Mitch: Jerry Buss' Failing Health Made The Lakers Impatient

Doc Brown wrote:I hope they are real impatient if this happens.....

Basketball
Ric Bucher

If the Philadelphia 76ers let Doug Collins go after his don't-look​-at-me-loo​k-at-the-p​ rant (but I'm not
throwing anybody under the bus), sources say that assistant coach Michael Curry will take over. Curry, who was last a head coach with the Detroit Pistons, also is expected to be a candidate for the job, long-term. 6 minutes ago

If the Sixers let Collins go, Lakers need to swoop in ASAP. Interesting situation to monitor.

From the looks of things and what I read in that interview...his players have tuned him out. Let's do The Dougie.

I think several in this thread are missing the subtext of Mitch's comments. They WERE impatient because of Dr. Buss, but now that he has passed they will be patient with D'Antoni. I wish otherwise, but I'll be shocked if he is not the coach next year.

While not happy with the early results of the D'Antoni hire, we were 1-15 with Mike Brown dating back to last season.

1-15.

Firing Brown at 1-4 wasn't quick, it was actually very late. Hell, he shouldn't have been hired to begin with.

One problem I have with the rationale that D'Antoni was a good choice since you have Nash at PG is that Nash is old. This isn't the 30 year old version that can run around for 40 minutes per game...its the 39 year old version that can realistically give you 28 good minutes per night and anything more will cost you some shelf life.

Also, if you have a Kobe Bryant on your roster, I go with a coach that makes him the most effective...not newly acquired 39 year old Nash.

Lastly, if you're looking to lock up "your future" then I would do my due diligence to make sure you bring in an environment he wants to work in....I mean we saw how much of a nightmare that last stop was and it looked as if coaching played a part in it. You bring in a choice that he is comfortable with...not newly acquired 39 year old Nash.

And will you look at that...there was such an option available....but we couldn't afford him 9 more hours. I think its somewhat disrespectful placing such a hasty decision on Dr. Buss. JB wanted a product that would win titles AND entertain and draw the masses. If he was in the right state of mind and health, he would've heard the masses screaming for an option that was available. That man would have done anything to make that option employable. We've seen the good doctor do it before...long time season ticket holders refused to re-up if Phil wasn't brought back as coach. What ended up happening?

Jimmy picked Rudy T, picked Mike B, replaced a long a tenured staff with his friends and bartenders and lastly picked Mike D over Phil....I refuse to put that on Dr. Buss's health and a hasty decision. Hey, but the disrespect doesn't stop there....Jimmy seemed to pick a guest speaker at the memorial too....notice the trend?

Vasashi17 wrote:Also, if you have a Kobe Bryant on your roster, I go with a coach that makes him the most effective...not newly acquired 39 year old Nash.

Or since Kobe is effective anywhere, at least bring the guy that makes your man-child 27 year old center happy and effective?

I never bought the crap that it was a collective decision between Dr. Buss, Mitch and Jim. Mitch is whatever Jim makes him. Dr. Buss....likely wasn't in good enough condition to truthfully evaluate the situation. So, Jim did what was easiest, and made everyone responsible, saving himself...

As far as Im concerned Mitch and Jim didnt make any incorrect moves (trade deadline is a different story). D'Antoni was the right hire, injuries have screwed up our team. We're having issues that we had since Phil was here come on lol didnt we see how we looked in 2011 playoffs? Old, slow and always a step behind

Your number one guy has a bum wheel and the Spaniard doesn't have his head screwed on right and LO is playing with a bum shoulder, meanwhile Drew...well something is always bothering his knees from being at 100%....LA advances to 2nd round and fizzles..

Your newly acquired guard is lost for a majority of games, the Spaniard was recently lost, Dwight has played the majority of games at 80%, while your number one guy is playing out of his mind....LA is sub-.500....

Yeah, I'll maintain....wrong coach for this team!

But hey, D'Antoni is signed for 4 years (option on last year) and Nash is signed for 3...those that are for this hire maybe the good times are just around the corner...for those that are against...WTF was LA thinking committing to this no-title bearing gimmick?

MWP + Big 4 have played 173 mins together all year.. MWP + Nash + Kobe your 3 perimeter guys are older and slower than ever before, especially on D. Kobe isnt much better than he was in 2011, hes still better than 95% of the league just like he was then. As Dwight acknowledged we lost a whole bunch of games because he had to leave because of injury or free throw issues from lack of conditioning so if he were 100% we'd be looking at the middle of the playoff pack

Phil couldn't have prevented the injuries which is the number 1 reason why we are where we are right now...MDA has made adequate adjustments with the roster provided to him, not to mention jumpstarted Steve Blake's Laker career, Clark and Hill have had career years under him as well

Try again

A relatively healthy, yet older Kobe compared to an injured Kobe isn't much better?

