Don't call me stupid or dumb then. I don't care about the "Oh I was talking about your posts". There's no difference to me. Who would be the coach? Anyone. These are basic things that coaches should be able to do. Ime Udoka or Juwan Howard are former players that would command respect and would be better defensive coaches. If you wanted to try to lure a college coach, Sean Miller would be perfect. Ettore Messina is another Popovich disciple that was a great European coach. There's many guys that would do a better job in my opinion.
We have two top 10 scorers in the league (CJ is top 10 given his efficiency). I don't think that the offense is a credit to him as it is to the players.
But I remember many Blazer teams that had 2 good scorers and they were mediocre offensively. No one aside from CJ and Dame have much offensive talent. In fact, many of our core rotational players are quite bad offensively, Aminu, Leonard, Plumlee, Davis...Harkless is ok, but has no ball handling skills. Same with Crabbe...a 2 guard with no ball handling skills.
This is all about expectations, and I blame Olshey more than Stotts. If this were last year, most fans would be happy that we were not basement dwellers.
The best basketball coach in the state is coaching in Eugene. That's about the only positive thing right now regarding the current level of basketball.
Firing a coach after 30 games into a season after he has taken you to two consecutive second rounds, and yes it still counts even if the Clippers were injured beyond belief last year, seems a little excessive and as much as people seem to want to call for his head around here isn't going to happen.
Tied all time for the most losses in NFL, has had 6 winning seasons in 22 years of coaching and hadn't made the playoffs in seven years. Yea not even a comparison.
So it's Stotts fault that we signed a center who won't play all year? A swing man who doesn't fit in with the roster? Re-signed a soft big that can't do anything but shoot threes....and is average at best at that? I'm also not saying Olshey should be fired.....this year, but Stotts is not the problem....Not all of it anyway
Using ESPN's formula for effectiveness points http://www.espn.com/nba/dailyleaders ESPN ranks the best performances of the season. http://www.espn.com/nba/gameleaders I wanted it per minute, so I divided by the minutes. Here are the 12 best individual performances so far this season (per minute). I copied the 12 best games (per minute) from the above link (you see the format is the same), and added 3 columns on the left. I sorted the lines by Column 3 (ESPN effectiveness points per minute), which = Column 1 (ESPN effectiveness points in the game) divided by Column 2 (minutes). ESPN MIN ESPN/MIN RK PLAYER TEAM DATE SCORE MIN FGM-A FTM-A REB AST STL BLK TO PTS ESPN 80.5 29 2.78 05 K. Thompson GS 12/05 Ind 142-106 29 21-33 10-11 2 1 0 0 0 60 80.5 58.5 27 2.17 76 J. Embiid PHI 12/18 BKN 108-107 27 12-17 7-8 10 1 2 3 3 33 58.5 81.7 38 2.15 03 R. Westbrook OKC 11/13 Orl 117-119 38 14-21 13-18 12 16 0 0 2 41 81.7 72.6 34 2.14 13 R. Westbrook OKC 12/17 PHX 114-101 34 9-17 7-7 11 22 2 1 5 26 72.6 87.1 41 2.12 01 A. Davis NO 10/26 Den 102-107 41 17-34 16-17 15 5 5 4 3 50 87.1 70.9 34 2.09 18 R. Westbrook OKC 10/30 LAL 113-96 34 11-21 6-6 11 16 1 1 7 33 70.9 85.0 41 2.07 02 D. Cousins SAC 12/20 Por 126-121 41 17-28 16-17 13 1 1 3 5 55 85.0 78.5 38 2.07 07 J. Harden HOU 11/01 @Cle 128-120 38 13-20 10-14 7 15 1 0 1 41 78.5 65.5 32 2.05 26 K. Love CLE 11/23 Por 137-125 32 12-20 8-8 8 3 1 1 1 40 65.5 58.3 29 2.01 81 S. Curry GS 11/23 LAL 149-106 29 11-18 2-2 5 9 1 0 1 31 58.3 62.3 31 2.01 42 K. Durant GS 12/17 Por 135-90 31 11-13 8-10 11 4 2 1 5 34 62.3 70.1 35 2.00 20 R. Westbrook OKC 12/19 Atl 108-110 35 16-33 11-13 11 7 1 0 4 46 70.1 Here's the takeaway. We are greatly overrepresented on the list. Lines 7, 9, and 11 were Blazer losses. The average team should appear on this list 0.8 times (12 lines x 2 teams per line / 30 teams). With 3 appearances, we have 3.75 times as many as average (= 3 / 0.8). Half should be losses and half wins, but our 3 lines are all losses. We are the league's Santa Claus, gifting players and teams with highlight games, each receiving their best game (per minute) of the season.
Wasn't Paul Westhead fired from the Lakers very early in the season to bring in someone who'd never been a head coach....Pat Riley?
Just 17 months after winning a championship, no less. Of course, the team's franchise player wanted him gone.
He has clearly lost the team. No point postponing the inevitable. How about an x-mas day firing? That's always super classy!
I think Mike Budenholzer's contract is about to expire... What do you say? replacing with a failing ex-Hawks coach with a sexessful one??
I have the same thoughts now as I did when lots of people were calling for McMillan's head: I don't think Stotts is anything special as a coach, but I think he does live in the 90% of coaches who don't make a material difference above and beyond the team's talent level. On one end, you have guys like Popovich, Kerr and Carlisle who add value to the talent they're given. Those coaches are rare. On the other end, you have guys who damage the value of the talent they're given. Those coaches are even rarer because they don't stick in the NBA for too long, generally. The vast majority of coaches are in between and their fortunes are tied completely to the talent level of their team. Last year, a lot of Blazers played well after the All-Star break, the team had a surprisingly good record and Stotts was hailed here as a tremendous coach. There was a lot of anger/annoyance on this forum when pundits would rank other coaches ahead of Stotts for Coach of the Year. This year, the players have mostly returned to their career norms and the team looks basically like what was expected last year and Stotts isn't popular. I don't think Stotts coached brilliantly last year and horribly this year--I think he has a mediocre roster, then and now, but that roster had a fluky good half-season last year. Give Stotts the Spurs' roster and he'll have an excellent record right now. That hardly means you don't look to replace him if someone better or potentially better comes along, but firing just to fire doesn't make sense. Stotts isn't the problem--he's not single-handedly solving the problem, but he didn't cause the problem. Stotts presided over a good defensive team when he had Matthews, Batum, Aldridge and Lopez surrounding Lillard. He didn't cause those players to get hurt, leave or be traded. Firing him mid-season without a clear and good option ready to go will just make the franchise look chaotic and lacking long-term vision. Good franchises evaluate and make their moves surgically--let a coach go when they have a smart replacement lined up. Bad franchises fire just to make a gesture and then figure out the rest later. Again, I'm no huge Stotts supporter, but the negative reaction to him right now is over the top, just as the positive reaction to him last year was over the top. He's a "standard NBA coach" in that he goes as the roster's talent goes. I'd be all for a better coach (or a promising coaching prospect) in the hope to find one of the few difference-makers, but I definitely don't agree with firing him to make a statement and then hoping things work out after that.
