Ex-Coach Luke Walton Discussion

But V, all what you listed is either an excuse (however well-justified) or a patience gospel.

I am talking actual abilities. For instance, from my untrained point of view -- Brad Stevens is great with ATOs. Simple to show and see. There are dozens of videos to illustrate.
Pop is clearly great at getting people to play within the system. Yes it took years to show that (can't be otherwise), but it's there.

JVG was a great defensive coordinator, poor offensive coordinator and a lousy motivator/leader. Again -- evidence exists (as much as there is an evidence in such a case).

There are coaches that are universally considered bad. Byron Scott comes to mind. So, there is some qualification, not only quantification (how many games the team won, or what are their advanced metrics).

What is it?

In my mind, all you guys are saying is distilled to: "well, he is a nice guy, people seems to like him, but we weren't able to see his abilities yet because... Let's give him some time, so we can decide".

Boggles the mind.

 

Well had Steve Kerr not come back, Luke coulda rode that 29-4 wave into the playoffs and maybe they win it all that year instead of lose to Bron haha. Also you brought up BScott, but ironically he led the Nets to back to back Finals within 3 years of 1st starting as a head coach. Of course a future HOF PG in Kidd helps in that regard, and Luke just acquired Bron...

Seriously tho just think about the team he's inherited, how young they are, the flux involved and we haven't even discussed the injuries he's experienced (forget Zo for a moment, 20% of our cap was held hostage by a dude that played 13 mins last year). Its hard to evaluate Luke's impact on a "team" like that.

Zen your concern is valid and Luke has so much to improve on, but I just can't find him at fault with all the instability and lack of continuity around him. You can't build a foundation in that type of environment. This year needs to be looked at as year 1, since the FO literally cleaned house and this is the team (outside of 14m this year and 5 m for the next 3 years in dead cap) that they wanted to start with. Obviously they're still not done and next summer will bring some finality to that.

So I feel its fair to look at this year as his year 1. Now we can amend that window of scrutiny by shortening it some since technically he's 2 years in the game...so by next year at this time if we are still talking about how we're running rudimentary sets on offense like PnR and Horns while still being defensive bottom feeders (last year we just missed top 10 believe it or not), then Luke deserves a 2nd look as our coach moving forward...no doubt. Till then, imho I think dude deserves to lay down the foundation and let this team develop into what he envisions his offense/defense to look like.

 

He took the team from pitiful to very respectable on defense last year. That's something.

If they play as bad all year as they have in games 1-3, he'll be fired. But to say his seat is hot right now? Not buying it.

 

A lot has to improve.

Our halfcourt offensive system has been garbage the last 2 seasons.

We're giving up 130 ppg a night on defense. That has got to change.

If we don't see some major changes, we could miss/barely make the playoffs. Too many people are using "team chemistry" and "it's early" as a blanket excuse, but there are serious execution flaws that have more to do with coaching than getting used to one another. And quite honestly, he's had training camp to fix it.

It's one thing if we were incorrectly executing our offense, or missing rotations on defense. But when the underlying system doesn't exist for the players to take advantage of it, thats a COACHING problem, not a TIME/CHEMISTRY/NEW TEAM problem. We can let this team play 500 games, have the greatest chemistry in the world, but the system in place won't take us anywhere.

It really reminds me of GSW under Kerr vs. Jackson. The talent is there, we just need the framework to take advantage of it.

 

Sure. Wait and see.

Phil benefited IMMENSELY from having Jordan. Before and during his prime. And Tex. He himself was infuriating.

The difference, however, was that, by all accounts, it was immediately clear there is a progress from Collins. Same with the Mark Jackson - Kerr situation.

Do you see the same improvement from Scott?

I could probably argue, just as easily, that Scott got the raw end of the stick, getting a bunch of misfits, DAR, Young, Boozer and all them dudes... He never had a roster quite like what Walton got.

Bottom line though, the product on the floor is sub-par and I don't see an improvement.

P.S.

I truly believe that defensive improvement came with Zo and BI. IIRC when Zo went down our defensive plummeted... Of course we were starting a midget as well, but still...

 

Yeah, he made the adjustments we were all clamoring for; I'm glad those suspensions game, and I knew they would be a blessing in disguise. It gave him the advantage of tinkering and finding out what works and what doesn't; let's hope he sticks with it.

Good job, Luke.

 

so when rondo and ingram comes back. what is Luke gonna do. put rondo and ingram back on starting 5. or keep the starting 5 right now and have rondo and ingram off the bench?

 

LakersBall > Luke

Start Hart, Start Lonzo, No Kuz, Beas, or Lebron at center. Jeez, we could be 4-0!

 

It has nothing to do with who is starting...

Y'all killing me with this s*** hahaha.

Now that small ball s***, I can f*** with you on that.

 

Hey, lay off our confirmation bias. Correlation does so equal causation! Butthole!

 

D soft huh? Thats what sh...

 

Ballers have ink and Zo's shooting better after getting some work done ...hey Luke, start Zo and bench Hart for KCP...Oh wait.


#sTATistics

Better being a butthole than having holes poked in your analytics