Seriously Rock, "WTF is wrong with you?"...I think you need to try again...

While you're at it, if you want to bring numbers to the discussion, 11-0 is all that needs to be said.... "now go sit down."

The Rock wrote:Jim didnt make any incorrect moves

The Rock wrote:D'Antoni was the right hire

Jim, is that you?

Vasashi17 wrote:A relatively healthy, yet older Kobe compared to an injured Kobe isn't much better?

Seriously Rock, "WTF is wrong with you?"...I think you need to try again...

While you're at it, if you want to bring numbers to the discussion, 11-0 is all that needs to be said.... "now go sit down."

D'Antoni is 2-0 vs Phil head to head, How about that?

Im not gonna go over this again, Phil is old, he wasnt sure he could travel with team, the core players we have now were with him in 2011 and tuned him out and could not raise up their game to play for him (Pau, MWP). THere are issues on the team outside of D'Antoni and Phil's control (injuries being the biggest). 2012 old man Phil would not have been that much better of a hire as MDA if we had the same injuries thats all Im gonna say on this

D'Antoni is 2-0 vs Phil... Yet is Phil Jackson that has 11 NBA championship rings. Just saying..

^ I was posting that to show how irrelevant Phil's 11 rings and D'Antoni/Phil head to head record is when it comes to this year. Injuries injuries injuries and Phil is old

I'm so tired of the injury excuse. Phil didn't have his ace in the hole...that is the bottomline.

When it comes down to it, nearly every team is not at a 100%. But as long as you got your 1-2 punch, you can compete if you are a championship level team. Miami did it without Bosh last year and lets not act like LA is foreign to it...we did it largely without Drew.

Health is a factor, but a true contender can roll with the punches as long as their ace doesn't go down. Kobe and Dwight have largely been playing the majority of these games and we've seen what has happened.

You give Phil this same line up with the injuries and a largely healthy Kobe and we're not looking at sub .500...period.

And you want to bring up players tuning out Phil....um, what exactly is this team doing with D'Antoni....haha. Seriously, you should be done with this topic...you got zero chance in a legitimate argument when it comes to comparing the winningest coach in history to a gimmick.

Half of Buss's titles have come through the hands of the Zen.....yet they move past him while his agent flies a red-eye to discuss terms....that's all Jimmy....and once again, that decision making has cost us a season.

BTW, Kobe is old....so what exactly is your point?

dj vitus wrote:While not happy with the early results of the D'Antoni hire, we were 1-15 with Mike Brown dating back to last season.

1-15.

Firing Brown at 1-4 wasn't quick, it was actually very late. Hell, he shouldn't have been hired to begin with.

This. One win in 16 games. Yes it has always been my position that the baseball cap boy blew the Brown hire.

I was never sold on Jackson coming back. Have to remember half the team had tuned him out by the time they got to the playoffs in his last season. While I can see the logic behind MDA, I would have preferred Sloan or McMillan.

I don't think we'll have this problem if they hired Adelman in the first place

injuries are a reality its why we are outside looking in the playoff picture, Fact is MWP + Big 4 have played only 173 mins together on the court. That is it. Thats not what Mitch + Jim intended. Thats not what us fans envisioned. But thats what happened and it blew up our team

Again everybody is entitled to an opinion...I just have a hard time finding any type of credibility to an argument that favors D'Antoni over Phil under any coaching capacity.

That being said, since you want to stick to this 173 number so badly, ask yourself, just how much that number is also influenced by D'Antoni's unwillingness to play a big frontline. He loves small ball and doesn't believe that a frontcourt of Dwight and Pau would work.....meanwhile, you know who would find a way to play that lineup effectively?

Anyways, moving on...

I mean that subtracted probably between 7-10 minutes of Dwight/Pau on the court in the 10 games Pau came off the bench.

But Pau still played way more than 30 minutes a night in that capacity and given Earl Clark's emergence it was the right move at the time. I'm not sure that's a good argument against D'Antoni.

Pau off the bench was incredibly effective. More so than when he was starting. And Earl starting for us has been fantastic.

dwighthowardsdad wrote:^I'll take Collins. He's better then what we have...

Doug Collins forever gets gigs having very short term success then falling out of favor like a rock. I guess this means he'll back on tv over analyzing and auditioning for another short term coaching gig. He talks too much during the game, practically unbearable. Sigh.

I don't understand people's tendencies to lump Nash and D'Antoni together. Nash was great under Alvin Gentry, too... while D'Antoni has ZERO success without Nash. Put the ball in Nash's hands and he'll produce great O. He's been pretty damn good for a 39 year old this year, while D'Antoni's impact is negligent.

