes up and has a game plan, we all buy into because we know how much effort he puts into studying every opponent." Carlos Boozer, who scored a team-high 24 points on Monday, saw Thibodeau's work ethic pay off from the moment he signed with the Bulls as a free agent last summer. "It's great, man," he said of Thibodeau's mark. "He's one of the most detailed people I've been around and it's been a fun ride. Knowing that, at the same time, none of us are satisfied. We want a whole lot more. And it starts with him, he wants a whole lot more too." Boozer believes the team-first, hard-working attitude that Thibodeau exhibits permeates through the Bulls locker room. "He's not about himself," Boozer said. "He's about the team. That trickles down from everybody. From coach Thibs to (Derrick) Rose to the rest of us, everybody's about the team, nobody talks about themself really." With the win, Thibodeau now has a 100-30 regular-season record as a head coach with the Bulls. The previous record was held by Avery Johnson, who accomplished the feat in 131 games as head coach of the Dallas Mavericks. "I always say when you put the work in, when you put the time in, you'll be successful in whatever you do," Bulls point guard John Lucas III said. "And he puts the work in and the time in and it shows. Look what he's done in the past two years. He's a guy that loves the game of basketball and he's still a student of the game of basketball. He's always learning something, always going into other things, trying to make us better and also make himself better as a coach. So when you have a coach like that, he's going to be successful."[/rquoter]
Great coach who slipped through the cracks ; ) I'll be rooting for Thibs and the Bulls to go all the way!
If he starts winning some consecutive championships, people may talk about him better than Phil Jackson.
The Bulls are an elite team without the former MVP . Anyone watch Noah last night? And people were saying they wouldn't trade Martin/Daly for him....
If it was ever apparent that Thibodeaux was a great coach, it was last night's win against Orlando. His teams play phenomenal defense and all of this without Rose. Sheesh!
