We ALL agree on ONE thing...

[TroyMcClure]

I am starting to agree with you a little more these days D.

Without having given it too much thought, I think I am in favor of your Paul Westhead as coach idea.

He really is maybe the one reject, slightly gimmicky coach with credentials and the possible desire to give it one last run.

How could you not at least consider someone with his accomplishments? Let's not forget Loyola. Had Hank not died, who knows? I'm a Bama fan and one of our best teams was put out by that group with Bo Kimble. Held them 60 points below their average and still lost?! Robert Horry actually passed up a wide open 10 footer to pass to All-SEC forward Melvin Cheatum under the hoop! He bricked in traffic, game over.

It's totally out of left field and I love it D. Paul Westhead for coach!

[TroyMcClure]

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That is that the Hawks are built to run. Woodson is certainly not an up tempo coach but when we play teams that run like the Suns or the Warriors we play at their pace and the results speak volumes about how this team should play every night. We still are desperate for a PG, a passing and running PG. A guy like TJ Ford, who isn't elite, but would help ignite this team. TJ is not available but there are PGs out there that can play up tempo and get the ball into places where guys are in a position to finish.

Speedy is not the PG we need as he isn't a good passing PG and never has been. Nor is T-Lue. BK seems to not consider the style we play when he makes his player acquisitions...its all by the seast of his pants.

I loved last nights win because it shows what we can do when we play to our strengths. I fear that Woody returns to the real Woody again after the GS game and that is a shame.

BK; Please get us a REAL PG for once!

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How do you feel about the Westhead idead TP?

[drzachary]

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I am starting to agree with you a little more these days D.

Without having given it too much thought, I think I am in favor of your Paul Westhead as coach idea.

He really is maybe the one reject, slightly gimmicky coach with credentials and the possible desire to give it one last run.

How could you not at least consider someone with his accomplishments? Let's not forget Loyola. Had Hank not died, who knows? I'm a Bama fan and one of our best teams was put out by that group with Bo Kimble. Held them 60 points below their average and still lost?! Robert Horry actually passed up a wide open 10 footer to pass to All-SEC forward Melvin Cheatum under the hoop! He bricked in traffic, game over.

It's totally out of left field and I love it D. Paul Westhead for coach!

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Welcome aboard! I'm glad we have our third member

[TexasPete]

Paul Westheads idea of running is a little crazy. And Magic Johnson wanted him gone from the Lakers and he was then kicked out despite having won a title.

Westhead is an advocate of running for the sake of running. He wants the team to shoot as quickly as possible...his way of offensive basketball is that teams overthink on offense and his theory is that you need to take your first good look. I disagree with that theory especially in the NBA. He had a little success at Loyola Marymount with this system but it was more of a freakshow than anything else.

I want the Hawks to be an up tempo running team. However, they also need to back out and run sets when the good shots on the break don't develop. Westheads system says that you let it fly at the first opportunity. And the biggest flaw in his system is that it relies heavily on shooting jumpers. In the NBA that will get you a lot of losses...attacking the rim is the way you win. Westhead loved launching 3's...go back and look at the teams he coached and see how reliant they were on the 3...

I'll take Mike D'Antoni's protege...Marc Iavaroni. He has a European approach to running and ball movement. That would ignite this team immediately into an Eastern threat. These Hawks are fundamentally unselfish...so the foundation is there, but the powers that be in this organization don't have a clue.

[KB21]

They do have a clue, because they realize that the European style doesn't stress defense enough. There's a reason the Suns have been unable to push past the Spurs in the West Conference, and that is because they don't play defense well enough.

Again, the model for building an up tempo team should be George Karl's Seattle team of the early to mid 90s. Those guys were great at the fast break, but they were also great defensive teams.

[Diesel]

Magic wanted Westhead gone because Westhead had a plan that didn't involve Magic getting all the credit for Showtime. Back when Riley was in the announcers booth talking about basketball, Westhead brought him down and Riley got in Magic's ear. You ever notice how the fallout of Westphaul led to the coaching start for Riley....his lowly assistant (when I say that I only mean in reference to his top assistant). Usually, you change coaches you change everything. They changed coaches and kept the offensive that Westphaul created... and won championships with Westhead's offense.

Moreover, there is some genius in Westhead's style. It's more than just run for the sake of running. It's run knowing that you will wear your opponents down.

