The Ime hate bots are strong today The Red side of the force is flowing, it's like watching an imperial meeting on Andor. Amen is first team all defense in his second year, Sengun made an all star team in his second year with Ime, who developed both. Ime is a fantastic coach, third in coach of the year by his peers and look forward to the team growing over seasons.
I responded to a person who believe Ime cannot be criticized because he took this team to the #2 seed. I was simply stating they lost in the first round. I mean it's not like the Rockets are hanging #1 seed banners at Toyota Center for the 2018 season, cause all I know is that everyone is just laughing at 0-27. People are judged by playoff success and failures. If OKC had lost to Denver in game 7, yeah people would start questioning if Daigneault is the right guy for OKC. But they didn't, so he's an awesome coach. Just like if the Rockets beat the Warriors in game 7, I would have a much better opinion of Udoka. See how that works? Cause as of right now, Udoka is no different from JVG, a guy who gets a lot of regular season wins and flame out in the playoffs.
Holiday did not outplay Reed "overall". Holiday was the best shooter on the team when he got on the floor and that was literally the ONLY thing he was better at. I know a lot of people like to believe he was a better defender, but he actually wasn't. And even with the big gap in shooting, the TS% wasn't even that far apart. I'm not hating on Holiday but, Reed should have been given those development minutes over him. Maybe we don't end up the #2 seed if he had played more (Maybe we do if he started playing better with more minutes)....But it doesn't matter because we lost in the 1st round anyways and most people are fine with that because it was a "learning experience"...But they weren't willing to sacrifice a few spots in seeding and probably having the same results to get the #3 overall pick we just drafted some experience...
Well sounds like they should have started him more often then. Especially since his best game came against the best team in the league …
....refresh my memory, did Reed start in AAU...was he a starter in college? I really wish you would have some decency sometimes. At this point you are all opinion - whether anything you say is completely wrong is irrelevant to you because you are PISSED off. I'm not even going to bother shooting holes in the many, many, many problems with what you say because why would I waste my valuable time with someone who refuses to be held accountable to what they say?
Ime only started playing Amen significant minutes after Jabari got injured … It wasn’t any tactical genius on his part. His hand was forced .
Seems more like a fluke based on his full body of work in his rookie season? We sure needed him to just be competent against the Warriors in garbage time… just cherry picking an instance.
Right, no credit for success only for mistakes. Many coaches can't achieve what he did joining one of the worst teams in the league three years in a row and many organizations don't rebuild this fast historically. Every game deciding who to play is a separate decision, Jabari could have been put back in when he came back as well. Amen became a two way all defensive star under Ime who developed under him. Yes, it has been a fantastic job so far, we can agree to disagree.
After his 25/5 on 31 minutes game against OKC, he was played 15, 12, 12, 9, 1, 1 minutes … before getting played 37 minutes again out of the blue. Seems like he was heavily mismanaged.
I didn’t realize pointing out Ime made mistakes and got lucky with certain outcomes means he didn’t do a good job. We’re out of the playoffs in the first round if you haven’t noticed. If was such a genius, why didn’t he start Amen in the first place?
Amen played 28mpg in 32 games before Jabari got hurt. That's already significant minutes and they were on an upward trend. In Amen's last 10 games before Jabari's injury he averaged 31mpg. That's starters minutes despite coming off the bench.
I do think Amen in the starting lineup happened earlier than Ime would have done. That said, Amen was going to be a starter before the end of the year. Amen ended up playing the second-most minutes of any sophomore.
Yes we all could see Amen had potential for greatness while Jabari was looking like being a winning role-player at best. And it still took an injury for Amen to get in the starting line-up. That’s Ime’s biggest flaw as a coach. Too safe and reliant on his favourites like FVV to the detriment of long-term success. For example … Reed putting up ROY numbers in his starts then going back to not playing again right after.
I wouldn't say Ime didn't like Reed. It was clear to me that at the beginning of the season, he tried to incorporate Reed into the lineup. Reed just wasn't ready. I mean, even Ime knew that we needed shooting. What Ime doesn't like is lazy, selfish, players who don't try hard all the time. (I suspect that's why Cam is in the doghouse.) Reed seems to be a hard working guy who tries hard on defense even with his limitations. I am sure Ime will mold Reed into a decent to good defensive player, like what he did to Jalen and Alpi. My worry is that Ime might not use Reed the right way on offense and waste his talent on that end.
I usually stop responding, and will after this. But Amen started 23 games his Rookie year in 2024. https://www.basketball-reference.com/players/t/thompam01/splits/2024 He started 42 games this year and became First Team all Defense under Ime. Not luck. https://www.basketball-reference.com/players/t/thompam01/splits/2025 We're also had one of the fastest rebuilds historically with many teams taking 5-7 sometimes 11+ years to rebuild. Our season as well as the playoffs was a great learning experience for these 22 year olds who had never been there before. Not saying yourself, but some fans don't consider that a player can actually develop on the bench fighting and earning his minutes fairly. You can argue with the results if you want to but Amen has accomplished and become what he is in his two years under Ime.
Exactly, agreed. He was already getting heavy rotation minutes and just got a few more and the title which didn't change he was already heavily involved and being used for his impact on the game. Sengun average 31.5 minutes the whole season and became an all star with similar minutes.
Yes, he started in AAU, no in college. Reed may or may not be a good player, he just should have gotten time from Ime to find out, same with Cam. DD
I think Amen is the exception rather than the norm. The dude is like a sponge absorbing the ropes of playing in the NBA. He was not very impressive in the first half of the first season. But his improvement trajectory is just exponential. And he is dead seriously focused. Not many players have that. I am still very hopeful for Reed's ascent.
