Ime Udoka offering some insight...
http://blog.mysanantonio.com/spursnation/2010/11/25/neal-clutch-times-three/
http://blog.mysanantonio.com/spursnation/2010/11/25/neal-clutch-times-three/
Fire Paul Westphal
- Thread starter TheWileyVet
- Start date
Speaking of OKC. They had this #2 pick they played out of position his first year in a half till they fired the coach and got a better one who uses players correctly. Oh, we could of had that coach too instead of Theus. Evans and Cousins 4th years only matter if they put in the right positions to succeed.
I’m probably in the minority but I don’t think that Westphal has lost the guys, but I do think the constant tinkering, the non-offense and the general attitude of him is what’s keeping this team from coming together (on the court). And that could result in the coach getting fired in the future…He needs to find something that will utilize his players talents and also let them have fun – they have fun, we have fun and the energy of the team will change for the better.
And he really needs to stick to a line-up and not play games with his players all the time.
Tyreke, Beno, Donte, JT & Demarcus
Head, Cisco, Omri, Carl & Sam (or Whiteside – I would love to see him)
And if coach has the mentality that one of these guys (donte or omri) will have a DNP every other game then is that the same mentality with our bigs?
Man I miss Jon Brockman. We really should have kept him.
That's something that has always bothered me (last year too). We have players that stand around and watch.
And he really needs to stick to a line-up and not play games with his players all the time.
Tyreke, Beno, Donte, JT & Demarcus
Head, Cisco, Omri, Carl & Sam (or Whiteside – I would love to see him)
And if coach has the mentality that one of these guys (donte or omri) will have a DNP every other game then is that the same mentality with our bigs?
Man I miss Jon Brockman. We really should have kept him.
That's something that has always bothered me (last year too). We have players that stand around and watch.
I would certainly call the Thunder a good team. On paper the Grizz appear to be a good team, but their current record is 6 and 9. Not a whole lot better than ours at 4 and 10. I wouldn't call New York a good team. They've certainly improved and are lucky enough to be playing in a very weak division with only Boston being a good team. But their record is 8 and 8 at the moment. Certainly better than ours but I doubt they'll get far in the playoffs, if they make the playoffs. There's still a long way to go.
I think the important thing to gleen from that list is the teams that are the oldest in age. Funny how almost all of them happen to be the best teams in the NBA. Of course there are exceptions like Oklahoma, but its rare and you have to be real lucky as well as being smart. None of this excuses whats happening on our team at the moment. Youth or not, we should be better than we are..
I think the important thing to gleen from that list is the teams that are the oldest in age. Funny how almost all of them happen to be the best teams in the NBA. Of course there are exceptions like Oklahoma, but its rare and you have to be real lucky as well as being smart. None of this excuses whats happening on our team at the moment. Youth or not, we should be better than we are..
So let's say Westphal does get fired. Who would you guys want? Byron Scott? Jeff Van Gundy? Maybe promote Elie? Bring back Musselman 
I really dont know what happened to this kings.. regressed? or just too young to mesh, I do agree that there is a LOT of standing around, we need to keep people moving..
as far as coaches out there There's slim pickings,
we need to WIN, some fans are getting tired of losing. at LEAST win at home. put up a damn fight! how the heck did it turn this bad so quick
as far as coaches out there There's slim pickings,
we need to WIN, some fans are getting tired of losing. at LEAST win at home. put up a damn fight! how the heck did it turn this bad so quick
I know this will get a rise out of some people, but how about John Calapari. He's certainly good at working with young players. He has had NBA head coaching experience with the New Jersey Nets and even coached them into the playoffs his second year. He's written three books on basketball, and is famous for developing a dribble motion offense thats used widely in college.
He would be inheriting two of his former players in Evans and Cousins. I don't know if he would be willing to give up his gig in Kentucky or not, but money talks. He's a very demanding coach, but at the same time seems to be able to maintain a good relationship with his players. One position he knows well is the PG position. He himself was a PG when he played in college, and he has quite a few of is former players that played that position in the NBA.
One of the things that Calapari is noted for is getting his players to play together. Something that the Kings need.