The Nash signing wasn't a mistake... the D'Antoni hiring was. And what's sad is, every CASUAL fan saw it coming, and said it would be a bad fit.

The Rock wrote:
D'Antoni is 2-0 vs Phil head to head, How about that?

Im not gonna go over this again, Phil is old, he wasnt sure he could travel with team, the core players we have now were with him in 2011 and tuned him out and could not raise up their game to play for him (Pau, MWP). THere are issues on the team outside of D'Antoni and Phil's control (injuries being the biggest). 2012 old man Phil would not have been that much better of a hire as MDA if we had the same injuries thats all Im gonna say on this

I have to say I do not understand any posters ripping on coaches for being old. That's one of the most inane criticisms of a coach I've ever heard. It has nothing to do with coaching ability. In fact, coaching is the one area in basketball where the wisdom of a maturing person actually comes in handy. It's not like Phil or any other head coach would be asked to go out and play on the court. What's required is basketball knowledge, wisdom accrued through experience and understanding.

So you'd say John Wooden was too old? He won several NCAA championships in his sixties. And I wouldn't say his abilities or understanding diminished a whole lot over his next couple/few decades either, even if he finally hung it up.

Hubie Brown won coach of the year when he was 70 years old.

Larry Brown is older than Phil by about 4 or 5 years. He's still a good coach and someone I wouldn't mind having here if he weren't such a wanderer.

Jerry Sloan - great coach. I'd love to have him. It's not like MDA is some spring chicken. He's been gimpy since he arrived and he's in his 60's too.

I just don't get the ageism thing. Not when it comes to coaches. That's the one area where age is helpful because of your basketball knowledge. You want a young coach? Mike Brown was young - I believe he was only 40. Let's go back to him.

And let's not forget that Bernie Bickerstaff inherited the same injured roster that MDA had. And he did a much better job with that group. And Bernie's pretty damn old too!!

And Tex Winter -sure he wasn't a head coach, but it was his system and his mentorship that helped Phil get 11 rings. He was pretty gosh darn old as well. He was in his 70s with the Bulls and his 80s with the Lakers. But you know, the guy was old and useless I guess. Just like Phil is now. Coaches lose all value once they hit 50.

You have to be kidding Rock. First of all, Jimmy's concerns about Nash losing value with Phil as coach probably stemmed with convos with Phil about the hiring, where Phil said he'd be putting both Dwight & Pau in the post & playing inside out. Nash would be playing off ball more. Those are some of the main adjustments D'antoni made when we scrapped his system & started winning games. The difference being we would have made those adjustments early in the season before we dug ourselves such a deep hole that we'll be lucky to make the playoffs.

Second, you think Phil wouldn't have been able to use the Dwight/Kobe rift to our advantage? This is the best guy in the business at managing egos.. There isn't a player on this team that wouldn't respect Phil. Instead, you have the players calling meetings & creating their own system & that's what it took for us to win games.

I know Phil wouldn't have stayed more than a few seasons, but you can't even make the long term argument for D'antoni. Nash is 39, he won't be around for more than 2 more seasons. Once he's gone, good luck finding any reason under the sun to keep D'antoni.

Vasashi17 wrote:Again everybody is entitled to an opinion...I just have a hard time finding any type of credibility to an argument that favors D'Antoni over Phil under any coaching capacity.

Pretty much, but this has been gone over so many times, and yet I still find it laugh out loud funny that anyone can still argue that Pringles was the right man for the job. I do think that injuries have had a significant effect on our season, but MDA is still the wrong fit completely, without a doubt IMO. I never say this, but I dont think I could have a serious discussion with anyone who disagrees with us in this instance, I think we're just too far apart for the debate to go anywhere.

I would say that maybe Dwight can facilitate MDA's exit as condition of him re-signing in LA, but the way the coaching hires have been going we may see another 'Mediocre Mike' brought in.

Atleast even through their rough patches, Dwight can clearly see Kobe's value and that can help put things into perspective a bit. Does he see that same value (or any at all rather) in MDA? Cant say for sure, but after playing under Brown and Pringles since leaving Orlando, Id bet that his time playing for Stan Van Gundy doesn't seem as bad anymore.

MDA as a coach really sucks ... but it really doesn't matter until he ruins a season with a championship caliber roster ...

The main thing some posters don't get is we could have Pop as the head coach and Thibs as a defensive asst and we still wouldn't win the title this season ...

The age, lack of speed/athleticism of the roster , poor depth at the SF/SG spot and D12 not being himself physically wouldn't completely go away with a better coach ...

Would we have a better record ? no doubt about it , would we be at the top of the NBA ? Hell no .

OKC went to the Finals last season and is again the favorite to come out of the West this season ... with a clueless coach