I have zero doubt that you believe that’s true and that there’s nothing I can say that will change your mind. For those who may be more inclined to listen to alternative opinions, consider that the Blazers have one player on their roster taller than 6’8”. Their bench has been decimated by injuries to the starters and the resultant promotion of Bazemore to the starting lineup and frequent need to play Tolliver as a starter. Their three “best players”, Lillard, CJ and Anthony, are not good defenders. It isn’t lack of scoring that’s killing the Blazers; their offensive production remains in the top 10 in the league; it’s lack of defense and a lack of bench production.
It starting to hamper there offense even though they won game in last 3 there offense hasn't reach there season average. Yes Dame getting his and Melo getting his and CJ getting close his but the rest of the team is struggling on offense.
Well when I wrote that I was looking at articles. The one I found was from December 2019. They said he was considering coaching. Not sure if that is still true? My father had MS for many years. Not sure it would have kept him out of the game? But maybe?
I'm so tired of the excuse that CJ, Dame are not good defenders. We have had them for over 5 years. Whose job is it to convince them that they need to play better D for this team to succeed? If they don't want to, why not trade one of them instead of keep paying them more and more money? Either Stotts gets fired. Or Olshay gets fired. Or someone gets traded. Tom Thibodeau is my choice. A defensive minded coach, who will ask for more efforts. We also need a coach who will make sure we get more ball movement/more assists.
Chicago and Minnesota thought that was a good idea too. You think our offense is bad now, just wait until Thibodeau gets the job.
If there's a Stevens out there, then do it. Just need certain attributes in our coach in order to get the most out of this team, and being a college coach doesn't mean that they don't have those traits.
Why wouldn't Messina come here? He's been dying for the chance to coach an NBA team and we could offer him a decent amount of salary...
While I'm sure some of these names are good coaches, which ones are guaranteed to be better than Stotts?
There are no guarantees. However for better or worse I think Stotts is a known commodity, and sometimes a calculated, educated thought out risk needs to be taken to move forward. I don't blame Stotts for this year, but I also dont believe he is capable of leading them to a championship. When he did it with Dallas he was an assistant and theres a major difference between an assistant and a HC, as an assistant being the friend, the brother of players is part of the job. When you’re a HC you can be a friend, but you also need to take the role on of a disciplinarian. Sometimes its time to say yes I care about you, but right now your habits need to change and I have to be harsh, because I need your behavior to change like a parent, rather than a brother. I think Stotts (at least my perception of him), is rarely the parent and often the brother. His players love him and my distant opinion of him is mostly positive as a person too. caveat: I obviously don't know how his private dealing are, this is just my observation from far away. Its just an opinion and I realize it could be wrong. X’s and O’s I also question his ability to make needed adjustments in games.
My point is, if Stotts is so bad it shouldn't be hard to find somebody guaranteed to be better. It took Jerry Sloan a decade to win a conference championship and he never won coach of the year either. Should Utah have fired him?
Believe me when i tell you. I absolutely WANT Ettore Messina here in Portland! I would pack Stotts's bags and pay for his ticket out of here to get the coaching gig open for him. Having a coach like Messina running the team would change so many things on so many levels (Not just on the Floor). The problem is that this holds true for a bunch of other teams in bigger better markets. You immediately get a huge portion of Europe watching your team. You get prospective European players wanting to come here and play as well as other international prospects. If we can see the value of having him here others can also. Now here is the real issue. The word is Messina wants not only to coach but to have executive decision making power. That means he wants the same position as what Pop has or even the way Phil Jackson ran a team. You would have to fire Olshey to get a coach like that. Now i would be willing to pack Neil's bags also. But you see the problem right? Now you have to fire pretty much everybody. Maybe even the owner at this point. The only way i see this happening is if Jody sells and the owner decides to completely rebuild the team. Maybe even a European Owner? Who knows. But right now he will stay with Olympia Milano. Here is a link- https://news4sanantonio.com/sports/...-reveals-why-he-left-spurs-for-olmipia-milano It say directly that he wants to Speak and Veto team decisions. Not sure this is the place he can do that at this point? Maybe at some other point? Here is a quote from another link- "Alas, it didn't happen and it won’t likely happen in the future, either. Like a lot of foreign prospects who are stars in the Euroleague, only to be pigeonholed as role players in the NBA, Messina could never convince a franchise to fully invest in him." https://www.poundingtherock.com/201...a-never-got-the-chance-he-deserved-in-the-nba
To be fair on that argument. Malone never won a Chip. It's a shame. Utah was pretty "Mediocre" for a very long time with two HOF players.
Not exactly apples to apples comparison here. Stotts in Portland: 0.555 winning percentage with a 0.373 percentage in the Playoffs (with a streak of 6 consecutive years of being in the playoffs - which is definitely in peril right now). Sloan in Utah: 0.623 winning percentage with a 0.490 percentage in the Playoffs (with a streak of 15 consecutive years of being in the playoffs). Those are significant differences, especially in the playoffs!
