martin wrote:

Marv wrote:

BRIGGS wrote:

unstopaball12 wrote:point guard is the most important position in his system and rubio i believe would be the best bet(if minnesota wins the lottery and lands john wall). He has good defensive instincts and is a magician with the ball. Not only will rubio solve our problems in the backcourt he saves us money. by getting him we wont run after felton, livingston or ridnour nand offer 4-8 million of capspace

That s all and good but if we dont put defense as a priority--we will not win championships or in our case win 41 games.

we will never put defense as a priority with mda coaching. maybe we should accept this and drop the "if's" from these statements.

i am trying to wrestle with this type of assessment. For the most part, we all know MDA's history with his PHO team; none of us have really tried to draw any type of conclusions from his many multiple Euro league wins (was it SSOL with no D? or SSOL with masterful D?), for better or worse.

If we take Riley and JVG snapshots of their time in NY, we could come to the conclusion for both of these coaches didnt know how to run up on offensive play, as demonstrated by their lack of offense and emphasis on defense. Generally speaking, both JVG and Riley emphasized what their personnel excelled in, namely defense, while eking out the best they could on the other end. Can we say that the coaches didn't know how to coach on the offensive end or that they focused on getting the best out of what their players were good at? Seems like Riley throws off the theory that he didn't know how to coach a team that could put up points - LA Lakers and whatnot - so why couldn't he make the Knicks a better offensive team?

During MDA's coaching reign in PHO, did he EVER have a defensive center to put next to Amare? Was this his fault or the GMs? Also, we know that 2 of his main cogs were Amare and Nash. Were either of those guys known as defensive players? Are they today? I'd say No and No. 2 out of 5 and nary a defensive presence at the center position. Steven Hunter, Lampe, Bo Outlaw, Thomas, Pat Burke, Brian Grant. That's who MDA had to work with.

AND, to top it off, MDA's teams were battling against perhaps the 2 most dominant centers of all time: Shaq and Tim Duncan.

Was this a bad defensive coach or a coach who just didn't have the pieces to play with?

My belief is that he feels that if his offensive system is run correctly then it will just take adequate, average defense to produce a win. I think he’s inherently much more interested in coaching offense than defense, and that he believes a superior offensive scheme will produce more for him than an emphasized defensive one.

I also believe that if he had superior defensive players who didn’t play offeanse the way he wanted – he wouldn’t play them.

I think he’s an offensive coach specialist. That’s what he brings to the dance, it’s made him millions and millions of dollars, and that’s what he’s going to go with. I couldn’t envision him being a defensive coach if you gave him a team of all-nba defenders.

Marv wrote:

martin wrote:

Marv wrote:

BRIGGS wrote:

unstopaball12 wrote:point guard is the most important position in his system and rubio i believe would be the best bet(if minnesota wins the lottery and lands john wall). He has good defensive instincts and is a magician with the ball. Not only will rubio solve our problems in the backcourt he saves us money. by getting him we wont run after felton, livingston or ridnour nand offer 4-8 million of capspace

That s all and good but if we dont put defense as a priority--we will not win championships or in our case win 41 games.

we will never put defense as a priority with mda coaching. maybe we should accept this and drop the "if's" from these statements.

i am trying to wrestle with this type of assessment. For the most part, we all know MDA's history with his PHO team; none of us have really tried to draw any type of conclusions from his many multiple Euro league wins (was it SSOL with no D? or SSOL with masterful D?), for better or worse.

If we take Riley and JVG snapshots of their time in NY, we could come to the conclusion for both of these coaches didnt know how to run up on offensive play, as demonstrated by their lack of offense and emphasis on defense. Generally speaking, both JVG and Riley emphasized what their personnel excelled in, namely defense, while eking out the best they could on the other end. Can we say that the coaches didn't know how to coach on the offensive end or that they focused on getting the best out of what their players were good at? Seems like Riley throws off the theory that he didn't know how to coach a team that could put up points - LA Lakers and whatnot - so why couldn't he make the Knicks a better offensive team?

During MDA's coaching reign in PHO, did he EVER have a defensive center to put next to Amare? Was this his fault or the GMs? Also, we know that 2 of his main cogs were Amare and Nash. Were either of those guys known as defensive players? Are they today? I'd say No and No. 2 out of 5 and nary a defensive presence at the center position. Steven Hunter, Lampe, Bo Outlaw, Thomas, Pat Burke, Brian Grant. That's who MDA had to work with.

AND, to top it off, MDA's teams were battling against perhaps the 2 most dominant centers of all time: Shaq and Tim Duncan.

Was this a bad defensive coach or a coach who just didn't have the pieces to play with?

My belief is that he feels that if his offensive system is run correctly then it will just take adequate, average defense to produce a win. I think he’s inherently much more interested in coaching offense than defense, and that he believes a superior offensive scheme will produce more for him than an emphasized defensive one.

I also believe that if he had superior defensive players who didn’t play offeanse the way he wanted – he wouldn’t play them.

I think he’s an offensive coach specialist. That’s what he brings to the dance, it’s made him millions and millions of dollars, and that’s what he’s going to go with. I couldn’t envision him being a defensive coach if you gave him a team of all-nba defenders.

