What will it take for Chauncey to get fired?

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Ed O said:
Looks like Billups is currently #9 in all-time lowest winning percentage for coaches with 200 or more games coached. He's recently passed Johnny Davis and it'll be a slog to catch up to Red Kerr and the others above him...

At some point, that record is either his fault or Cronin's fault... or both. I am sort of morbidly curious to see where he ends up at the end of his Blazers' coaching tenure.

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How many of the coaches above him were coaching expansion teams? I know Bill Musselman was the first coach of the Timberwolves...

And, of course, none of the coaches above him got beaten twice by at least 60 points...
 
Phatguysrule said:
From my recollection Davis left both of the games Portland won with injury (and the Pels were up when he went out), and he was playing limited minutes for them the 2nd half of the season. I distinctly remember thinking our only hope in that series was a Davis injury. I was not at all surprised we were swept.

All of that aside. How in the hell were we supposed to match up with Cousins and Davis, while Dame and CJ was being hounded by Rondo or Holiday? Even if we were lucky enough to get a game or two during the regular season, there was no coaching move that was going to put us over the top more than once against that team during the playoffs if they were healthy.

Chief would have had to play like a freaking all star. And that was NEVER going to happen.
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Cousins didn't play in the series so that excuse is kaput

AD did get injured in the first regular season game and only played 5 minutes. In the other two games he played 41 and 39 minutes

the Pels big men were AD and Mirotic; that was the entirety of their big man rotation. Portland had Nurkic, Zach, Ed Davis, and Meyers

I'm sorry, seems you are stretching for excuses to defend Stotts in that series. Again, it wasn't the Pels winning 4-2. It was Portland having HCA and still getting swept. But this debate is a tangent. I already said that Olshey should have been fired before Stotts. Olshey was a terrible GM....Stotts was an average coach
 
wizenheimer said:
Cousins didn't play in the series so that excuse is kaput

AD did get injured in the first regular season game and only played 5 minutes. In the other two games he played 41 and 39 minutes

the Pels big men were AD and Mirotic; that was the entirety of their big man rotation. Portland had Nurkic, Zach, Ed Davis, and Meyers

I'm sorry, seems you are stretching for excuses to defend Stotts in that series. Again, it wasn't the Pels winning 4-2. It was Portland having HCA and still getting swept. But this debate is a tangent. I already said that Olshey should have been fired before Stotts. Olshey was a terrible GM....Stotts was an average coach
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AD left the game late in one of the games we won. When he went out the Pels were up. Even without cousins, AD kills Nurk, and we had no advantage. They had 3 players better than our 2nd best player. That series was over before it started. We finished the season 1 game better than them. They should have been the 3rd seed.

The team with more talent will almost always do better in the playoffs, and they had a LOT more talent, as well as more playoff experience with Rondo.

Stotts was the best coach we've had since Dunleavy. I was 100% fine with moving on from him for a better coach. Not for the coaches we were considering hiring when we hired Billups.

I don't see how saying the team with 3 of the 4 best players on the court was obviously better is making excuses for Stotts. Just doesn't make sense to me.
 
Phatguysrule said:
From my recollection Davis left both of the games Portland won with injury (and the Pels were up when he went out), and he was playing limited minutes for them the 2nd half of the season. I distinctly remember thinking our only hope in that series was a Davis injury. I was not at all surprised we were swept.

All of that aside. How in the hell were we supposed to match up with Cousins and Davis, while Dame and CJ was being hounded by Rondo or Holiday? Even if we were lucky enough to get a game or two during the regular season, there was no coaching move that was going to put us over the top more than once against that team during the playoffs if they were healthy.

Chief would have had to play like a freaking all star. And that was NEVER going to happen.
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Wasn't Cousins injured? His Achilles tear happened right before that series.
 
I like to view him based on if he helps the team execute what he preaches better over the course of the season.

In that regard, he's been awful.
 
Phatguysrule said:
Yeah, you're right. I forgot about that.
Still... AD vs Nurk... CJ vs Holiday/Rondo, Dame vs Holiday/Rondo.

