he's also the only one on this team with any type of playoff success. yaos impression of a 11 year old girl, and tmacs houdini act in the final minutes in the series is the signs of a real winner.
Fine, keep JVG. Get rid of Yao and/or T-Mac, exonerate JVG despite the fact that CD only tries to acquire players the coach can use and let's build from scratch under JVG's 1999 vision of the NBA where the talent differential is "razor thin" and his wife disdains playing rookies. Anyone who's watched the NBA for the least 30 years knows how much this is a player's league and coaching changes are sometimes needed despite performance. My fellow Cougar, Don Chaney, must relate to Pete Best in a gut-wrenching way. But, stop trashing posts that are based on the bottom-line performance of JVG. If you're mantra is "blame the players, not the coaches" you may as not watch NBA basketball. This is the only major sport that embraces the creativity of it's superstars. And Stern has pushed the league further than anyone in the last 10 years. Other than JVG "giving T-Mac his own head" JVG's creativity is limited to making sure Thibodeaux makes Yao as much like Ewing as possible. And anyone who's watched Yao since JVG got here knows it. The love JVG gets around here is blind, and I can't figure it out. I have given JVG tremendous credit for the record this season. I've disagreed with some of the more knowledgable posters here that JVG had to have a good showing in the 2nd round to stay. I believe if we'd gotten out of the first round JVG should skate through a 2-year deal even though I didn't want him here. The results, Yao's comments that Feigen described as "less than of a ringing endorsement of JVG" hold more sway than any coach-love who hasn't accomplished anything here. When he's gone, I won't gloat. I'll just watch as eveyrone in our organization gets trashed in complete awe. Except CD, I'm too loyal to this franchise to let that go.
^ good post but parts were vague. if trying to get yao to be dominant in the post is trying to be 'just like ewing' than i dont know what to say. Regardless, we would be lucky to have yao like ewing...great instincts, smart, tough and well rounded. unfortunately yao doesnt consistantly show those qualities. what yao comments?
what did he say? but it goes both way. you will take one comment that can be interpreted as a negative on jvg and run with it...meanwhile ignoring comments praising him. but again. THE ROCKETS LOST. 5 pt lead with minutes left in game 7 and you are at home. THats when prime time players take over. thats when players prove themselves. All a coach can do is put their team in a position to win and its up to the players win get the job done. they were and they didnt. prove something is wrong with that statement. No need to change subjects or point to some other topic. I think the above statement is what it all comes down to, if you dont then explain why. i dont get why people are so reluctant to acknowledge that their players just choked and werent good enough. i know rox cool aid is good, but not that good.
i didnt say that. i didnt even mention names. Names need not apply. Its purposely being general so ones preferences dont confuse the situation even more.
no yao will never say something controversial against the coach, because JVG treated everyone fairly off the court, especially Yaoza... Yao also would not say something controversial because of his nature/culture Yao said in his last interview quote: At the beginning of the season, everybody said we have a deep bench. But the further we played into the season, our bench had become thinner and thinner. Vassalis Spanoulis and Steve Novak were not given chance to play because they were rookies. Bonzi Wells was abandoned and I am certainly not at all surprised, because he and the head coach were having personality clashes. But later in the series, Kirk Snyder was also dropped, and this I just could not comprehend. Each NBA team needs to have an energy player, who just plays with energy and hustle once sent on court. We need such an energy player, playing against Utah Jazz. Moreover, (I think) this also conforms to the style of our head coach. Kirk Snyder is also very familiar with the (play style of) Utah Jazz. I just could not understand why he (Jeff Van Gundy) did not use Snyder. In this playoff series, if we have an energy player like Mike James, we definitely will have won the series. Well, in lieu of Mike James, if Kirk Snyder had played, we might have come up with better results. which is directed towards JVG coaching style and philosophy you are clearly upset by this and some other things that don't fit you, but still you know this team is not going anywhere with JVG
maybe yao was too busy turning the ball over or fading away from a center he should abuse...but kirk did play and when he did he was beat for layups and threw the ball away. grasping for faint hopes, meanwhile reality is going on. maybe if yao didnt turn the ball over almost 5 times a game the rockets would have won. maybe. but you could also say that this team will never go anywhere with only yao and tmac to lead the charge...and that statement has just as much weight as yours. but i still revert back to my statment 5 pt lead with minutes left in game 7 and you are at home. THats when prime time players take over. thats when players prove themselves. All a coach can do is put their team in a position to win and its up to the players win get the job done. they were and they didnt. how is that reasoning wrong?
prime players? who is the leader on our team? noone really knows? is it TMac? Is it Yao? what I have seen it was more Alston then anyone else.... Mac pushed of beeing a leader, he clearly failed! Yao was upset, he doesn't care of who is going to be the leader, he just wants to win! there were so many things going on...IMO the team was not running 'oiled', there was something that just didn't click I would not put it on Yao, or even Mac. Most of the time he does not know what he is talking about, it's like he wants to please the media and the management... lets be real, this team needs someone to tell them "hey, you guys have potential, we all need to work on this, all 14/15 players, we are all a family" JVG took his stand: please remember Bowen who did not deserve the minutes he got, remember the outracious three point shooting by Wesley, they still both got magnificent minutes, Alston this year....and there was Luther who got lucky players were down and he can keep his mouth shut and play.... point is, it wasn't on TMac, it was on JVG, he could not bring this team above the first round, he had all the tools, yes there were some significant injuries, but at the end, he did not bring it JVG needs to go
My hope. Donald Trump buys Les Alexander out. He tells JVG to come into his office. "Jeff, you had 4 years. 3 of those years you washed out in the first round. We bought you everything you needed to be successful. You wasted those assets and forced us to trade them away. This year you've wasted Bonzi, Novak, V-Span and JL3. You insisted on playing Head in the playoffs even though he wasn't producing. Your offensive stratagies are lacking. I"m sorry Jeff but.... YOU"RE FIRED!"
what you say doesnt make yao look very good. If yao wants to win then he should realize that he is the leader. " this team doesnt need a pep talk about family. they need a pep talk to start being tough and act like they are the best. wtf is he suppose to do. He is a coach. the team has to play on the court. the team had a lead in the closing minutes and lost. what you say makes no sense. sorry.
