ESPN can go overboard with a lot of analogies, comparison, and obscure stats. But it was interesting when they drew up analogous situations in other sports to illustrate LA Lakers coach Mike Brown's firing just 5 games into the season. It's apparently equivalent to a NFL coach getting fired before the end of the first game of the season or a college football coach getting fired in the 3-Rd quarter of their season opener. Or a baseball manager getting fired after 10 games. They got him even before I got around to my first NBA blog post of this
season - it's just been over a week into this NBA season. All crazy stats, but I still can't totally condemn the Lakers brass for letting Mike Brown go this early. Granted, it's totally mind boggling that a coach with a brand new team in terms of it's key players got fired after just 5 games - way before those guys even got to learn to play with each other with any level of comfort. One of the key guys, Steve Nash had been hurt for 3 of those 5 games, Dwight Howard is returning from a serious back surgery, Kobe is hurt and both Kobe and Dwight missed most of the preseason. I think we have all heard enough on ESPN about them implementing a new offense too. Give all this, it should not surprise anybody that they started the season 1-4.
But their talent is so good and the expectations are so high, Brown got popped even in these circumstances. I have never been a big fan of Mike Brown. He is supposed to be defensive minded and seems like a decent guy, but I have always found him to be completely unimaginative, especially on offense. Nothing path breaking on defense either, but I find him to be really clueless on offense. It's now fashionable for these so-called experts to knock on the Princeton offense that Mike Brown tried to incorporate this season. I don't mind the Princeton offense, but Mike Brown seemed to have adopted it just because he wanted something and had no clue what to do on offense with the pieces he got. Of course with Nash, Kobe and Howard, Princeton is a not a great fit anyways. It's not just the losses that got him fired but the fact that he was generating less than the sum of the individual parts he had on his hands with his unimaginative coaching. To quote Bill Simmons, Mike Brown single handedly stopped LeBron James as his coach for years in Cleveland. That would be funny if it were not so close to the truth. Throwing the ball in LeBron's hands at weird spots on the floor and having the other 4 guys watch it from even weirder corners was his offense for years.
There is only one basketball and it's never going to be easy to get the most out of all 4 stars the Lakers have on their roster. But if you can't win with both Kobe and Howard shooting more than 55% from the field, there are some basic structural issues. I wouldn't trust Mike Brown to fix those even if he is not responsible for creating those. To be fair to Brown, the Lakers do have some issues with this roster despite all it's talent. Nash is not very useful if you don't let him generate a lot of your offense, which he sure can. But with Kobe and Howard, is that the right way to go? May be, may be not. One approach would be to run more and let Nash be the creator, and when they do go half-court, let the system, Howard and Kobe take care of things with Kobe also being the closer. Whatever it is, I think they have to maximize their productivity on offense to be able to win. Nash is a defensive liability and Pau is not an asset on the defensive end either. Even MWP is not what he used to be as a defender. I think there is an opportunity here for the Lakers to be great offensively and halfway decent defensively and it's going to take some coaching to make that happen.
Laker faithful is already begging for Phil Jackson to come back. They were chanting the Zen master's name as the Lakers blew the Warriors out tonight. I would personally love to see them hire Mike D'Antoni, who should have Nash and even Kobe's blessing given his familiarity from Italy and from the recent Olympics. Granted, defense wins championships and D'Antoni will only make them weaker there but he will solve their offensive problems. There is also an argument that though D'Antoni would have more talent in this roster than he ever had with the Phoenix Suns, these are not the same athletic types that will do well running up and down in his system. Plus, Kobe and Nash are older and may not survive that system and this roster doesn't have the three pointing shooting he needs either. MWP bricking another three is probably the Laker fan's worst nightmare. With all that said, Nash and D'Antoni operating with Kobe, Pau and Dwight will be a lot of fun to watch! If it doesn't work, who cares. It's the Lakers' problem anyways. It's a win-win as far as I am concerned.
But their talent is so good and the expectations are so high, Brown got popped even in these circumstances. I have never been a big fan of Mike Brown. He is supposed to be defensive minded and seems like a decent guy, but I have always found him to be completely unimaginative, especially on offense. Nothing path breaking on defense either, but I find him to be really clueless on offense. It's now fashionable for these so-called experts to knock on the Princeton offense that Mike Brown tried to incorporate this season. I don't mind the Princeton offense, but Mike Brown seemed to have adopted it just because he wanted something and had no clue what to do on offense with the pieces he got. Of course with Nash, Kobe and Howard, Princeton is a not a great fit anyways. It's not just the losses that got him fired but the fact that he was generating less than the sum of the individual parts he had on his hands with his unimaginative coaching. To quote Bill Simmons, Mike Brown single handedly stopped LeBron James as his coach for years in Cleveland. That would be funny if it were not so close to the truth. Throwing the ball in LeBron's hands at weird spots on the floor and having the other 4 guys watch it from even weirder corners was his offense for years.
There is only one basketball and it's never going to be easy to get the most out of all 4 stars the Lakers have on their roster. But if you can't win with both Kobe and Howard shooting more than 55% from the field, there are some basic structural issues. I wouldn't trust Mike Brown to fix those even if he is not responsible for creating those. To be fair to Brown, the Lakers do have some issues with this roster despite all it's talent. Nash is not very useful if you don't let him generate a lot of your offense, which he sure can. But with Kobe and Howard, is that the right way to go? May be, may be not. One approach would be to run more and let Nash be the creator, and when they do go half-court, let the system, Howard and Kobe take care of things with Kobe also being the closer. Whatever it is, I think they have to maximize their productivity on offense to be able to win. Nash is a defensive liability and Pau is not an asset on the defensive end either. Even MWP is not what he used to be as a defender. I think there is an opportunity here for the Lakers to be great offensively and halfway decent defensively and it's going to take some coaching to make that happen.
Laker faithful is already begging for Phil Jackson to come back. They were chanting the Zen master's name as the Lakers blew the Warriors out tonight. I would personally love to see them hire Mike D'Antoni, who should have Nash and even Kobe's blessing given his familiarity from Italy and from the recent Olympics. Granted, defense wins championships and D'Antoni will only make them weaker there but he will solve their offensive problems. There is also an argument that though D'Antoni would have more talent in this roster than he ever had with the Phoenix Suns, these are not the same athletic types that will do well running up and down in his system. Plus, Kobe and Nash are older and may not survive that system and this roster doesn't have the three pointing shooting he needs either. MWP bricking another three is probably the Laker fan's worst nightmare. With all that said, Nash and D'Antoni operating with Kobe, Pau and Dwight will be a lot of fun to watch! If it doesn't work, who cares. It's the Lakers' problem anyways. It's a win-win as far as I am concerned.