They had 3 of the best 4 players in that series. We were screwed.
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32 year old Rondo, 5 years after his last all-star game, was better than prime CJ or Nurkic?

last time I'll bother: you can make all the excuses for Stotts in that series you want. Some are valid; some aren't. But a coach who has HCA has some share of the blame when his higher seeded team is healthy, and still gets swept. Especially when his team was 1-12 in the last 3 playoff series and they lost those series for the same exact reason each time
 
wizenheimer said:
32 year old Rondo, 5 years after his last all-star game, was better than prime CJ or Nurkic?

last time I'll bother: you can make all the excuses for Stotts in that series you want. Some are valid; some aren't. But a coach who has HCA has some share of the blame when his higher seeded team is healthy, and still gets swept. Especially when his team was 1-12 in the last 3 playoff series and they lost those series for the same exact reason each time
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Yes. Rondo over CJ. Especially head to head. Rondo also certainly a bigger factor in that series than Nurk, and more reliable in general.

Sure Terry Stotts bears some responsibility. And if we could hire a proven better coach I would have been all for it.

But the reality is that team was built for the regular season. Its weakness was a playoff series where an opponent could game plan to stop Dame.
 
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dviss1 said:
We lost that series because of coaching. Stotts didn't have the ability to adjust. Still running pick and rolls when they're trapping the ballhandler is asinine...
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True. But was was the alternative? CJ ISO vs Rondo or Holiday?

Nurk is worthless vs Davis... Can't have Chief putting the ball on the floor (nobody needs to see that..)

Or just dirty it up an play lock down D?
 
dviss1 said:
We lost that series because of coaching. Stotts didn't have the ability to adjust. Still running pick and rolls when they're trapping the ballhandler is asinine...
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Phatguysrule said:
True. But was was the alternative? CJ ISO vs Rondo or Holiday?

Nurk is worthless vs Davis... Can't have Chief putting the ball on the floor (nobody needs to see that..)

Or just dirty it up an play lock down D?
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a wildcard in that sweep was Mirotic. The Blazers had no answer for a girthy, rangy 6'10" PF dropping 20/10's with blocks and steals.

it was last playoff series i got to watch. It just didn't look fair. The Pelicans 1-2 big man combo made their 4 wins look easy.
 
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Whyachi said:
a wildcard in that sweep was Mirotic. The Blazers had no answer for a girthy, rangy 6'10" PF dropping 20/10's with blocks and steals.

it was last playoff series i got to watch. It just didn't look fair. The Pelicans 1-2 big man combo made their 4 wins look easy.
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Excellent point. Portland was just completely out manned.

Stotts is not a great coach and I'm not trying to excuse his lack of ability to make adjustments. But I don't think there is a coach in the league that would have made a difference in that series.
 
Phatguysrule said:
True. But was was the alternative? CJ ISO vs Rondo or Holiday?

Nurk is worthless vs Davis... Can't have Chief putting the ball on the floor (nobody needs to see that..)

Or just dirty it up an play lock down D?
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When your PG is being trapped you simply bring your C into the high post and GIVE HIM THE BALL. You run cutters off of him and have him make plays. Boom. No more Dame getting trapped.
We watched Stotts FAIL MISERABLY at this for MULTIPLE playoff series. We could've beaten GSW had he simply brought Nurk into the high post. I know this and I've only coached middle school ball.
 
Whyachi said:
a wildcard in that sweep was Mirotic. The Blazers had no answer for a girthy, rangy 6'10" PF dropping 20/10's with blocks and steals.

it was last playoff series i got to watch. It just didn't look fair. The Pelicans 1-2 big man combo made their 4 wins look easy.
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Never use this word again. LMAO!

We could've guarded him. Again, our coach didn't know how to adjust.
 
dviss1 said:
Never use this word again. LMAO!

