Well, you are right, he isn't Phil Jackson. He never got to head coach MJ or Kobe. Orlando seems more like a Skiles job. Thibs wants to win a ring. He's won plenty, just not a ring. By your logic, basically all the current Bulls have "won nothing." Rose has a MVP. Noah has a 1st team all-NBA award. The ring of course is the ultimate, but "won nothing" is a bit harsh. The Bulls accomplished quite a lot over the last 5 years, they just could not get by Lebron. It was a good era. The wise move is to bank Uncle Jerry's money and wait for the job you feel best about. I think everyone knows he'll head coach again.
D'Antoni about to become Nuggets coach. If you doubt Thibs will get another coaching gig, think again.
Thibodeau will get another coaching gig. I have never said otherwise. My comment is that the machinations this offseason strongly suggest that Thibodeau isn't treasured among NBA front offices as much as the press believes. Let's break this down again. The Thunder job came on the market and ownership didn't even wait to interview him. That was one of the very, very few ready-made spots available. More than that, Kevin Durant is going into free agency; which means that if Durant had wanted Thibodeau the Thunder would have almost certainly gone with him. That's only one spot but it's as true and honest a data point as we can possibly expect. The rumor that Thibs isn't interested in New Orleans because Davis might leave in three years strikes me as BS. Which teams have a better roster than the Pels? The Thunder, Cavs, Warriors, Rockets, Clippers . . . that's it. The Thunder didn't bother to interview him. Thibodeau is not going to be coaching the Cavs and Lebron anytime soon. LJ would never want to give up that much control, nor should he. The Warriors are going to have Kerr for the next half decade; same goes with the Rockets and McHale. Doc is both the GM and coach of the LAC. What is this magical opportunity Thibs supposedly is waiting on? The rumors which you're all taking as fact is that he wants a roster better than the Pels, 8M a year and GM duties. That opportunity doesn't exist and won't exist. You know what is much, much more likely? Thibodeau had interest in the Pels job but it wasn't mutual, just like it wasn't from the Thunder and the Nuggets. Maybe the Pels were worried that they would alienate Davis if they hired Thibodeau and that's why we saw the bizarre statement about the Pels losing Davis in three years. That's a hell of a jump but it makes more sense than the claims that Thibdoeau is waiting on 8M a year, GM duties and a better roster than the Pels.
The Bulls demanded a draft pick for Thibs. For all we know, a 1st rounder from the reports. You expect teams to get within 1-2 days of announcing a new coach after the Bulls dragged out the firing for weeks and then drop everything to hire Thibs? I don't think Thibs wants to jump from one team operated like it's in a small market to one that actually is. The Thunder? They traded away the guy with the beard that falls down a lot and this year Reggie Jackson. Ready made? Ha! The last paragraph above looks like you just made it up.
http://bleacherreport.com/articles/...om-thibodeau-is-to-sit-2015-16-nba-season-out I thought this was a decent article. I could imagine the guy is a bit burnt out / exhausted at this point. Its rough working in a shitty environment. Its pretty clear from both Vinny Del Negro and Thibs that the Bulls are a pretty rotten place to work, if you expect to do normal head coaching things like allocate minutes and pick assistant coaches and the like. Heck, the smear is still going on, with the "wearable technology" leak the org put forth recently. The Bulls are a cruel bunch. Just let the guy move on with his life, all he did was win a lot of basketball games for you, which supposedly is what you hired him to do. Ron Adams was better off getting away from GarPax. I would imagine the same will be true for Thibs. Its sad that the organization spent so much energy this season, one where the Bulls were a whisper away from beating Lebron James finally, in smearing and undermining the head coach during a championship run season. Unforgivable. There is nothing wrong with collecting Uncle Jerry's millions, working with Team USA and waiting for the best fit for your services. Hopefully the Bulls remain a title contending - relevant NBA basketball team and the players continue to maximize their potential without him. One thing is for certain. GarPax have their puppet now and they will get several more years of paychecks.
Yeah, K4E. The fact that he didn't take a job within 3 days of getting fired doesn't mean teams don't want him as coach. He's getting paid $millions so he doesn't have to be in a hurry.
Yeah, it'd be an upset if he didn't, but that's a long way from the "he'll have his pick of any job" rhetoric we had been hearing. If $8mil, ready-made contending roster and a real say in personnel decisions is the bar, I think the bar is set too high.
Just out of curiosity, if not the Thunder, which teams do you think have a better roster than the Pels? Of those teams, do you see any that are looking for a head coach?
The Thunder didn't make the playoffs. Only 3 teams were actively looking for a head coach. That the other 27 aren't firing coaches to hire Thibs this soon after he was fired doesn't say much.
Why does Thibs want to go to a small market team that's going to do salary dumps of his rotation players like happened to him in Chicago? He's been there, done that.
