[USA Todays] Rockets' struggles put Van Gundy in jeopardy

In the middle of last season, I said something like, "Now that JVG has assembled an intelligent team, his mission is accomplished. Let's get Rudy back to lead this team to championship."

 

Isiah Thomas did and look at what a great coach and gm he's become.

 

Dang'ol.

 

By the way Women's Nintendo Entertainment System,

To answer your profound response a couple of days ago, I AM well aware of what my dang'ol Moniker stands for in Chinese. It means "****" (being that I AM chinese).

What's your point? Does that make you witty to point out something that is pretty obvious to most posters on here? Your responses are just so dang'ol witty, I can't even fathom the idea of getting into a debate with you.

Dang'ol

 

You are testing Mobs' patience. Carry on. I don't mind.

 

Mob eh? what is that if you dont' mind me "courteously" inquiring? Pray Tell.


Dang'ol.

 

Fair enough, I didn't mean to write a complete essay on Laimbeer, only to stir a discussion.

As far as I am concerned, Laimbeer was a far more accomplished and well rounded player than Cooper, who was nothing more than a defensive specialist. Despite limitation to his athleticism -- as an NBA player whose small vertical leap and slow feet surpass probably only the likes of Yao Ming -- Laimbeer had innate talent for positioning in the paint and anticipation of rebounds, never mind he was a fine scorer as well. Of course nobody can deny his remarkable *talent* to get under the skin of his opponents. While his thuggish antics on the court as a player may draw ire of many, he can definitely teach Yao something that is glaringly missing in our big man.

Leading Detroit Shocks to their WNBA championship as an underdog, Laimbeer was tremendously respected by his players. If you happened to watch Laimbeer on the court side as a head coach, you'd be impressed with his calmness under pressure, a stark contrast to JVG. Granted WNBA is a vastly different business from NBA, the fact Laimbeer successfully instilled his knowledge and experiences in NBA into his players in the first ever professional basketball team he coached says a lot about his coaching and leadership ability.

 

He only looked like one, but never was proven.

 

Umm I think that was the point he was trying to convey. His message had a hint of dry sarcasm in it while you took it for face value.

Dang'ol Brilliant!

 

Actually, you'd find yourself at the end of a very looooong line of people waiting to kick said person...

 

you know one shot saved JVG's career, in the Heat/Knicks first round series in '99, game 5, Allan Houston hit a last second shot that hit the front of the rim then went in and sent the knicks to the second round. They ended up going to the finals that year against the spurs....to think where would JVG be now if that shot hadn't fallen...because he was going to get fired if he lost that series...that knicks team had a lot of turmoil and i remember people calling them a disappointment before the playoffs...knicks fans were chanting for van gundy to be fired.....i was just thinking if allan houston never hit that shot, where would jvg have been now?

 

Or that phantom 4 points play by Johnson against the Heat (or different year)? But it's such a intense compitition, you can say those what ifs to all the great teams and coaches. What if Horry's shot didn't fall, where would be Shaq and Kobe's second ring? What if Shaq's goaltending and offensive foul actually called, the Blazers would have Shaq's first ring? The list goes on and on.

 

That run by the Knicks was amazing. They were always outmatched in terms of talent, played tough, and sqeezed out wins. The formula was great defense combined with low scoring offense to hang in the game, and raise the intensity in the last minutes to steal wins. JVG was the right coach for that team as his hard a$$ coaching style matched the team's identity - a bunch of overachiving underdogs, mustering up all its energy for one championship run and that was it. They never repeated the feat they accomplished in 1999.

Spree and Houston were nice players but nowhere near dominant. JVG is a coach that demands more and more fire from his players to put up overachieving heroic perfromances to overcome obstacles. Houston responded, Spree responded, Larry Johnson and Marcus Camby(he played like an all star against the Pacers) all responded. Taking turns, they overcame one obstacle after another until they fell to the Spurs.

JVG is a coach who wanted to implement his micro managed system to put less emphasis on relying heroics to save the team. He did it and failed last season. Players didn't really buy into his boring and complicated system. So he had to loose the reins and go back to his Knicks way. The old way of his heroic emphasis worked with Sura, Barry and Mike James. Yet the new players don't buy into it or simply can't do it. Players are different. Some can always be fiery and some like to go with flow. Lacking the ultimate hero on this team, T-Mac, JVG is exposed with his lack of coaching on offense. So JVG is stuck now, he doesn't have the heros on the Knicks team and last year's Rockets team to overachieve, and he doesn't have good coaching on offense to let the flow created by a system carry the players. JVG is a good coach with his limits, and the limits are exposed now.