He would be inheriting two of his former players in Evans and Cousins. I don't know if he would be willing to give up his gig in Kentucky or not, but money talks. He's a very demanding coach, but at the same time seems to be able to maintain a good relationship with his players. One position he knows well is the PG position. He himself was a PG when he played in college, and he has quite a few of is former players that played that position in the NBA.
One of the things that Calapari is noted for is getting his players to play together. Something that the Kings need.
I don't know. I've seen at least a couple of interviews with Tyreke where he was asked if Calipari would be a good NBA coach, and both times he answered that he doesn't think so, and that he would be better off sticking with the college job. He said guys in the NBA wouldn't take well for the way he gets on players for making mistakes. Now, I don't know if Tyreke has something against Calipari or if it's just his honest opinion, but it sure doesn't sound like Tyreke wants him as his coach, and I doubt GP would bring him to Sac against Tyreke's will.
As long as we are throwing our potential coaches right now...
Keep in mind I havent thought about this too long, but one name keeps popping up in my head. Kevin Mchale. Talk about a guy who will get respect from everyone on the team. Hall of Famer, LOVES basketball to death. Wasnt a great GM, but when he had to step in and coach the Twolves he wasnt that bad. He would be a great influence on the young guys. Cousins would have no excuse with McHale on as a coach. If you cant learn from one of the greatest post players in NBA history, you cant learn.
Another coach out there that I wouldnt hate is Lawrence Frank.
Keep in mind I havent thought about this too long, but one name keeps popping up in my head. Kevin Mchale. Talk about a guy who will get respect from everyone on the team. Hall of Famer, LOVES basketball to death. Wasnt a great GM, but when he had to step in and coach the Twolves he wasnt that bad. He would be a great influence on the young guys. Cousins would have no excuse with McHale on as a coach. If you cant learn from one of the greatest post players in NBA history, you cant learn.
Another coach out there that I wouldnt hate is Lawrence Frank.
just no...
You can't yell at grown men for every little mistake they do. Calipari is a college coach and should stick to college. But, he would not be taken well by the NBA players who would be getting yelled at for every little mistake.
Nate McMillian would be great, but if he were ever to leave Portland, it would be to a championship contender.
You can't yell at grown men for every little mistake they do. Calipari is a college coach and should stick to college. But, he would not be taken well by the NBA players who would be getting yelled at for every little mistake.
Nate McMillian would be great, but if he were ever to leave Portland, it would be to a championship contender.
Well he's the one who decides how many minutes each player will play, right? He needs to find that balance and to force them on practices to work harder, or something like that. We can fire or trade 1 or 2 players, not the entire team. We need a coach that can get 150% out of these guys we already have...
No, its really not that simple. That's just a lazy complaint. Virtually every member of this team is performing worse than they did only a season ago in one way or another. And that's with the team being overwhelmingly young, and therefore expected to natrually improve. When shooters suddenly stop shooting, drivers suddenly stop driving, post guys become jump shooters, passers quit passing, that's not a talent issue. There's an obvious, and I do mean obvious, malaise permeating the air here. And its not about the individual talent of the team members. You take just about any player off of any team in the league right now, add him to the lifeless mix here, and his performance drops guaranteed. A few might up their numbers by complete selfishness, but nobody comes into this rut and plays at their talent level. And its not because they magically lost their talent. Its because the talent is not being meshed/utilized well. Bad chemistry or bad coaching always makes underacheivers out of most everybody.
L
While I admit it was somewhat of a "lazy" response, the fact of the matter is they won 25 games last year and they are well on their way of a repeat (or worse) of that this year. I know they are young but, in my opinion, they are not as talented as everybody believes they are. I've posted before that I think they major reason we are where we are is because Thompson, Hawes, Greene, and Casspi ended up being extremely mediocre and will never amount to solid NBA players. Of course, there is still time for them to prove me wrong but I don't think it's going to happen. The Kings organization already figured out that Hawes was worthless and now there are rumors that Thompson might be traded as well.
I understand your point about players underachieving from last year. I agree with that but when you're just not very good that can happen. Upper echelon players find a way to compete night in and night out. Marginal players will have their ups and downs (mostly downs). They ARE NBA players so they can show you glimpses of brilliance, which they did last year, but most of the time they will play badly. They still only won 25 games last year despite playing what we considered pretty good basketball.