I concur. Decent article. Thibs is a good coach; he'll be back. I also liked this article: http://bleacherreport.com/articles/2485019-is-there-still-room-for-old-school-coaching-in-todays-nba
There are only a handful of rosters in the NBA that matter and Thibs isnt getting any of those jobs right now. And without the roster the coach doesnt matter. Who cares if a team wins 35 with a shit coach v 40 with a good coach? It's a sport with 40 games too many in the regular season to begin with, the have nots in the NBA are like exhibition games.
That old school coaching article does a great job in articulating what I think are valid questions about Thibodeau's future. It also rejects the leak about Thibodeau turning down the Pelicans job because of Davis' forthcoming departure, which I think never made any sense. The one thing I would question from the article is that I don't think Skiles should be considered one of the old guard. He never seemed to me to be one of those guys that rejected analytics or input from management. It always seemed to me like Skiles' problem is that he loses his team somewhere around his fourth season, which isn't rally that much of a detraction in the broader scheme of things. I wonder if the fact that he looks like an old guard coach may have put him on the list.
http://www.csnchicago.com/bulls-talk/old-school-thibs-shares-views-new-school-nba-trend “We have a guy that we’ve hired that’s terrific, Steve Weinman. We’re using him for the draft, that sort of stuff. I’ve been big on it for a long time. I like to use Elias [the long-time stats bureau]. There’s a number of things that I look at that have been a big part of preparation for a long time for me,” he said, first noting that he didn’t “want to get into specifics,” so as not to key opponents in on his tactics. “I get a stat pack both on our opponent and on us for every game, and there is a lot of information. I think the important thing is to determine what you feel is important to either make you think about things or confirm things that you’ve already thought about.”
Well, he is unrepentantly old school. And no way to class this anecdote as a smear-leak from the FO: Look, I liked Thibs. It was a great run. But I also think that unless he makes some changes in his approach, he's going to always be a "hired to be a fired", "point A to point B" coach. I think (and hope) though that he can grow into a better coach if he loosens up some. I think a year from now, we'll all be content with the new coach and the direction of the franchise, and I'd probably be in the same boat as K4E if I didn't feel generally optimistic about the Hoiberg hire..
Old School. New school. Whatever. Few coaches have been more successful over the last 5 years then Thibs. And that's without a superstar for almost the entire run. That's in "the modern NBA." The Bulls were a hair from getting by Lebron and making it to the finals this season. If the front office was actually focused on winning and not smearing / undermining who knows how it would turned out. If Gasol didn't break down at the worst possible time (he played within the teams minutes quota this season) the Bulls very well could be in the finals right now. Its a shame their priorities were so out of whack. The Atlanta Hawks were the poster children for the "modern" approach to running a team. They were swept by Lebron, who plays on a team that plays their studs heavy minutes. http://espn.go.com/nba/statistics/player/_/stat/minutes/sort/avgMinutes/seasontype/2 Kyrie - #3, Lebron - #5 Are the Cavs "old school?" Ron Adams, another GarPax castoff, seems to be doing a great job with the Golden State Warriors. He is cut from a similar cloth as Thibs. GarPax hated him and showed him the door. Adams (and thibs) did seem to like Draymond Green a lot though. Thibs did a great job here. A historically good job. If he does need to change a thing or two, it certainly won't be based on any advice from a mediocrity like John Paxson. It will be interesting to see the next time the Bulls are actually close to winning a NBA title again. Hopefully sooner rather than later. Under Paxson without Thibs, the Bulls have not been a real player in the NBA. Hopefully the players respect the new coach and play hard for him, and that Hoiberg knows how to put those players in the best roles for them to succeed. If he's just a puppet for GarPax, that's a problem. If his opinion differs from GarPax, well, that's a problem too (see Vinny Del Negro and Thibs). It will also be interesting to see how Thibs does in his next job. He's accomplished everything a coach can accomplish for the most part save for the ring as head coach.
Wearable technology? REEEEEEEEAAAAAAACH. Bulls medical staff played Asik with a broken leg. http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/news/story?id=6587324 Chicago Bulls center Omer Asik is done for the rest of the season because of a fractured left fibula that he suffered in Game 3 of the Eastern Conference finals. An MRI and CT scan before Game 4 on Tuesday confirmed the diagnosis, but Asik still played two minutes in the Miami Heat's 101-93 victory. The Heat will try to eliminate the Bulls in Game 5 on Thursday. "You'd have to ask [athletic trainer] Fred [Tedeschi why the Bulls played Asik after the diagnosis]," Bulls coach Tom Thibodeau said. "It was something that they thought that he could play with. He tried to go, he couldn't, and that's the way it is." --- Then the same medical staff told Thibs that Lu was suffering from the flu while he was given that life threatening spinal tap. http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/nba-b...ins-game-6-absence-game-missed-213029133.html So yeah, wearable technology for the win. /sarcasm
Beyond analytics, the hallmark of the modern head coach is the importance placed on forming and managing relationships and creating a positive atmosphere around the team. Kerr emphasizes these areas as did his key mentors, PJax and Popovich. These are not considered Skiles strong suits...he's a hardass autocrat.
