Steve Kerr Credits Nash And D'antoni For Warriors Championship

http://probasketballtalk.nbcsports....laying-foundation-that-became-warriors-title/

 

Everyone's plan is to outscore the other team. That's the goal of the game. D'Antoni's plan to maximize possessions was to minimize variables.

On defense, he had to have been doing something for that Suns team if they were in the middle of the pack defensively with Nash and Amare starting. Even Raja Bell (their defensive "specialist") wasn't anything special. They did have Marion though, who was kind of like their "Draymond Green". Still, that team didn't really have a lot of talent defensively so really, how much of that blame actually falls on him?

Also, despite how Byron is touted as a defensive head coach, we had the same defensive rating this year as we did last year under D'Antoni. A lot of people also credit 2012 Knicks team's 5th defensive rating to Mike Woodson and not D'Antoni. But, that very next year, they fell to 18th when Woodson was the head coach.

Edit: Not that I completely disagree with you, but does D'Antoni deserve all the blame he gets regarding the team's defense?

 

Gotta play defense. 'Antoni never cared about. Kerr did. that's the difference.

I like how he mentions pace of the game as a reason for Phoenix giving up so many points, but no one considers that when discussing Nash's numbers those years and how it helped him steal 2 of Kobe's MVPs.

 

That doesn't really answer my question. The media and many people call Byron a defensive coach. Under him, we did not improve one iota defensively so what does that say about Byron and D'Antoni? I know that you don't like Byron though so I already know the answer to that question.

Also, they did go to the second round with Woodson, but that's again not really my question. Under D'Antoni, they were 5th in defensive rating (101.0). A lot of that credit went to Woodson, which is fair. Their defensive rating under Woodson though that very next year was 18th. That's not saying that Woodson is a bad defensive coach. It's asking, "How can people blame D'Antoni for the Knicks defense when his team was 5th defensively and then go around praising Woodson when his team was 18th defensively with the same exact team?" Compared to both Byron and Woodson, D'Antoni's teams have done better defensively when he had comparable talent.

His Suns team had Nash and Amare starting. Their specialists were Bell and Diaw. James Jones, Barbosa, and Diaw were other contributors. They didn't have great defenders at every position like the GSW. They didn't have two DPOTY candidates like Green and Bogut. They didn't have Iggy (could be another DPOTY candidate on another team) coming off the bench. Do you really think that those Suns team could have been average defensively (hovering around 15th in defensive rating) without some sort of scheme or plan? I'm very well aware of Jalen Rose's story, but lets not act like Rose's story is 100% true. He tells a lot of over-the-top stories all the time about players and coaches that he doesn't like.

The two years after D'Antoni left, the Suns were 26th and 23rd defensively under Porter and Gentry. If teams consistently become worse defensively after D'Antoni leaves, how is it that he gets blasted for his defensive schemes and other coaches don't?

 

You brought up the Suns defensive personnel, but hold it against Byron that the stats didn't show us as being better defensively last season? That seems unfair. Our roster last season was mostly D-League talent towards the end there along with one decent player in JC.

Plus, you can use the numbers any way you want but I don't remember us getting blown out by 40 points last season very much and that seemed to happen regularly with D'Antoni as the coach. Byron's not great, but he's a far, far, far better leader than D'Antoni and as HC that's half the battle.

 

I have been talking about coaches who take D'Antoni's roster after he leaves. So no, I'm not comparing the Suns defensive personnel to our personnel this year. I'm comparing D'Antoni's roster last year to Byron's roster this year. I'm also not arguing who's the better leader. Clearly, that's Byron. I'm strictly talking about defense.

Lets not pretend like our roster was any better under D'Antoni. Blake only played 27 games that year. Gasol played 60 games, and when he did play, he was terrible defensively. We were running Kendall Marshall and Meeks.

This year, Hill and Young both regressed. Clarkson, Lin, Davis, Black, and Ellington are also a much better defensive group than what D'Antoni had in 2013-14 (Marshall, Meeks, Kaman, Kelly, etc.). Despite this, we didn't improve defensively.

In the Lakers Discsusion, Doc Brown has also previously posted stats on our poor defense this year, comparing it to D'Antoni's defense from 2013-14.

 

I don't think I necessarily disagree with you on these statements, although I think Byron has some positive attributes that can help this team. I think he communicates well with the players and is at least laying down a foundation of hard work to prep for the future. I'm hoping he does something like what Mark Jackson did for the Warriors and someone like Kerr comes along and expands upon it.

 

C'mon man you're really going to tell me last year's roster was significantly better than what D'Antoni had to work with? Black and Clarkson were good, but every other player either was downgrade, regressed, or wasn't playing because we were tanking.

All I know is that this season we fought in almost every game we played except against the truly elite talents like Golden State. We didn't do that under D'Antoni. Arguments we have generally center around the fact that you're a stats guy and I'm not as much, and I think we're going to come to that same conclusion here.

I'm not saying Byron is a defensive mastermind or that D'Antoni is the worst defensive coach I've ever seen... Well actually yeah, I'm saying that last part. D'Antoni is the worst defensive coach I've ever seen. He simply didn't care about it and it showed. His previous players have all said the same thing too. Pros like Antawn Jamison have said it as well. D'Antoni just didn't care about defense. His philosophy was "we'll maximize possessions and our team is better at scoring than theirs" but that completely ignores the defensive end of the ball. Magic's Lakers and Curry's Warriors last year maximize possessions, but they still focused defensively as well.

 

Suns had Marion too. Greatly underrated defender.

 

In terms of defense? Yes, I do think we had a better defensive roster last year than we did two years ago. I think Clarkson and Lin are solid defensive starting and backup point guards. I think Ellington is a solid defensive SG, but he's more of a backup SG and didn't really get much playing time till later in the season.

I think Davis and Black are solid defensive bigs, although Boozer sucks. Still, I think Davis/Black/Boozer are better overall defensively than Gasol/Kaman/Williams (with Hill and Kelly being on the roster both times).

 

I think they're better individually maybe, but Boozer is much worse than Gasol AND those guys didn't play consistent minutes. Clarkson and Lin had wildly inconsistent minutes all season long until everyone got hurt and they HAD to play. I think Ellington is marginally better than Jodie Meeks defensively. Meeks works a lot harder, but Wayne is just miles smarter on the floor. Davis and especially Black got sporadic playing time as well.

The Lakers had a set rotation under D'Antoni and he gave them nothing defensively. You can't be good if you don't practice.

 

I think if you give Byron Pau for 60 games and Kobe for more than a handful of games, his coaching numbers don't look nearly as bad.

We'll see this year though when Byron is given more talent what happens.

 

That grin on Hamblen's mug...

 

Byron certain holds more command than D'antoni and thus a better leader. But if you compare their basketball mind's its like comparing F1 technology to Nascar technology. Leagues apart.