I guess what I'm saying is that outside of Reke and Cousins, I don't believe we have any talent on this team. If those 2 guys turn out to be total studs then we might be okay going forward if we surround them with solid veterans. I just think we as collective Kings fans have WAY overvalued the talent of younger players like Greene, JT, Casspi, etc. That's where I'm coming from.
Agree with both of those statements. To hear some folks talk, you'd think The Kings had a roster in place that will be winning 55 games in two or three seasons. Even if they develop to their full potential, they're not anywhere close to that, though. They'd be lucky to ever win 45 with the roster as it stands now. As you said, they basically have Evans and Cousins. And even Cousins is still a question mark/project at this point. Every vet on the team with the exception of Landry is mediocre and every young guy with the exception of Evans and Cousins are not meeting expectations. Some of that may very well have to do with coaching, but still, any way you look at it this roster just isn't the future title contender that many folks duped themselves into believing it was.
Last edited:
You seem to look at the current kings and see terrible players. Others of us look at them and see alot of talent that isn't being used correctly. At this point I bet I could take over the team and still win over 30 games thats the talent I see the young inconsistent maddening talent that needs to be molded propped up and kept under a firm hand while being allowed to grow through mistakes and leaving all their effort on the floor.
So many of the coaches as they age they forget that these guys don't come into the league as pros especially lately they come in as young kids in their teens immature and with games that need to be nursed to where they can be. One mistake and you go from starting to dnp-cd is absurd.
I would have come into this year tempering the expectations of our team we aren't going to get to the playoffs and we won't sacrifice our future to try but instead we are going to grow and get close to 500 and next year we will grow more and get farther. I would have made the players aware that extra effort win or lose succeed or mess up means extra minutes. I would have let them know what is expected of them mostly effort and when they are wrong you point it out to them and have them try to learn. I would change the offense(Or create one in this case) to take into account abilities of the new guys and the older guys after something we tried didn't work I wouldn't go back to it time and again. I would have stuck to a lineup and made only 1 player change at a time if warranted. Edit And if you have to call every play from the sidelines so be it. /edit
You look at the team and see only 1 or 2 players I look at the team and see a core that could get 55 wins in 2 or 3 seasons if they were placed in a situation they could grow learn and flourish in.
So many of the coaches as they age they forget that these guys don't come into the league as pros especially lately they come in as young kids in their teens immature and with games that need to be nursed to where they can be. One mistake and you go from starting to dnp-cd is absurd.
I would have come into this year tempering the expectations of our team we aren't going to get to the playoffs and we won't sacrifice our future to try but instead we are going to grow and get close to 500 and next year we will grow more and get farther. I would have made the players aware that extra effort win or lose succeed or mess up means extra minutes. I would have let them know what is expected of them mostly effort and when they are wrong you point it out to them and have them try to learn. I would change the offense(Or create one in this case) to take into account abilities of the new guys and the older guys after something we tried didn't work I wouldn't go back to it time and again. I would have stuck to a lineup and made only 1 player change at a time if warranted. Edit And if you have to call every play from the sidelines so be it. /edit
You look at the team and see only 1 or 2 players I look at the team and see a core that could get 55 wins in 2 or 3 seasons if they were placed in a situation they could grow learn and flourish in.
I don't think anyone predicted 55 wins for his team. Well, some idiot might have. But I certainly didn't. Of course I may seem like an idiot for predicting 35 wins. What you or I think of this talent aside, the team should be playing better than it is. They play like a highschool team at times. They miss obvious rotations on defense. The guards start pick and rolls before the Pick is set, and then sometimes go the opposite way off the pick and right into the defense. Were talking about fundamentals that you learn in highschool for god's sake. You, or no one is going to convince me that everyone on this team is ignorant to this extent. I will admit that knowing and doing aren't the same thing. And that might account for an occasional mistake here and there. But thats not what were dealing with. Were dealing with a total team breakdown, both on offense and defense.
