Ummm. No you can't. Not at all. Kerr was gifted quite possibly the best roster a new head coach has ever seen.
This is so incredibly hindsight biased. The Warriors were coming off losing in the first round and had lost in the second round the year prior. Before that they had been to the playoffs once in 18 years, so we're talking Minnesota level futility.
Roster is very important, but I think when it comes to coaching you're not giving them enough credit. Look at Thibs and McMillan from just this past season as examples to the contrary. Both had basically the same roster as the coach before them.
Well let me rephrase that. Kerr was given a better roster than what Billups or Porter were given in my opinion. If you want to call it hindsight then so be it but most agree Kerr was given a good situation. Nash as well could do very well. Nash great player but might not be the greatest coach even though he has a pretty darn good roster. It ain't hindsight to say the Nets will do well this year.
There's definitely exceptions. Hawks got healthy pretty much right when Nate took over which gets overlooked, but the players definitely liked him more though (especially Trae) and I think he gave them more structure offensively and demanded a bit more from them defensively. Thibs was interesting, the conversation around him was that the league had passed him by, but no doubt did some great things. Simplified things defensively for them. Got more conservative with the big and zoned up more on the weakside. Alot of shooting luck involved in their defensive improvement though. Gave up one of the worst shot profiles in the league. Got career years out of a lot of guys. Interested to see how year 2 goes for them. Really like the Kemba addition for them. Not so much Fournier. Was truly awful defensively last year.
I don't understand why people act like the roster and coaching aren't intertwined. Coaches develop players. Coaches lead players. Players will look better or worse depending on if they're utilized correctly or not by the coach. If a player isn't utilized properly, they'll look bad and people will blame the GM for it. Putting percentages on the importance of the roster verse the coaching is strange to me considering how much player skillsets, development, and play-style are impacted by the coach.
I was really looking forward to seeing this in the preseason with the ample opportunities he was going to have.
I was definitely joking but I think its going to take a long time for him to find his groove. Im not as excited as I was before but still think its possible he could be good.
ITS THE PRESEASON WHO CARES?! if in 35 games we have issues then address them. Right now it looks fucking stupid.
my only problem is if we wait until game 35 to address something the season might be lost and with all the rumors of dame wanting out this was supposed to be a turn around year.
100% agree. Some folks are trying really hard to make him out to not be a good coach. Others have already spent time talking about how much better he is/will be than our previous coach. I have no clue how either side could come to that conclusion. I think Billups is likely to be a good, not great coach. If people think he has a great roster (he doesn't), then they're going to think he's doing a bad job, which isn't fair in my opinion.
Honest question, why were you excited before? Like I’m not fazed by how this team is playing right now, this is exactly what I expected.