You could have said that of Riley after he finished coaching the Lakers too, right?

Marv wrote:

martin wrote:

Marv wrote:

martin wrote:

Marv wrote:

BRIGGS wrote:

unstopaball12 wrote:point guard is the most important position in his system and rubio i believe would be the best bet(if minnesota wins the lottery and lands john wall). He has good defensive instincts and is a magician with the ball. Not only will rubio solve our problems in the backcourt he saves us money. by getting him we wont run after felton, livingston or ridnour nand offer 4-8 million of capspace

That s all and good but if we dont put defense as a priority--we will not win championships or in our case win 41 games.

we will never put defense as a priority with mda coaching. maybe we should accept this and drop the "if's" from these statements.

i am trying to wrestle with this type of assessment. For the most part, we all know MDA's history with his PHO team; none of us have really tried to draw any type of conclusions from his many multiple Euro league wins (was it SSOL with no D? or SSOL with masterful D?), for better or worse.

If we take Riley and JVG snapshots of their time in NY, we could come to the conclusion for both of these coaches didnt know how to run up on offensive play, as demonstrated by their lack of offense and emphasis on defense. Generally speaking, both JVG and Riley emphasized what their personnel excelled in, namely defense, while eking out the best they could on the other end. Can we say that the coaches didn't know how to coach on the offensive end or that they focused on getting the best out of what their players were good at? Seems like Riley throws off the theory that he didn't know how to coach a team that could put up points - LA Lakers and whatnot - so why couldn't he make the Knicks a better offensive team?

During MDA's coaching reign in PHO, did he EVER have a defensive center to put next to Amare? Was this his fault or the GMs? Also, we know that 2 of his main cogs were Amare and Nash. Were either of those guys known as defensive players? Are they today? I'd say No and No. 2 out of 5 and nary a defensive presence at the center position. Steven Hunter, Lampe, Bo Outlaw, Thomas, Pat Burke, Brian Grant. That's who MDA had to work with.

AND, to top it off, MDA's teams were battling against perhaps the 2 most dominant centers of all time: Shaq and Tim Duncan.

Was this a bad defensive coach or a coach who just didn't have the pieces to play with?

My belief is that he feels that if his offensive system is run correctly then it will just take adequate, average defense to produce a win. I think he’s inherently much more interested in coaching offense than defense, and that he believes a superior offensive scheme will produce more for him than an emphasized defensive one.

I also believe that if he had superior defensive players who didn’t play offeanse the way he wanted – he wouldn’t play them.

I think he’s an offensive coach specialist. That’s what he brings to the dance, it’s made him millions and millions of dollars, and that’s what he’s going to go with. I couldn’t envision him being a defensive coach if you gave him a team of all-nba defenders.

You could have said that of Riley after he finished coaching the Lakers too, right?

yes you could have and he would have put it to rest after game 1 of coaching the knicks. riley didn’t try to recreate showtime when he saw what he had here.

mda came here and tried to replicate phoenix without the offensive players to do it. that system was based on outscoring the opponent with a faster and more efficient offense. So that’s what he went for here instead of trying to make up for offensive deficiencies by balancing out with an equal emphasis on D.

didn't MDA put it to rest after game 10?

Marv wrote:

martin wrote:

Marv wrote:

martin wrote:

Marv wrote:

martin wrote:

Marv wrote:

BRIGGS wrote:

unstopaball12 wrote:point guard is the most important position in his system and rubio i believe would be the best bet(if minnesota wins the lottery and lands john wall). He has good defensive instincts and is a magician with the ball. Not only will rubio solve our problems in the backcourt he saves us money. by getting him we wont run after felton, livingston or ridnour nand offer 4-8 million of capspace

That s all and good but if we dont put defense as a priority--we will not win championships or in our case win 41 games.

we will never put defense as a priority with mda coaching. maybe we should accept this and drop the "if's" from these statements.

i am trying to wrestle with this type of assessment. For the most part, we all know MDA's history with his PHO team; none of us have really tried to draw any type of conclusions from his many multiple Euro league wins (was it SSOL with no D? or SSOL with masterful D?), for better or worse.

If we take Riley and JVG snapshots of their time in NY, we could come to the conclusion for both of these coaches didnt know how to run up on offensive play, as demonstrated by their lack of offense and emphasis on defense. Generally speaking, both JVG and Riley emphasized what their personnel excelled in, namely defense, while eking out the best they could on the other end. Can we say that the coaches didn't know how to coach on the offensive end or that they focused on getting the best out of what their players were good at? Seems like Riley throws off the theory that he didn't know how to coach a team that could put up points - LA Lakers and whatnot - so why couldn't he make the Knicks a better offensive team?

During MDA's coaching reign in PHO, did he EVER have a defensive center to put next to Amare? Was this his fault or the GMs? Also, we know that 2 of his main cogs were Amare and Nash. Were either of those guys known as defensive players? Are they today? I'd say No and No. 2 out of 5 and nary a defensive presence at the center position. Steven Hunter, Lampe, Bo Outlaw, Thomas, Pat Burke, Brian Grant. That's who MDA had to work with.