My point is, that you don't need super talented players to be fundamentally correct. This is not a well coached team. Period! If it was just always about talent, then anyone could coach any team and make it work. You wouldn't need a coach. Don't get me wrong! You need talent. But you also need a coach that knows how to get the most out of that talent. No matter how good or bad that talent is.
I thought Westphal was mis-using his talent last year to some extent. It was my hope that he would become more consistent with his starting 5 and his rotations this year. I'll cut him some slack with injuries, but other than that, its been the same movie from last year replaying over and over again. You never know when you might start. You never know when you might play, or even suit up for that matter. No one knows what their roll is on the team. This is not the way to develop young talent. Its not all Westphal either. This goes back 3 or 4 years. I remember Brad Miller saying he wasn't sure of his roll on the team shortly before he departed. Greene doesn't know whether he's a PF, a SG or a SF. Thompson has been a Center, a PF and now a SF. Tyreke is a SG or a PG. Beno probably doesn't have a clue what he is, just get him on the floor and he's happy. And by the way, if anything goes wrong, its anyone else's fault other than Beno's.
Tyreke is obviously not healthy, and every team in the NBA is just inviting him to try and drive to the basket, or back away and do your best to kill us from the outside (LOL).
You may be right about the talent. I disagree and think there's a more talent here than you do, but I'm hardly the last word on the subject. But for me personally I can't really make an objective judgement on what we have, until I see a well coached, cohesive team on the floor, that looks like it has an actual plan, both defensively and offensively. I go all the way back to Oscar Robertson and Bob Petit, who I knew personally, and in all those years I've only seen a mess like this maybe less than 10 times. And in every other case, it was remedied by a new coach. Yeah I know, we've had a parade of coaches going through the revolving doors of late. But thats not the players fault, its managements fault. Where in management the blame lies, I have no clue. When you have owners getting involved in the decision making its hard to know where to point the finger. But ultimately Petrie is getting paid to take the heat. And in reality, it doesn't matter. Petrie is going nowhere and you don't fire owners. So what is, is what is. But somebody better do something about it soon, or this fourm is going to turn into the 2011 draft fourm 20 games into the season.
My point is, that you don't need super talented players to be fundamentally correct. This is not a well coached team. Period! If it was just always about talent, then anyone could coach any team and make it work. You wouldn't need a coach. Don't get me wrong! You need talent. But you also need a coach that knows how to get the most out of that talent. No matter how good or bad that talent is.
I thought Westphal was mis-using his talent last year to some extent. It was my hope that he would become more consistent with his starting 5 and his rotations this year. I'll cut him some slack with injuries, but other than that, its been the same movie from last year replaying over and over again. You never know when you might start. You never know when you might play, or even suit up for that matter. No one knows what their roll is on the team. This is not the way to develop young talent. Its not all Westphal either. This goes back 3 or 4 years. I remember Brad Miller saying he wasn't sure of his roll on the team shortly before he departed. Greene doesn't know whether he's a PF, a SG or a SF. Thompson has been a Center, a PF and now a SF. Tyreke is a SG or a PG. Beno probably doesn't have a clue what he is, just get him on the floor and he's happy. And by the way, if anything goes wrong, its anyone else's fault other than Beno's.
Tyreke is obviously not healthy, and every team in the NBA is just inviting him to try and drive to the basket, or back away and do your best to kill us from the outside (LOL).
You may be right about the talent. I disagree and think there's a more talent here than you do, but I'm hardly the last word on the subject. But for me personally I can't really make an objective judgement on what we have, until I see a well coached, cohesive team on the floor, that looks like it has an actual plan, both defensively and offensively. I go all the way back to Oscar Robertson and Bob Petit, who I knew personally, and in all those years I've only seen a mess like this maybe less than 10 times. And in every other case, it was remedied by a new coach. Yeah I know, we've had a parade of coaches going through the revolving doors of late. But thats not the players fault, its managements fault. Where in management the blame lies, I have no clue. When you have owners getting involved in the decision making its hard to know where to point the finger. But ultimately Petrie is getting paid to take the heat. And in reality, it doesn't matter. Petrie is going nowhere and you don't fire owners. So what is, is what is. But somebody better do something about it soon, or this fourm is going to turn into the 2011 draft fourm 20 games into the season.
Last edited: