Of the 9:16 of the 4th quarter that wasn't garbage time (Mills and Shavlik in the game), the Blazers scored 13 points. Andre Miller was in the game for 5:02 of that and was 2-3 (missed a 3) for 4 points, assisted Webster on his 3. that's 7 of the 13 points. And for most of his stint, Bayless was in there with he and Roy and the other two controlled the ball.
Not directly, but indirectly yes. His skills don't translate to winning basketball come the fourth quarter, at least not with this club.
His repeated statemens that players "earn" their playing time and then handing the starting PG spot to Steve Blake and leaving him there for week, after week, after week, after week when Miller was playing better and out producing him. Good for you. What I find absurd is a head coach benching a productive, experienced player who is having a great game in the 4th quarter and then shouting at him "You don't play the way we want to play" in front of the whole team at practice. Well the "way" the team played in the last 3:45 of the Clippers game cost them a win, but way to stick to your guns Nate. Maybe rather than stubbornly sticking to a style of play that's failing miserably, the coach should set aside his ego and try sometrhing different. BNM
How do you know? He played the last 8 seconds of the 4th quarter in the loss to the Clipps. So, suddenly it's HIS style that cost us the win and not Nate's style? BNM
How is it "failing miserably" when our coach has effectively led this M*A*S*H unit to within 1 game of the NW Division lead? (This, BTW, with the team going 1-3 without him on the sideline.)
For the last few minutes he was in the game, he was jogging back on D, standing still watching guys battle for boards when we put up a shot and not taking a step in either direction until someone actually got the rebound, arching his back and grimacing in pain, and ignoring any offensive flow we had by stopping the ball every time it touched his hands regardless of the situation. Granted, he did work hard with the ball and when his man had the ball, but he was definitely coasting the rest of the time. The guy was tired and hurt. Good on him for thinking he could play through it, but it was clear to me that he couldn't.
Who was he watching battle for boards? he had 2 offensive rebounds in the last minute and a half. Was he struggling on those? Who was he watching? Bette ryet, who were you watching?
Let's go with that and assume you're right about everything. Somehow he then found the fountain of youth (3 quarters only) variety the next game and was able to get rebounds and go 7-11. "he was jogging back on D, standing still watching guys battle for boards when we put up a shot, not taking a step in either direction until someone got the rebound"... Are we talking about Miller, LMA or Roy?
I am trying to not post and just read... but I had to say something. You people who think Bayless had a choice on what shot to make and miss, are ignorant. I thought posters in this community were more intelligent. But to suggest a player can just freaking decide if he wants to make or miss a FT??? Why is everyone in the league not shooting 100% if they can just choose if they want to make it or miss it?!??! If any of you actually looked. Bayless tried to miss the 2nd FT, he tried to follow what Brandon said and he blew it. He made it. OOPS. Shit happens. Get over it and move on. BAYLESS DOES NOT CONTROL IF HE CAN MAKE OR MISS A SHOT. To think he made it on purpose, because Miller said so, is absolutely senseless. B Wookie you are unreal!!! The things I want to say would get edited. You have some idiotic beef with Miller and that has your eyes glossed. You need to wake up. Nate is an idiot, stubborn fuck who lets his emotions get in the way of his work. That is not good. This crap with Miller proves it. Miller need to play and Roy needs to learn to play with him. Roy is a fantastic player and I love the guy, but he is not good enough to demand some Jordan type team dominance. Miller is a great player and Roy needs to deal with it and let him play. Can you imagine how good we would be if Roy AND Miller got 22\6\6 ???
Miller was benched because he was completely out of gas, and it was showing. Your definition of "earn" is obviously vastly different from Nate's. That's not Nate telling lies, that's you disagreeing with his opinion. I strongly disagree that Nate's stubbornness is because of any sort of inflated ego. The man has played and coached the game the way he has his entire career because he believes it to be the right way to play/coach, not because it brings him accolades.
Here's a request: A list of the coaches Miller has played for, and the winning record under each coach. I'd like to see if he's played well under any "strong willed" (i.e., Nate-esque) coaches or if his best results have been under "players' coaches (i.e., Mo Cheeks-esque).
Excuse me? Looking at the box score, the Blazers were down 8 at the end of the 3rd, where Miller played 31 minutes. It seems that the entire "no Miller" group was +4 the entire time he was off the floor in the 4th. Maybe they would have won if they did not play him as much as they did in the first 3 quarters as well... A basketball game is played for 48 minutes - and it seems that this team played better the period they did not have Miller's great contributions... Given his average of -2.666 points per quarter when playing - and extrapolating it to the 4th quarter - one would assume the Blazers would have lost by 10 instead of 4 if he played more in the 4th... Repeat after me - Andre Miller is not the answer. Never was, and if we are lucky - we will not spend an awful lot more time seeing him prove it, as he did before in Philly, Denver, LAC or Cleveland. The numbers do not lie. Miller is the same player he was last year and the year before in Philly. When he is on the floor - his team wins 50% of the time. That's just what he is, the data is there to back it up. Time to accept the fact that he is a role player, and not a good fit on this team.
Nate's not perfect, he's a coach developing, much the way our young players are. But, each year, he shows improvements. It's not just me that thinks highly of him. His players do (minus Miller). Colangelo and Coach K did. Bryant and James did as well. Want results, look at his win-loss record. IMO, he and the coaching staff have put their players in roles that allow them to succeed and, in turn, for the team to achieve wins. Nate's style wins games, right. It's Nate's design that led all these seasons, correct? Every time the team goes up against an adverse situation and we're all waiting for the walls to come crumbling down, what happens. We win. Obviously Roy has a ton to do with this, but it's the system also that allows Roy to garner these results. I'm taking my opinion from what I've seen over the multitude of fourth quarters this season. I'm not sure what the reason was that he sat the entire fourth quarter of the Clippers game, but logic tells me that it was a good decision considering what I've seen from the Roy/Miller tandem at the end of games.
Cleveland: Randy Whitman - 2 years (32-50, 30-52) John Lucas - 1 year (29-53) LA Clippers: Alvin Gentry - 0.5 years (19-39) Dennis Johnson - 0.5 years (8-16) Denver: Jeff Bzdelik - 1.5 years (43-39, 13-15) Michael Cooper - 0.25 years (4-10) George Karl - 1.25 years (32-8, 44-38, 14-9) Philly: Mo Cheeks - 1.75 years (28-28, 9-14) Tony DiLeo - 0.75 years (32-27) Portland: Nate McMillan - 0.5 years (22-15) Trend: Plays for a coach for a while, that coach is fired, and the next coach decides to trade him after a season.
Don't you know that your exchange with PapaG was caught on security cameras and Stern has got the feds on your ass? Um - it's pretty easy to MISS a shot. You certainly have a choice about that. FWIW Ernie Johnson seemed to think that Bayless had tried (and his expression after the FT might back that up, except that's his permanent expression). Why don't you just show him three guns and ask him to pick one. Actually I think Wookie is being very reasonable and citing good evidence (y'know, from actually observing the games) to support his claims. People could learn from him. Ah. Good thing you can show Wookie the cool objective insight of someone who doesn't have some idiotic beef. Easily -- in past seasons when we played the Sixers. Unfortunately it's pretty obvious it would never happen with them both on the same team.
I was referring specifically to the Clipper game where our coach's offensive scheme of ISOs and nothing but ISOs generated a grand total of 1 point over the final 3:45 and cost us the game by turning an 8-point lead into a 4-point loss. BNM