We could've guarded him. Again, our coach didn't know how to adjust.
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Yeah, Stotts fucked us over bad that series. Before then, no one was guarding Dame like that. After that, every game till he was traded he was being guarded like that. Stotts couldn't figure it out in those playoffs and he couldn't figure out how to adjust after it. He did start playing Nurk high post towards the end of his tenure, but it was two dimensional play because Nurk would high post, rotate outside the arc and never back to the basket. It wasn't very functional. Then Dame just said fuck it and was shooting quicker, right in people's faces or at times just staying away from the ball. This continued into Billups reign as his focus was defense.
 
dviss1 said:
When your PG is being trapped you simply bring your C into the high post and GIVE HIM THE BALL. You run cutters off of him and have him make plays. Boom. No more Dame getting trapped.
We watched Stotts FAIL MISERABLY at this for MULTIPLE playoff series. We could've beaten GSW had he simply brought Nurk into the high post. I know this and I've only coached middle school ball.
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I've seen them do that though. I believe, even in that series they tried this. Davis was denying Nurk the ball. Nurk isn't going to get open if Davis wants to deny him. They are just completely different levels of athletes.

They found a lot of success doing that when Nurk first got here and everyone talked about what a great passer he was. Plumlee as well.

Problem is, if you know that pass is coming and you have an athletic/good defensive big you just take that pass away.

Now you're hoping your other 3 guys can get it done. The forced slow reverse to CJ leaves tons of time for the defense to recover (and often steal it for a wide open layup) you're now counting on your other 2 guys. Our other 2 guys never could get it done consistently against talented and prepared teams.

We never had enough talent to compete in the playoffs unless the opposing team had no answer for Dame.
 
Chris Craig said:
Yeah, Stotts fucked us over bad that series. Before then, no one was guarding Dame like that. After that, every game till he was traded he was being guarded like that. Stotts couldn't figure it out in those playoffs and he couldn't figure out how to adjust after it. He did start playing Nurk high post towards the end of his tenure, but it was two dimensional play because Nurk would high post, rotate outside the arc and never back to the basket. It wasn't very functional. Then Dame just said fuck it and was shooting quicker, right in people's faces or at times just staying away from the ball. This continued into Billups reign as his focus was defense.
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We never had the roster to make teams pay for defending Dame like that.

Every team we lost to in the playoffs was more talented than us.

A healthy Collins would have helped us flip that script, IMO. But it didn't work out.

If we hadn't lost Aldridge for nothing we probably have an answer, even with Collins going down.
 
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Phatguysrule said:
We never had the roster to make teams pay for defending Dame like that.
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That's true. We never had enough talent to keep opponents honest. But, you can still adjust and that never really happened. Dame just took it upon himself to hit shots anyway.
 
Chris Craig said:
That's true. We never had enough talent to keep opponents honest. But, you can still adjust and that never really happened. Dame just took it upon himself to hit shots anyway.
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what's kind of funny is that the 2021 playoff series against Denver showed that a team didn't have to completely sell out their defense to stop Dame. Denver did run some double and traps at Dame, pretty consistently too; but they didn't completely flex their defense toward Dame

the result was kind of predictable: Dame averaged 34 & 10 with playoff leading efficiency but Dame's teammates couldn't beat normal defense enough to make a difference. Pretty sure Cronin watched that and thought that the supporting cast was a lot worse than Olshey believed. Olshey chose to, once again, reboot his failing roster and got fired in December. Cronin's first moves were to dismantle the supporting cast
 
wizenheimer said:
what's kind of funny is that the 2021 playoff series against Denver showed that a team didn't have to completely sell out their defense to stop Dame. Denver did run some double and traps at Dame, pretty consistently too; but they didn't completely flex their defense toward Dame

the result was kind of predictable: Dame averaged 34 & 10 with playoff leading efficiency but Dame's teammates couldn't beat normal defense enough to make a difference. Pretty sure Cronin watched that and thought that the supporting cast was a lot worse than Olshey believed. Olshey chose to, once again, reboot his failing roster and got fired in December. Cronin's first moves were to dismantle the supporting cast
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Yep. The team just wasn't good enough for the playoffs. We general had 3 legit starters. Dame was incredible and CJ and Nurk were okay to good starters. But CJ was duplication of Dame so it wasn't very helpful.