[KB21]

It's also, "don't give a damn about defense." That's what Pat Riley improved when he took over the Lakers. He let them run when needed, but he made them play defense.

[Diesel]

If Paul Westhead didn't create Showtime... Where did it come from??

Wow KB... You come up with some dumb things something... Now you're trying to suggest that Showtime just evolved from what... Classic basketball play of the Lakers?? Or maybe you believe that Magic brought it with him??

That's straight foolishness.

About Denver, had the nuggets GM gotten a defensive Center, then maybe we'd be talking about them differently. However, Mutombo came after Westhead. Had Westhead had him... OMG!!

Like I said before, Basketball coaching is a mixture of Style and Personnell. If one is off, then you won't win.

[Diesel]

Pat Riley did absolutely nothing that Westhead didn't do.

Pat Riley just came in and stroked his players egos... That's it.

The Lakers were not a great defensive team ever... You see the fingerprint of Westhead all over showtime.. .it's undeniable.

If you want to know how Riley really coached, look at what he did when he left LAL. Classic NY Knick basketball. Get some playground bullies like Mason and Oakley.. let them intimidate everybody.. Go to Miami... Play the same style of basketball.. that the previous coach played.. only bring in Lonzo...

However, for as successful as Showtime was, Riley has never tried to do it anywhere else...

Thats because he's not the inventor of Showtime.

[KB21]

That's because he hasn't been at a place that had players like Magic Johnson, Michael Cooper, Byron Scott, Karim Abdul-Jabbar, and James worthy that could run.

[AHF]

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I'll take Mike D'Antoni's protege...Marc Iavaroni. He has a European approach to running and ball movement. That would ignite this team immediately into an Eastern threat. These Hawks are fundamentally unselfish...so the foundation is there

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I am with you. I am also of the opinion that Westhead's approach is fundamentally flawed and unbalanced.

[TheNorthCydeRises]

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Pat Riley did absolutely nothing that Westhead didn't do.

Pat Riley just came in and stroked his players egos... That's it.

The Lakers were not a great defensive team ever... You see the fingerprint of Westhead all over showtime.. .it's undeniable.

If you want to know how Riley really coached, look at what he did when he left LAL. Classic NY Knick basketball. Get some playground bullies like Mason and Oakley.. let them intimidate everybody.. Go to Miami... Play the same style of basketball.. that the previous coach played.. only bring in Lonzo...

However, for as successful as Showtime was, Riley has never tried to do it anywhere else...

Thats because he's not the inventor of Showtime.

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LOL @ Diesel. It's a reason why Paul Westidiot hasn't been able to secure another NBA coaching gig after the Denver debacle. That style is highly flawed and just doesn't work on the NBA level . . unless you do have a superstar PG who can find people anywhere on the court and have guys who can conistently knock down open jumpers.

You better give Magic most of the credit for "Showtime", than Westidiot. He was the catalyst for the style of play that the Lakers played. Without him, there is no "Showtime".

But even that Laker team didn't just run and gun all over the place. That Laker team got a ton of easy shots mainly because they had an unstoppable force in the middle with Kareem, and they had a young PG who had an uncanny knack for running controlled fast breaks and almost always turned into points.

The Lakers back in their 79 - 80 Championship year, only made 20 threes the entire year. Kareem skyhooked people to death. Jamaal Wilkes had the awkward, but money mid-range jumper. Norm Nixon would penetrate at will and score, or dish in the halfcourt offense. And Magic would do the same and dazzle people on the fast break.

In 78 - 79 . . before Westidiot and Magic, the Lakers averaged 113 ppg and shot 52% FG

In 79 - 80 . . when Westidiot and Magic came abord, the Lakers averaged 115 ppg and shot 53% FG. And Magic upped his game as the season wore on that year, becoming damn near a dominant force by the time the playoffs came around.

It wasn't Westidiot that made the Lakers great, it was Magic and Kareem that made them great, along with the other great players they already had there. Magic was just the missing piece.

Magic replaced a nice scoring SF in Adreian Dantley, who averaged 17 ppg and shot over 50% FG in 78 - 79. Magic, who was a PG with SF size, averaged 18 ppg, almost 8 rebs, and a little over 7 assists. That team became more efficient with Magic. And it had very little to do with Westidiot.

LOL . . I tell you exactly what would happen if Westhead became the coach of the Hawks. He'd immeadiately insert Salim Stoudamire into the starting lineup, because he's are the type of player that he prefers to play in his system. Actually, that may not be as bad as it seems, because I wouldn't be against Salim starting games ( but playing only in a role like Ivey's, and only keeping him in if he were scoring ).

