Good Thing the Vulcans Made Nate Change His Coaching Staff

[BGrantFan]

Bringing in those 'offensive gurus' has really made the difference this year!

 

[Nikolokolus]

I find it difficult to feel much sympathy for Nate; this is big boy basketball, he's well compensated and these guys get fired all the time. He had his run and presumably somebody else will soon.

 

[HailBlazers]

bench Roy and we'll be fine, time to put the hammer down sarge

 

[SlyPokerDog]

Bringing in those 'offensive gurus' has really made the difference this year!

So you think all was fine with Blazer coaching last season?

 

[ABM]

So you think all was fine with Blazer coaching last season?

Maybe not. That said, though, one would think Nate wouldn't have to be addressing the offense for the probably the 6th straight game.

 

[MickZagger]

Who was the offensive guru supposed to be? Bickerstaff?

Ociepka is known for his defense and Williams for hustle? footwork? I don't really know about Williams. I didn't know we were bringing in 'offensive guru's'.

 

[Nikolokolus]

bench Roy and we'll be fine, time to put the hammer down sarge

Hardly.

 

[MARIS61]

So you think all was fine with Blazer coaching last season?

Far better than this season.

 

[Mediocre Man]

94.8 vs 95.7

Those are the points per game we gave up last year vs this. Ocepka is supposedly a defensive specialist, but the numbers aren't there.


98.1 vs 94.4

Those are the points per game we scored last year vs this year. Nate has said in intervies, and in print that he is responsible for the offense.

 

[ucatchtrout]

Nate McMillan’s days are numbered

I’m going to tell you something that I’ve learned over many years covering sports:

The media doesn’t get coaches fired and fans don’t get coaches fired. Sometimes coaches don’t even do anything to get themselves fired. But you know what — players can get their own coaches fired.

And while I watched the Trail Blazers’ pathetic effort Friday night in Washington against the Wizards, it crossed my mind what I’ve written here previously — are the Blazer players trying to get their coach fired?

It sure looks like it.

I mean, the effort was horrible. And the execution was just, well, as bad as you’d ever want to see it. Washington came into the game as the second-worst defensive field-goal percentage team in the league. Opponents shoot 49 percent against the Wiz.

Portland made 33.3 percent of its field goals. I mean, really? That’s not just a bad shooting night — that’s a team not even attempting to get good shots against another team that normally allows a lot of layups and wide-open looks.

Sometimes, players just tire of hearing the same messages from their coach. At some unconscious (usually) level, they work toward an outcome that they’d like to see — the departure of their coach. It certainly looks as if the Blazers, on some level, have chosen this course.

Afterward, Nate McMillan confessed that it appears, even to him, that his team isn’t responding to him:

“Evidently, they’re not responding to me, because all these games look similar,” McMillan said. “So I asked them: ‘Is it clear what we’re asking you to do?’”

His words were met with blank states and silence.

“They didn’t say anything,” McMillan said. “The thing is, they didn’t have to say anything. I think the games show that. We’re not getting it done.”

A lot of guys get fired — immediately — when there’s any appearance that the team isn’t responding to them. This is a coach admitting that it appears his players aren’t responding. So what does that leave an owner or general manager to do?

In most cases, it leads directly to a coach being fired. If McMillan isn’t due that fate soon, he’s certainly setting the stage for it. And if the Blazers were going to do such a thing, I cannot imagine a better time than the present — with the Civil War stealing all the attention.

No major Trail Blazer move goes under the radar, but a move done this weekend has the best chance to be passed over quickly. It would not shock me at all to see this happen — particularly after McMillan’s admission after the game that his players aren’t responding to him.

How can you coach a team when it doesn’t respond to you?

http://www.dwightjaynes.com/

 

[hasoos]

Really? You folks are really having this conversation about the assistant coaches when the player deficiencies on this team are obvious? Half the guys that made our bench tick last year are gone. Half of our squad plays the exact same position. We have no depth at PG, and Roy is no longer able to sustain the elite level of play he once played at, and you guys are now bitching about the assistant coaches? Buck Williams was brought in to coach the bigs, but there have only been 2 bigs to coach all year long until Joel came back the other day. That's more than half the problem in itself. Small teams get punked in the NBA, that is a fact. Every once in a while a small team will scrape into the playoffs and make some noise in the first around against a team that doesn't match up well, but for the most part, it is just a matter of time before they are punked and out. Then once you consider the fact that Portland is small, and not very good at being a small team, it gets worse.

 

[ucatchtrout]

Really? You folks are really having this conversation about the assistant coaches when the player deficiencies on this team are obvious? Half the guys that made our bench tick last year are gone. Half of our squad plays the exact same position. We have no depth at PG, and Roy is no longer able to sustain the elite level of play he once played at, and you guys are now bitching about the assistant coaches? Buck Williams was brought in to coach the bigs, but there have only been 2 bigs to coach all year long until Joel came back the other day. That's more than half the problem in itself. Small teams get punked in the NBA, that is a fact. Every once in a while a small team will scrape into the playoffs and make some noise in the first around against a team that doesn't match up well, but for the most part, it is just a matter of time before they are punked and out. Then once you consider the fact that Portland is small, and not very good at being a small team, it gets worse.

Or you could say that the team that gave up in an embarrassing loss to Washington (one of the worst teams in the league) has all five starters returning from last years playoff team, replaced Martell Webster with a better player in Wesley Matthews has not been playing up to the level expected. The coach consistantly throws the players under the bus and blames them after every loss and stubbornly continues to employ strategies that are obviously ineffective and don't put his players in a position to succeed. He is also the same guy that yanks young players in and out of the lineup and destroys their confidence. Either Nic Batum is the next Scottie Pippen and there was good reason to make him untouchable in trade talks, or he is another highly overrated player whose confidence and trade value will be destroyed by the coach.