Sort of OT: which coach is this?

[Rastapopoulos]

This sounds like what might be written about Nate next year:

His team improved its record in five straight seasons, yet ended his sixth, and theoretically most successful, year leaving the home court to a chorus of boos and with probably his most unhappy locker room.

On the court, the oddities were apparent too. He was an old-school guy who patterned his coaching style after Larry Brown, yet his teams were never particularly good defensively. He had players who were devastating in transition, yet his instincts were to slow the game to a crawl. He was criticized heavily for his team's offense, yet that was the one thing that consistently worked; in fact scouts say he was among the best designing plays out of timeouts.

On balance, it's easy to see why he lasted six years, and just as easy to see why it was time for a change.

 

[DaRizzle]

Woodson...obvious if you are awesome like me

 

[maxiep]

This sounds like what might be written about Nate next year:

Wow. The parallels are eerie.

 

[jlprk]

I get goosepimples. The GM who fired Woodson is Rick Sund, none other than Wally Walker's right-hand man in the Sonic debacle. When the Okies bought the team, they replaced Sund with Presti. Get this. When McMillan was Sonic Coach, his boss was Sund. I'm breaking out in shivers now. This was all meant to be.

 

[jlprk]

Hasoos and Oddenormous started threads about this, too. Other similarities to McMillan (from the ESPN article):

Woodson maintained a remarkably even keel and...his team played hard for him until the final few weeks. At the beginning, this took the patience of Job -- Atlanta went 13-69 his first season...

He kept things relatively simple and kept the star player (Johnson) in his corner with heavy doses of minutes and shots...Woodson wasn't afraid to play the young guys, but never before they'd earned it...

The Hawks had reached their ceiling with this general. His iso-heavy offense was too easily defensed in the playoffs, his other players were too restricted by the heavy diet of Johnson isos, and for a team that accumulated a ton of defensive talent they remained shockingly average at that end of the floor...

Whoever takes over, it's likely that he'll be encouraged to increase the tempo, run more elaborate offensive sets, and emphasize defense more...

Differences from McMillan: At the end he lost touch with his players. Atlanta played without intensity, direction, leadership, or inspiration (according to some comments).

 

[jlprk]

That was from Hollinger's article on TrueHoop. The main ESPN article has these parallels.

"In this case, Woody has been here six years and had basically been the only voice that many of these players had heard," the GM said...But it was clear that some players had tuned him out, especially in the playoffs...

Center Zaza Pachulia said Woodson...became a victim of the increased expectations. "...when you get better, you want even more..."

He came to Atlanta preaching hard-nosed defense, but some complained that he lacked imagination on the offensive end, even as the team kept adding talented players and improving every season...

The Hawks had the lowest payroll of any playoff team, and were the only squad that reached the final eight without paying the luxury tax.

 

[jlprk]

The players tuning out Woodson / him losing touch with some players--

I called it a difference, but maybe there are signs of that becoming a similarity (Rudy, and Andre Miller until he started).