But Westidiot would give Salim free reign to take any open shot he gets, which would be suicide for this team. I could easily see a situation where JJ would still be the go-to-guy, but Salim would be 2nd in FG attempts. Smoove, Chill, and Marvin would still get theirs. But Salim would definitely be a focal point in Westidiot's system.

And how do I know that he'd love Salim? Because when he coached the Nuggets from 90 - 92, Michael Adams, a 5-10 PG who was really a shooting guard, took 564 three pointers that year. I'm not quite sure, but I think that's still an NBA record for 3 point attempts. That Nugget team averaged almost 120 a game. But they gave up 130 a game . . an NBA record.

You'd see no Royal Ivey in the game if Westhead were here. It'll be Salim at the point, with JJ, Chill, Marvin, and probably Smoove playing the 5. Speedy would be a defensive specialist, who'd have the green light to shoot anytime he wanted, which would also be suicide for this team. ZaZa would come off the bench, and have the green light at all times as well, another suicidal move. Lue would see time too. Solomon Jones would probably play before Shelden, because Solomon can run.

But Westidiot would LOVE Salim. He's a Michael Adams clone, if I ever saw one. The emphasis would be to run as much as possible, and not worry about playing great defense. We'd be a much more entertaining team to watch, but an absolutely HORRIBLE defensive team.

Imagine how many times Smoove would be out of position to play defense in that system. Even with his great closing speed, you can't ask him to run the floor on offense, then run right back on defense to erase mistakes.

Diesel, you say that Westidiot's system "tires his opponent out". History says that his system only gives his opponent easy looks at the basket. And if you're getting easy looks, a team could play their 9th - 12th guys, and still not lose much in the scoring department.

LOL . . it's a nightmare that I never want to see happen here.

I'm all for this team running . . . in CONTROLLED spurts . . and ONLY if we forced a turnover or got a long rebound. But to let these guys run, just for the sake of running, would be detrimental to this team.

KB is right. If people want this team to run . . let their role model be the Sonics teams of the mid 90s. But even that team had a pretty good low post scorer ( Kemp ) and a damn good defensive PG ( Payton ) who controlled everything for them.

This team is probably a better defensive ballclub ( when healthy ), than a running ballclub ( when healthy ). If we had a defensive center here, who just rebounded and played good defense, we'd probably be a top 10 defensive team right now . . even if that center didn't provide any offense.

The vast majority of the time, the Hawks win games because they play good defense, not because they're great offensively. When they don't play good defense, it almost doesn't matter how we play offensively. Shoot, we've lost plenty of games in the past 2 years, in which we've shot well over 50% FG.

[TroyMcClure]

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Magic wanted Westhead gone because Westhead had a plan that didn't involve Magic getting all the credit for Showtime. Back when Riley was in the announcers booth talking about basketball, Westhead brought him down and Riley got in Magic's ear. You ever notice how the fallout of Westphaul led to the coaching start for Riley....his lowly assistant (when I say that I only mean in reference to his top assistant). Usually, you change coaches you change everything. They changed coaches and kept the offensive that Westphaul created... and won championships with Westhead's offense.

Moreover, there is some genius in Westhead's style. It's more than just run for the sake of running. It's run knowing that you will wear your opponents down.

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Have you gone crazy D?

Paul Westphaul and Paul Westhead are two different people.

Westphaul played and coached for the Suns!

When was Riley doing TV? He was an assistant, I thought?

[TexasPete]

Paul Westhead will never coach another game in the NBA and there is a good reason for that...Diesel, if you can figure out how to buy the Hawks from Belkin then you can give Westhead another shot. Your his last hope for a coaching gig.

KB, just because you are a running team doesn't mean you can't play good defense. That is a myth. The reason the Suns don't defend all that well has to do with the fact that they don't have great defenders overall. Raja is good, and the Matrix can do well when he wants to...but when your PG gets beat into the paint on a regular basis it breaks down the defense. Nash is a brilliant offensive player obviously, but his defense isn't bad, its terrible.

I'm not sure where the fallacy began about running teams not playing defense. But it is certainly not valid.

[TroyMcClure]

I'm not sure there is a true fundamental way of playing basketball. You can win with a Big or a Guard. It all depends on your talent. It's not like baseball or football, where the formula for winning is almost scientific. I think you really can outrun your opponents if you are willing and able.

