Seriously, Mike D'antoni? You just lost all credibility. We're talking about a coach that FAILED horribly with the Knicks, where his replacement did a MUCH better job with the EXACT same team. We're talking about a coach that now has a losing record with a HOF roster including a HOF PG. So no, he wouldn't be better than McHale, as bad as McHale is. The ONLY reason you want Mike D'antoni is so he can inflate Lin's stats. But at the cost of what? We would have a losing record with D'antoni right now.
Are we talking about the coach that has Steve Nash, Kobe Bryant, Dwight Howard and Pau Gasol but are currently 17-24?
Well, when you really think about it, it would inflate everyone's stats right? Steve Novak was getting 19 points per game. Where is he now? Tyson Chandler was scoring 20 something points. What's Chandler's ppg now? Jared Jeffries had 10 points within a half. Is he scoring any points now? Knicks and Lakers have slow players. We have fast. Melo and Amare are slow. Dwight and Pau are slow. Hell, even Nash and Kobe have slowed down a bit. It could probably work out, but of course the future is uncertain.
Yes, the one where Pau has plantar fasciitis, Dwight having a bad back and Nash w/ a broken leg. Yea, that one. Similar to how the 2004 Lakers had Malone, Payton, Kobe and Shaq, and lost to a bunch of no namers at the time, the Pistons. We're faster and younger, we play to this advantage.
Yes the same team that lost to Wolves in the last game of a 4 games in 5 night situation after having played a ridiculous road heavy and compacted schedule. Are you going to keep cherry picking?
I agree that it was a 4 games in 5 night situation and it was a tough schedule, yes, but 7 losses was inexcusable. I have a personal vision, not really important of course, it's just me, of what the team was going to be like when Lin came over, a fast breaking, run and gun offense. We did it earlier in the season when we were winning. Now we're losing and it coincides with these terrible half court offensive sets. So, yea, it's not cherry picking. Perhaps I didn't write like a whole friggin essay on my unimportant vision for this team to enable you guys to understand what I'm talking about. In a nutshell: We ought to be a run and gun team, Lin is excellent PG for that. We were winning, and it was fun to watch. It's not fun to watch anymore. It's not like we continued to run and lost. Then I can't say jack because it's like, well, we're losing and running. I don't think Lin is a great player in how you guys assess great players like Kobe, MJ, Mchale, Bird, or whatever. I think he's a great player in leading fast breaks and creating open shots for people. So there. Cheers. :grin:
Please stop, I'm hope you're not implying Novak is going to be scoring 19 PPG with his offense. D'antoni is a bad coach. You know how I can tell? When his replacement goes 18-6 after him including going 6-1 WITH Lin. Factor in the fact that he doesn't play defense and you have a losing record. There are MANY better coaches out there that can help Lin succeed and at the same time actually WIN games. D'antoni is probably the worst HC in the nba right now. So please stop man, use your head, and not your emotions.
Well, it was just a suggestion. Maybe Sloan too. Mike D was just a suggestion because he's not working well w/ the Lakers, and we're a run and gun team. Maybe we could make it past the second round because the Suns were able to do it w/ a run and gun offense. My 2 cents. Cheers.
D'Antoni did win the NBA coach of the year in 2004-2005. He also led the Knicks to the playoffs in 2010-2011 for the first time in 10 years. Let's not forget that the year of Linsanity Melo played horrible under D'Antoni due to Lin jealousy which led to Mike D resigning. It's true his teams don't play much defense and rely on outscoring other teams (Like McHale). With the Lakers they didn't even have Nash for 17 games, Howard is stil not 100% recovered, Pau has been hurting, they're an old team and have to learn to play with 2 centers. I'm not saying D'Antoni is the greatest coach in the world but he's not the worst either. Seems like people tie him and Lin together and don't like either of them.
Jerry Sloan is an awesome coach, and there aren't any divas on the team. I think they would all buy into his system. Get it done Morey!!
I feel bad for McHale. But business is business and McHale has shown he has no business coaching whether or not he was just going through family tragedy. If Morey can lure away Pop that will be perfect (I can only dream). Sloan will be a great hire as well. And D'Antoni is not a good coach. He has no control of players' ego. Lakers would have been winning this season if he would just let Nash run the offense and make Kobe a deadly SG/Slasher. At least Kobe is still playing hard. The other guy in New York just flat out admitted he stopped trying last year.
Actually Dantoni's replacement was his defensive assistant Mike Woodson. After Woodson took over, he admitted that he simply inherited & retained Dantoni's offensive sets & strategy since it was not feasible to change it in the middle of the season which the players were familiar & accustomed to. Note that he was also their defensive coach prior to Dantoni's resignation. So the knicks' offense & defense under Woodson were essentially the same pre & post Dantoni. But the knicks played well under Woodson, so what was the difference? Well the first thing Woodson emphasized when he took over the job from Dantoni was "ACCOUNTABILITY". During the knicks loosing streaks, it was clear that some knicks players were not giving sufficient efforts on both ends of the floor, especially on defense. In the game against Milwaukee, the lack of defensive efforts were pretty obvious when the opposing forwards were able to grab the offensive boards time & again during crunch times while Melo & Amare simply stand in the paint & watch (they were not even boxing out nor hustling for the ball). Woodson said the accountability should start from his star players & he was not afraid to call out Melo, JR Smith, etc. He was especially critical of Melo & openly said Melo was out of shape & ordered him to come in better shape before the start of 2012/13 season. Dantoni on the hand was afraid to call out his star players. I wish the Rockets coaching staff could hold the star players accountable as well. Have you ever heard McHale criticise for instance Harden for his (lack of) defensive efforts? In McHale's post-game interviews especially during the loosing streak, he always said the ball tends to get sticky, but what happened in subsequent games? Did overall ball movement improve or did it ended up the same sticky situations? Without holding the player accountable, the same mistake will repeat itself again & again. Melo & Harden are no doubt the star player & the foundation of their respective own teams. The Rockets needs Harden in order to compete for the championship in hopefully the next few seasons when they acquire the second piece. But to NOT reign in Harden for some of those obvious undesireable habbits, I don't think the Rockets can easily fixed some of the issues which McHale frequently spoke about. Why Hadren you may ask? Because accountability starts from the top. When your top player/leader acknowledges his mistakes/flaws & make a concious effort to correct or minimise them, the rest will follow. This is the one area Woodson has done exceptionally well. You can see Melo is putting in efforts on defense as well as offense ever since Woodson took over. This is not a knock on Harden or Melo btw. I do think that as the foundation of the team, they tend to feel the pressure of carrying the team on their backs especially when the team is not doing well. I think it's on the coach to let them know that they should trust their teammates, or to come up with some offensive plays for them to play within the system. By putting the team on their backs, sometimes they just expend too much energy on the offense that they simply do not have enough to foucs on defense, especially star players tend to play heavy minutes. Also by doing so, the rest of the team tend to just stand around & watch their star player do their things which is not good for the team as a whole. Just my 2 cents.
