OFFICIAL AROUND THE NBA THREAD -May 2021

I expect Pops to retire, he's missed the playoffs two years in a row and he doesn't have any super stars developing for him to coach.
Tough league to coach in unless you have a few super stars on the team. He has been on record that the game has changed way to much with to many threes and his team shoots fewer than any team in the league. Game has passed him by.

 

So it begs the question - was he ever really that good to begin with or did he just have arguably the best power forward of all time on his roster? His teams were extremely good. The guy took over a team with Duncan and David Robinson. He might have been one of, if not the, best GMs of all time though. He assembled some excellent teams. So how much of their success was Pop the GM and how much was Pop the coach?

 

You can make the same argument with Phil Jackson, Red Auerbach, Pat Riley, Chuck Daley and on and on. Great coaches need great players and vice versa. Great coaches tend to go where there are great players. Jack Ramsay won it all with Bill Walton but couldn't coach a team to a title without him.

 

When you take over a team with a couple future HOF & other great players it makes your job much easier I would guess. I recall Hill the guy he replaced felt betrayed and even David Robinson didn't agree with the change. When Robinson came back and injured his foot and they end up with TD, the planets lined up for POP.

 

I don't think you can make that argument with Phil Jackson.

The Bulls had Jordan and Pippen before he took over. They didn't win anything.

The Lakers were a cultural mess before Phil took over.

 

I didn’t say that a bad coach could fail to achieve success with great players, or that even a good coach needs a good supporting cast to go with his stars. Doug Collins was a decent coach, but I don’t think he meshed well with Jordan. Jackson and all of the guys I listed were really good coaches. So is Pop. It still takes great talent to win a title.

 

No. It's the winner of the Suns/Lakers series.

 

I'm just saying that Phil is a little different because he was known as a guy who could work with egos and malcontents. Dennis Rodman is a perfect example. Pop and Rodman did NOT get along. At all. Pop also wasn't able to do much with Kawhi and Aldridge. Why do you think that is? LMA and Kawhi were at the top of their games when they were on the Spurs together.

Phil was able to win with two almost completely different Bulls teams and Lakers teams. Only similarity obviously being Jordan and Pippen on the Bulls and really just Kobe on the Lakers. Pop couldn't win without Duncan, even though Kawhi was able to go on and win in Toronto. I'm just saying we never really got to see Pop have success without Duncan, but Phil won without Jordan. He won without Shaq. Kobe wasn't able to win without Phil.

 

He didnt do well in New York though.

 

That's more of an indictment of the Knicks than of Jackson IMO.

 

He was the GM. Not the coach. I don't think Phil was a good GM.

 

They played one season together, while Aldridge was being torn down and rebuilt in the SA big man mold, and then Kawhi sat out all but 9 games the next year. (LMA missed 7 games that year. Is there an easy way to see how many of the 75 games coincided with Kawhi's 9?) There wasn't time there to do much.

 

Russ and the Wiz get another shot!

 

If Pacers loose any chance Domantas Sabonis may become available? LoL...

 

So the Wizards are in.
Ain’t no way the Pacers are coming back now.

 

indiana is likely top 4 team in the east fully healthy

 

I kind of think this is the kind of blowout you will see tomorrow as well.
Anyone honestly think the Grizzlies are gonna hang with the Warriors?