One thing will never change though. It is a lot easier to make a layup than a three. No matter how wide open the three is.

[Diesel]

Wikipedia is not fact!!!!

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That Nugget team averaged almost 120 a game. But they gave up 130 a game . . an NBA record.

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First off, Westhead's coached Denver in 1991 and 1992.

The 1991 team gave up 114 ppg (27th in the league in defense).

Click 1991

The 1992 team gave up 108 ppg (13th in the league in defense)...

Click

Now, you can believe the opinion of some Laker fan about Westhead if you'd like, but it's not factual. Do your research if you don't know.

Secondly, 13th in the league tells me that Westhead was not some defensiveless coach. In fact, I would say he did a very credible job when he got credible personnell. Like I have said over and over again, Style + Personnell = Wins.

[KB21]

You mentioned Shawn Kemp, and there are a lot of similarities between his game and Josh Smith's game at this point. Shawn Kemp wasn't a great back to the basket player when he first got into the league. He was more of an open floor athletic type that did a lot based on his athleticism. He eventually became a better inside player offensively and defensively. Kemp was also around 6'9", 240 lbs, which is about the same size as Josh.

They had Gary Payton at point guard, which is clearly something the Hawks do not have. Gary Payton was the defensive catalyst to that team, and he made the offense go. He wasn't the typical point guard that would set everyone up, though he could do it. He was a point guard that had the impressive size and scoring skills to isolate himself and set up mismatches whether it was on the perimeter or in the post. Gary Payton got the nickname "The Glove" because of his defense though. Watching him and Shawn Kemp on the fast break when Gary would force a turnover was a thing of beauty.

When George Karl got that job, he started out having Derek McKey at the small forward position and after a couple of years had Detlef Schrempf at the small forward position. The commonality between the two where that they were unselfish and very good passers on offense and they gave great effort on defense.

Sam Perkins was the starting center for the most part despite being 6'9" tall. He was a great jump shooter and a solid defender for the defensive style that team ran.

Those Sonics teams had the consummate defensive roles players coming off the bench as well. Nate McMillan and Michael Cage were very good defenders off the bench, especially in the half court set. Nate McMillan was a player that could play anywhere from the point guard to the small forward position.

The point is though, those teams stressed defense. Bob Kloppenberg initiated his trapping style of defense, and George Karl ran with it when he took over.

[KB21]

Which is why I bring up the Seattle Supersonics of the early '90s.

I never said that up tempo teams do not play defense. I said that unless we can prove to play consistent defense, we need to pick and choose when we go up tempo.

I mention the Sonics because of their full court pressing style of defense. To me, that's what up tempo is all about. You use your defense to create turnovers and fast break opportunities. You use your rebounding prowess to start fast breaks with long kick out passes. The key is getting yourself back into a position to defend or defending the full court with tenacity.

I've seen what going up tempo has done to the Memphis Grizzlies. They are not a good team and weren't a good defensive team before Mike got fired, but they have been downright horrible defensively since then. I think they have given up over 100 points in every game since Mike's firing, and they are no better now than they were then. Like us, they had a lot of fans that believed they should be running more, but Mike told them back in December that the team couldn't run because they couldn't do it and defend at the same time. Mike was right, and that is my fear about this team going to an all out running style.

As I said though, I'd love to see this team go up tempo with its defense. We've got enough long and athletic players to adapt to a full court, trapping style of defense.

[TexasPete]

Magic Johnson has never been known as a malcontent but he wanted Westhead out, as did most of the showtime Lakers. The NBA has always been a league where coaches get fired from one job and hired in another. Its a league of retreads and always has been. Westhead has a ring and only got one more quick chance. The list of coaches who have rings and are available is a short list. Westhead is not up for a HC job and won't get one...apparently, the powers that be have a different view than Diesel.

Westhead was a guy in the right place at the right time. And the Laker organization, led by a top 5 all time player, felt he was holding them back. They went on to win multiple rings without the coach. Apparently, he wasn't that important to the team success. Riley is 10x better than Westhead. Nuff said.

[TroyMcClure]

I hesitate to call any coach that leads a team to a title an idiot, but you do several times. It's not very funny either. I presume you think it is. You may be right, but he has accomplished a few thing in his career. He is an innovator. I'll take his gimmick over Woody any day of the week.