That team got as far as pretty much any coach could take it. And they were there often enough that they sometimes got lucky and beat a team they probably shouldn't beat in a series.

That's credit to Dame and Stotts, and sometimes CJ.
 
Phatguysrule said:
I've seen them do that though. I believe, even in that series they tried this. Davis was denying Nurk the ball. Nurk isn't going to get open if Davis wants to deny him. They are just completely different levels of athletes.

They found a lot of success doing that when Nurk first got here and everyone talked about what a great passer he was. Plumlee as well.

Problem is, if you know that pass is coming and you have an athletic/good defensive big you just take that pass away.

Now you're hoping your other 3 guys can get it done. The forced slow reverse to CJ leaves tons of time for the defense to recover (and often steal it for a wide open layup) you're now counting on your other 2 guys. Our other 2 guys never could get it done consistently against talented and prepared teams.

We never had enough talent to compete in the playoffs unless the opposing team had no answer for Dame.
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Go back and watch the games. There was never one time in that series where Terry flashed a ANY of our bigs to receive a pass in the high post. He KEPT running pick and roll after pick and roll.

Same as the GSW series.
 
dviss1 said:
Go back and watch the games. There was never one time in that series where Terry flashed a ANY of our bigs to receive a pass in the high post. He KEPT running pick and roll after pick and roll.

Same as the GSW series.
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I miss making the playoffs.
 
dviss1 said:
Go back and watch the games. There was never one time in that series where Terry flashed a ANY of our bigs to receive a pass in the high post. He KEPT running pick and roll after pick and roll.

Same as the GSW series.
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So Terry Stotts just forgot to do something that had worked incredibly well for several seasons?

That was literally a featured part of the offense until we played Golden State in the playoffs and they just flat took it away. Then other teams (especialy those with athletic bigs) started taking it away.

We had no counter.

Because we didn't have the horses. We only had 3 positions with legit starters.
 
Phatguysrule said:
So Terry Stotts just forgot to do something that had worked incredibly well for several seasons?

That was literally a featured part of the offense until we played Golden State in the playoffs and they just flat took it away. Then other teams (especialy those with athletic bigs) started taking it away.

We had no counter.

Because we didn't have the horses. We only had 3 positions with legit starters.
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That is the way I watched it.
The counter was our wings who couldn't make a shot when needed. If you pull up stats Aminu actually hit 34-37% of his 3's depending on what year you look but look a little further at the playoffs. Against Denver Aminu hit 5-23 and against GS he hit 1-6.
Fact is both Harkless and Aminu were good defensively but could not hit shots when defenses took Lillard out. Then there is CJ...
 
kjironman1 said:
That is the way I watched it.
The counter was our wings who couldn't make a shot when needed. If you pull up stats Aminu actually hit 34-37% of his 3's depending on what year you look but look a little further at the playoffs. Against Denver Aminu hit 5-23 and against GS he hit 1-6.
Fact is both Harkless and Aminu were good defensively but could not hit shots when defenses took Lillard out. Then there is CJ...
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Yep. And with Harkless and Aminu on the team Stotts had a top 10 defense.

They both had slow wind-ups on their 3 and didn't catch the ball down and ready to shoot. Good defenses were prepared in the playoffs and had time to rotate, so they were shooting contested 3s in the playoffs.

We really just needed better players to be legit contenders.
 
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Phatguysrule said:
So Terry Stotts just forgot to do something that had worked incredibly well for several seasons?

That was literally a featured part of the offense until we played Golden State in the playoffs and they just flat took it away. Then other teams (especialy those with athletic bigs) started taking it away.

We had no counter.

Because we didn't have the horses. We only had 3 positions with legit starters.
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Jusuf Nurkic in the high post (Free Throw line, Elbow area not the top of the key) was hardly ever used by Terry. I would argue that Nurk was hardly ever used correctly by Stotts and he succeeded despite Terry's coaching.

We were up double digits in each of those GSW games and Terry did not adjust to their defensive scheme in the 2nd half. At all.
 
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