It's painfully obvious that either Stotts refuses to or is unable to utilize Nurkic effectively. He's always so quick to pull Nurkic and adjust to what the opponent is doing rather than make them adjust to the Blazers.
I have been saying it for years. Stotts is not a championship caliber coach. He has been awful during the playoffs. It's funny because the biggest win of his career in Portland, the win over Houston in the first round, was a shot by Dame that wasn't even designed by him. The ball was supposed to go to LMA, but Dame saw a mismatch and Batum got him the ball. Stotts is a nice guy and he's totally fine if you're trying to make the playoffs, but the guy simply isn't good enough to take anyone to the next level.
Oh, so you think he should be demoted to assistant coach? Because that's the job that he held when he won a championship. That's a good suggestion Eric!
No. I'm saying he has as good experience for winning a championship as most coaches. One of the GMs (not Olshey) in the GM poll said that Stotts is the best coach in the league.
What better way is there to learn how to coach a championship team? Are you saying that if Stotts was the coach of the Warriors, they wouldn't win championships?
A monkey could coach the warriors to a championship right now. They have literally five all stars in their starting lineup. Could Scotts have coached them to a championship the year after they fired Mark Jackson? No. I’m going to say that Steve Kerr is a superior coach and that Stotts could not have taken that team to the next level.
Steve Kerr, Brad Stevens, and Greg Popovich are much superior. There are bad coaches like Fred Hoiberg or Mark Jackson who Stotts is much superior to. I don't think Stotts is worse than Mike DAntoni. That team was in a position to win the title if CP3 wasn't hurt or it's players could hit easy shots. With the right roster Stotts could coach a title winning team. To the original poster, the problem is Nurkic is in a league where the advantage of big over small is much less than small over big. Kuzma on the Lakers destroyed Nurk forcing Stotts to remove him. The Nurkic contract could harm the team if we won't be able to play him in playoff series. Wrapping up the coach angle, I do think it's possible to have a better coach than Stotts. Problem is none of those are available. A coach like Stevens NBA successs was unknown when hired. Hiring him was a gamble that could as easily turned into a Fred Hoiberg. If we fire Stotts it's far more likely we end up with a worse coach than a superior one. Right now this team roster is 95% of the problem so fixing a coach or other changes won't make us contenders. Most likely no action will make us a contender. The best chance to contend is if somehow Neil makes a great trade or we hope one of our players improves to a star. Either is not impossible, but certainly not likely. Replacing Stotts is a bad gamble that hurts those chances more than it helps.
My point is that the roster will dictate whether or not Stotts can coach championship. If NateB , you think Stotts can’t coach us to a title, are you implying that you think we have a championship roster?
Stotts is alright as a coach. The major problem last night was more the players then the coach. I am not saying am not questioning some his decision last night. But last night was the players playing shitty defense. Look we had 111 at regulations and 124 for the game on a off shooting night by Dame and CJ. Even though we lost that a positive that the rest of the team is playing good basketball. Hell our bench had 40 last night. We need to shore up the defense if we do that we will be successful this season.
Stotts coaching ability has nothing to do with the roster. Changing the roster to fit what he wants to do might make him look better overall but doesn't change his ability to make adjustments..or lack of ability to make adjustments. Is an actor judged on the script he reads?
Stotts is a really average coach who has a job because the players like him. He routinely gets out coached when it matters. Blazers could do worse, but could do way better too.
Stotts is a horrible coach who is saved by the roster, not held back by it, primarily Damian and CJ who often take and make incredible shots. Poor in game adjustments Poor mid series playoff adjustments Late to change defensive and offensive schemes Poor rotations Just seems very robotic and lacks adaptability. If Stotts was coaching the warriors, they wouldn’t win a damn thing in my opinion. They would’ve lost to Houston, OKC, Cavs, Spurs. Kerr does all the things mentioned above brilliantly - and has a better overall staff - as well.
Oh cmon man. The Amazing Brad Stevens went ot seven games in ECF without 2 best players. We are losing in 1st round how many years now? How many wins did Stotts manage to get in the Playoffs? He's average as fuck... He dont wanna change even with that horrible loss to Pelicans last season. Our bench is better this years. Nurk is getting better, but for fuck all as far Stotts is concerned. Hes going with two main stars no matter how horrible they play. I'm sick of it. Mediocre coach for mediocre team. Mediocre GM. If this organisation want success, they should fire Olshey and Stotts and trade CJ. But they would rather be mediocre than try to actually change the culture around the team.
He also took a team that lost Kyrie and Hayward to a game 7 of the ECF. Solid resume point that Stotts could never achieve if he was coaching the Celtics.
