Posted by tomverve:

So we have Steph sabotaging the team by not being aggressive enough at times; last night apparently Nate was deemed to do the same; Crawford for long stretches this season did nothing but dribble the ball up court and pass it off passively to someone else; and Francis, who's looked just terrible as a Knick, is saying to the press that he needs to get his "swagger" back.

So all of our point guards are collectively attempting to sabotage the system, obviously. Or maybe Larry Brown, famously hard on his point guards, has something to do with each and every instance of our points playing like zombies at various parts of the season.

This is not all Larry Brown's mess, but it's clear as day to me that a lot of our PG troubles are due to an incompatibility between the coach and the players. That is not necessarily an indictment on either the players or the coach. Maybe it's just a bad match through and through for two different parties who both have their respective strengths and weaknesses. But whatever it is, I don't think you can pin this on the players only and say they're "quitting" or trying to subvert the team, anymore than you can say Larry Brown is "quitting" and trying to subvert the team.

The fact that this has happened with *every* point guard on our roster, though, strongly indicates that Larry Brown very much has had a hand in our various episodes of PG malaise throughout the season. It's too simple minded to claim that it's all Brown's fault, or it's all the players' fault.

[Edited by - tomverve on 04-05-2006 4:39 PM]

It's everyone's fault, enough pointing fingers but I will say this.Steph has never been out of the first round of the playoffs. Francis may have once. not sure. Jamal never. Nate is a rookie. Apparently with this lack of success all their coach's must have been too hard on them.

Enough of this. LB was just in the finals 2 years in a row, saying that the league has outgrown his methods is typical fan, sad over-reaction. We need him in NY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! We have catered to losers for 7 years. Enough is a god-darn nough. Why are there so few here who are sick of listening to millionaires make excuses for why they are not playing hard?????????????????? If Q had said he can't play hard today because his finger hurts would you cut him slack? Of course not. If the players want to carry some weight against LB. Do two things. Shut up and play!!!! Until you can play hard on a consistent basis I don't want to hear anything you have to say.

Posted by nyk4ever:

If it's not evident to everyone yet then I don't know when it ever will be. The players that need to be brought in here this offseason are character players who are about whats best for the team before whats best for themself. Guys like Steph, Stevie, Nate all need to go becuase they will NEVER make it on this team if they can't scale back on their games to make the rest of the team better. EVER.

The funny thing is ... the team Zeke inherited would be an LB type team.

Posted by Bippity10:

It's everyone's fault, enough pointing fingers but I will say this.Steph has never been out of the first round of the playoffs. Francis may have once. not sure. Jamal never. Nate is a rookie. Apparently with this lack of success all their coach's must have been too hard on them.

Or maybe the teams they've been on haven't been good enough to get good playoff seeding (if they got it at all), entailing first round matchups with the best of the best when they do get in, thus early exits. I never fail to be astounded with how ubiquitous this fallacy of equating player success with team success is.

Kevin Garnett has been a loser all his career, except for that one magic season where he put it together and became a winner, right?-- and oh yeah, he also just happened to have a great supporting cast that one year. But that was just a coincidence.

Then single out those things in particular if you feel they are accurate representations of what is wrong Steph and co. At least that would constitute a legit gripe with the players, assuming it was true. But the old line about player X being a failure because of never making it out of the round Y of the playoffs is just bunk.