khandor’s sports blog

Sources: Rick Pitino makes himself a candidate for Nets’ coaching job

As snow swirled outside the Meadowlands on Wednesday night when the Nets played the Bucks, talk about Rick Pitino making overtures to the Nets about their coaching job circulated inside the arena.

Sources close to Pitino said that the Louisville coach has reached out to Nets brass in recent days, making himself a candidate for the job now held by GM and interim coach Kiki Vandeweghe, and due to open after their woeful season is completed in April.

According to sources, Pitino had intermediaries recently contact Nets president Rod Thorn on his behalf. Thorn himself is in the final year of a contract, and is looking to get a new deal from incoming owner Mikhail Prokhorov.

A source close to Thorn said the Nets’ president has denied that he spoke to Pitino, while Pitino’s camp insists that “no direct contact” was made between the coach and team. Earlier this week, Pitino and Thorn attended the funeral of Knicks Hall of Famer Dick McGuire.

“Pitino is interested in the job,” said a high-ranking team official, who added that the interest is all one way, coming from Pitino’s side.

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Yikes.

After reading this story earlier today, and then considering that there were all of 1016 actual people in attendance at last night’s Nets/Bucks contest, in the swamp … due, mostly, to the blizzard that hit New Jersey yesterday … these are the thoughts which came to mind:

University of Massachusetts, 1970
University of Hawaii, 1974
Syracuse University, 1976
Boston University, 1978
New York Knicks, 1983
Providence College, 1985 
New York Knicks, 1987
University of Kentucky, 1989
Boston Celtics, 1997
University of Louisville, 2001
“The Real Life Story of Frank & Carl“,  2002

?, 2010

At some point … after all the shenanigans are finished … there really does become, “No one else left to call.” 

If you have but 1 article to read today, make it this one.

Bill Plaschke’s take, on the background to why, exactly …

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Lakers Coach Phil Jackson is liked but not beloved

He may have mastered Zen, but he has not mastered Los Angeles.

There will be no statue of him outside Staples Center. There might not ever be a night honoring his achievements. There will be very little fanfare when he retires, just as there was very little outcry when he left the team several years ago.

He is not Tom Lasorda. He is not Pete Carroll. He is not Mike Scioscia. He is not the sort of folksy personality that this town expects of its high-profile coaches.

More than anything else, he is not Pat Riley.

When longtime Lakers fans think of coaches, they still will think of Riley, even though he coached one fewer season here. Riley looked like Los Angeles. He acted like Los Angeles.

“Pat Riley is the L.A. story,” admitted Jeanie Buss, Lakers executive vice president and Jackson’s longtime girlfriend. “This was the birthplace of him as a coach and a leader, we watched it all happen, it’s like a mother and a child, any success that Pat has, we feel we have part of.”

And Phil?

“Before Phil came here, all I knew about him was that he was a freaky dude who left his job in Chicago on a motorcycle,” said Buss. “I thought that was strange. A freaky dude.”

That is still the way much of Los Angeles looks at Jackson, and that is too bad, because that freaky dude may be the greatest sports leader in this town’s history. That we haven’t completely embraced him is as much about the city as it is about the man.

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At the end of the day, it really is all about being able to say with the utmost conviction …

Kudos … all around.

Despite winning the 2007-2008 NBA Championship, there are certain many? individuals, who are highly active in the on-line hoops community, that consistently attempt to put down the effectiveness of Doc Rivers’ coaching.

In reality, however …

What Doc keeps doing, repeatedly, is simply knocking ‘em outside the yard … with coaching expertise like this:

Example 1, via specific play design

Example 2, via specific verbal communication with his players

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Rivers won’t go with flow

They were words spoken when a team loses a game it should have won, and after blowing an 11-point halftime lead to the Magic yesterday at home, someone in the Celtics’ locker room said them.

“We’re better than Orlando.’’

Despite what you may have been told to believe by certain segments of the on-line hoops community …

Not all coaches are, in fact, created equal, and some really do make a tangible difference to the quality of performance they elicit from the individual players on their team, on a game-to-game basis and over the course of a season and/or a career.

When it comes to working successfully with the very best of the best … men like Red Auerbach, Phil Jackson, Pat Riley, Bill Sharman, Red Holtzman, Dr. Jack Ramsay, Chuck Daly, Larry Brown and Gregg Popovich have set the standard:

#1. By the way in which they communicate their priorities to their players each and every time they speak … 

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Spurs fizzle late against Blazers

“That’s what this journey is about,” Popovich said before tipoff Thursday. “It’s an exercise in commitment to each other, and having the character to continue to believe, and not try and moan and blame, but to try and be the best group you can be, no matter what.”

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and,

#2. By the exacting quality of their personal handywork, in the areas of the game over which they have complete control, for example:

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Crunch-time X’s and O’s by a master

What does the ideal crunch time play look like?

The play that got the Spurs’ preferred shooter (Manu Ginobili) the best possible shot for his team (a wide-open 3 from the corner, where 3s are shorter distance and easier) in the highlights above is about as pretty as crunch time execution gets.

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Fans of the NBA game should learn to appreciate each one of them for what they truly are … i.e. a very special type of human being that does not come along every day.

Related:

Teachable Moments, NBA Style

When you take a look at the following extended video clip, it’s important to understand exactly what the Portland Trail Blazers are trying to accomplish this season …

and just how remarkable it would be, if they can actually pull it off, considering that they are playing WITHOUT their:

1. Starting Center, i.e. Greg Oden;

2. Back-up Center, i.e. Joel Przybila; and,

3. Back-up Power Forward, i.e. Travis Outlaw;

completely, and with several other key players like their:

4. Starting Off Guard, i.e. Brandon Roy;

5. Starting Small Forward, i.e. Nicolas Batum; and,

6. Back-up Small Forward, i.e. Rudy Fernandez;

each having spent a fair number of games on the Inactive List this season, due to an assortment of different major and minor injuries.

Yet, somehow, this team is still:

- well above the .500 mark with a W-L Record of 29-21 [i.e. .580]
- in 3rd place in the Pacific Division
- in a tie for 5th place in the Western Conference

in spite of also having to cope with the fact that their head coach, Nate McMillan, is still in ”recovery mode”, himself, from a torn achilles tendon injury, sustained when he stepped into practice earlier this season because the Blazers did not otherwise have enough “healthy” players on their roster to be able to conduct a full scale session.

If Portland can sustain their current level of performance … especially their present Points Allowed Ranking and Rebounding Differential Ranking … now that some of their walking wounded are finally beginning to return to good health, and make the Western Conference playoffs, then, there should be NO DOUBT, whatsoever, which coach should eventually receive this year’s Coach Of The Year Award, in the NBA.

No … doubt … whatsoever!

For the benefit of those who might find fault with certain aspects of this blog …

Big Chief Stand Alone
In what remains my favorite bit of Phil-speak, Jackson once intoned, “When your vision is based on a clear-sighted, realistic assessment of your resources, alchemy often mysteriously occurs and a team transforms itself into a force greater than the sum of its parts. Inherently, paradoxically, the acceptance of borders and limits is the gate to freedom.”

… know that there’s a whole different WAY OF THINKING ABOUT LIFE than what you may currently hold which is extremely successfully.

Complexity is everywhere.

So is simplicity.

The secret is understanding the intrinsic and tangible relationship between the two, and the indelible connections which exist between [I] FREEDOM & RESPONSIBILITY, and [II] Individual & Team, in every facet of Life.

Bravo! … to Bernie Lincicome for acknowledging THAT and The ZenMaster for Making It Happen!