Every professional sport lives by the famous adage, “Coaches are hired to be fired.” It is well known that when things go south, it is the coach and not the players who get the blame and the ax. In the NBA, with 15 players collectively making somewhere north of $60 million in salary and being almost impossible to replace, it is no wonder that the coach and his assistants are the usual fall guys for poor performance. Few jobs carry so
The Denver Nuggets, possibly one of the most exciting teams to watch in the playoffs this year, are seemingly falling apart. The Nuggets leadership is dissolving before our very eyes and clearly having its affect on Denver’s players, as can be seen from Thursday’s quote from Kenneth Faried. [Read more…]
NEW YORK — How did Frank Vogel get his start in coaching? “That’s a long story you’re getting into there,” I was warned as I asked Vogel that question at the Pacers’ shootaround on Tuesday morning at MSG. Indeed, it is. Vogel, who finished a distant fifth in voting for Coach of the Year honors, isn’t a former NBA player. He is, however, a former Division III, pre-med varsity point guard with a 2.6 GPA (“That was not going to get me into med
When I cast my Coach of the Year vote for George Karl, I had no idea so many others would do the same. More than half the voters made the same choice. The final individual award given out by the NBA was announced this morning, and Karl was the Coach of the Year in a runaway. with Erik Spoelstra of the Miami Heat second and Mike Woodson of the Knicks third. [Read more…]
We already know the winners of the Most Improved Player award, the Sixth Man Award and the Defensive Player of the Year. Rookie of the Year will be a runaway, as will MVP. Coach of the Year? That is one of the biggest mysteries remaining in this NBA postseason — along with the question of whether the Miami Heat will ever lose a game. I have a tremendous history with coaches. It started by growing up with an NBA Coach of the
We ran a similar poll to this one a month ago, and Mike Woodson was the winner by a resounding margin. Now we are setting the reset button and starting over, given that Coach of the Year it is the only award for which there is any suspense now that we know that Marc Gasol is the Defensive Player of the Year, Paul George is Most Improved and J.R. Smith is the Sixth Man Award winner. (Click on any of those
This is one of the most difficult NBA postseason awards that one can be asked to vote upon, but vote upon it I will late Wednesday night when I cast my official ballot. This poll has been running for several days in a Coach of the Year/Coaches From Hell column written by former player Danny Schayes, who played under everyone from Doug Moe to Pay Riley to Magic Johnson to Frank Layden. It is worth a read. Danny has a ton
Life without Kobe Bryant for the Los Angeles Lakers began Sunday night, and it wasn’t so bad. In fact, it was pretty good. With Dwight Howard having a big game and Steve Blake somehow outplaying Tony Parker, the Lakers defeated the suddenly struggling San Antonio Spurs and need just one more win to clinch a playoff berth. [Read more…]