Some high praise from Larry Brown

Uh, no. Did you see the Knicks under Isiah Thomas?? They were worse than the Knicks under Larry Brown.

 

Pick and Roll

 

No he hasn't. The only time Carter ever coasted was the 20 games at the start of the 2004-05 season when he wanted out of Toronto. And while sandbaging because you want a trade is not an admirable quality, the 57 games he played in New Jersey that season after the trade was some of the best ball of his NBA career (highest scoring average and second highest PER). The two years after that were pretty darn good, too. He was down a little last year, but he had a few minor injuries and losing Jason Kidd hurt his game. Part of that is natural decline as he's now in his 30s, but he's back to averaging over 20 PPG and has a PER over 20.

I definitely wouldn't want him as my go to guy, or team leader, but we don't need him to be with Brandon Roy on the team. He'd be a solid 2nd or 3rd scoring option and a huge upgrade at SF over what we currently have. Yes, he'll probably only be so for another 2 or 3 years, but by then our younger players will be ready to take over and he can either be let go or slide into a 6th man type role. We're not looking for Carter to lead this team, we're just looking for an upgrade at or weakest position - and Carter is a significant upgrade.

BNM

 

Yep. He coached the 1988 Kansas team. I'm sure he loves KP.

 

Ya, but when you do a great job in your other 15 (give or take) stops, I'll give him a flyer. Larry Brown is one of the best all-time and if he is down with Nate (as is just about every other NBA'er in the know), I'd say we have a pretty good coach here.

 

Vince makes $15 million a year, and for the next 4. The Nets have to consider him a heck of a long-term liability.

Are they cheap enough to swap Raef + Trout for him?

I would *definitely* be stoked with this deal.

http://games.espn.go.com/nba/features/traderesult?players=136~454~2015&teams=22~17~17&te=&cash=

I like Trout, but the dude still has no IQ, and it hurts. Vince could be the guy who leads at the SF role while Batum/Web grow up. It would make us contenders THIS YEAR.

iWatas

 

You will note, that it took not only a coaching change, but GM change to move the climate in NY to a positive atmosphere. Nothing good was going to happen with Isiah in charge there.

 

I'd blame others for the 2004 Olympic team besides just the guy who coached them. The selection committee would easily be first in line though as they didn't seem to give a thought towards putting together a team of complimentary talents for the international game. The players themselves were not fully committed... 10 out of 12 guys from the previous years FIBA squad declined offers

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_men's_national_basketball_team

STOMP

 

Just like in Portland.

 

I wasn't really arguing with you Nik. You said "he wouldn't be the long-term answer" and I was kind of building on that point.

 

Gotcha, no worries.

 

33 wins the season before larry brown. 23 wins with larry brown. 33 wins the next season with isiah thomas.

 

Larry has had some pretty good teams and only won one title. The fact that he never won with Indiana was pretty sad. The Pacers were better than the Knicks and they were better than the Magic. They should have gone to the Finals at least once more than they did, and it took Larry Bird to get that team past the ECF.

 

Nice props from Larry. Good to hear some high-profile coaches throw praise our way and not get bothered so much by that e-mail. 28-17, whoo hoo!

 

I don't think they were better than the Magic or the Knicks. The Magic were much better. Shaq and Penny weren't that far off Shaq and Kobe and they had great complementary pieces in Horace Grant (when he was still close to his prime), Nick Anderson and Dennis Scott. That was a pretty tremendous team. The Knicks are more arguable, but they were structured similarly to the Pacers: One star and a bunch of good players. But Patrick Ewing was a much better player than Reggie Miller.

I really never thought the Pacers were very talented during the Larry Brown years. They broke through in one of the weakest Eastern Conferences ever. A few years later, they had a pretty excellent team, with a prime Jermaine O'Neal, Ron Artest, Stephen Jackson and a declining Reggie Miller. But Brown had moved on by then (and beat them with his Pistons team).

 

To be fair, two of those years were when the Bulls were absolutely dominant.

 

And, Brown also took a Philadelphia team that was basically Allen Iverson, and an already old Dikembe Mutombo and a bunch of scrubs to the NBA finals. I mean come on that team started George Lynch, Tyrone Hill and Eric Snow - and they made the finals.

Yeah, I know the East was weak that year, but that's nothing new.

BNM

 

They were also the only team to win a game against the Lakers in the playoffs that year.

 

That Game 1 was incredible where Philly took that 1-0 lead I think in the series. AI, being draped all over by Tyonne Lue the entire game, then hits the dagger with a crossover and steps right over him. Sweetness.