AND, to top it off, MDA's teams were battling against perhaps the 2 most dominant centers of all time: Shaq and Tim Duncan.

Was this a bad defensive coach or a coach who just didn't have the pieces to play with?

My belief is that he feels that if his offensive system is run correctly then it will just take adequate, average defense to produce a win. I think he’s inherently much more interested in coaching offense than defense, and that he believes a superior offensive scheme will produce more for him than an emphasized defensive one.

I also believe that if he had superior defensive players who didn’t play offeanse the way he wanted – he wouldn’t play them.

I think he’s an offensive coach specialist. That’s what he brings to the dance, it’s made him millions and millions of dollars, and that’s what he’s going to go with. I couldn’t envision him being a defensive coach if you gave him a team of all-nba defenders.

You could have said that of Riley after he finished coaching the Lakers too, right?

yes you could have and he would have put it to rest after game 1 of coaching the knicks. riley didn’t try to recreate showtime when he saw what he had here.

mda came here and tried to replicate phoenix without the offensive players to do it. that system was based on outscoring the opponent with a faster and more efficient offense. So that’s what he went for here instead of trying to make up for offensive deficiencies by balancing out with an equal emphasis on D.

didn't MDA put it to rest after game 10?

how so?

i thought i remember d'antoni saying he scrapped the SSOL after like 10 games because Duhon couldn't run it.

Marv wrote:and then did exactly what with coaching defense? that's the whole point of this discussion.

Marv, you are assuming that there were players that COULD play defense, which was the point of me bringing up offense with Riley during the Ewing years - they didn't play it even though their coach could obviously implement it.

martin wrote:

Marv wrote:and then did exactly what with coaching defense? that's the whole point of this discussion.

Marv, you are assuming that there were players that COULD play defense, which was the point of me bringing up offense with Riley during the Ewing years - they didn't play it even though their coach could obviously implement it.

for me, the equivalent with d'antoni would have been reigning in the 3's (which i don’t think he did) and emphasizing defense more (which i don't think he did). that's why i'm saying in this thread that the question is still on the table about whether d'antoini CAN change his approach, while riley answered the question immediately upon his arrival in ny. You can say that riley had the defensive players to answer that question with – I say that mda has not done anything here to show that he’s capable of addressing defense and improving it one iota or show that he’s putting any emphasis on it to try to compensate for an inadequate offense.

What do you see that he’s done to show it?

Marv wrote:

nyk4ever wrote:

Marv wrote:

nyk4ever wrote:

Marv wrote:

martin wrote:

Marv wrote:

martin wrote:

Marv wrote:

martin wrote:

Marv wrote:

BRIGGS wrote:

unstopaball12 wrote:point guard is the most important position in his system and rubio i believe would be the best bet(if minnesota wins the lottery and lands john wall). He has good defensive instincts and is a magician with the ball. Not only will rubio solve our problems in the backcourt he saves us money. by getting him we wont run after felton, livingston or ridnour nand offer 4-8 million of capspace

That s all and good but if we dont put defense as a priority--we will not win championships or in our case win 41 games.

we will never put defense as a priority with mda coaching. maybe we should accept this and drop the "if's" from these statements.

i am trying to wrestle with this type of assessment. For the most part, we all know MDA's history with his PHO team; none of us have really tried to draw any type of conclusions from his many multiple Euro league wins (was it SSOL with no D? or SSOL with masterful D?), for better or worse.

If we take Riley and JVG snapshots of their time in NY, we could come to the conclusion for both of these coaches didnt know how to run up on offensive play, as demonstrated by their lack of offense and emphasis on defense. Generally speaking, both JVG and Riley emphasized what their personnel excelled in, namely defense, while eking out the best they could on the other end. Can we say that the coaches didn't know how to coach on the offensive end or that they focused on getting the best out of what their players were good at? Seems like Riley throws off the theory that he didn't know how to coach a team that could put up points - LA Lakers and whatnot - so why couldn't he make the Knicks a better offensive team?

During MDA's coaching reign in PHO, did he EVER have a defensive center to put next to Amare? Was this his fault or the GMs? Also, we know that 2 of his main cogs were Amare and Nash. Were either of those guys known as defensive players? Are they today? I'd say No and No. 2 out of 5 and nary a defensive presence at the center position. Steven Hunter, Lampe, Bo Outlaw, Thomas, Pat Burke, Brian Grant. That's who MDA had to work with.

AND, to top it off, MDA's teams were battling against perhaps the 2 most dominant centers of all time: Shaq and Tim Duncan.

Was this a bad defensive coach or a coach who just didn't have the pieces to play with?

My belief is that he feels that if his offensive system is run correctly then it will just take adequate, average defense to produce a win. I think he’s inherently much more interested in coaching offense than defense, and that he believes a superior offensive scheme will produce more for him than an emphasized defensive one.

I also believe that if he had superior defensive players who didn’t play offeanse the way he wanted – he wouldn’t play them.

I think he’s an offensive coach specialist. That’s what he brings to the dance, it’s made him millions and millions of dollars, and that’s what he’s going to go with. I couldn’t envision him being a defensive coach if you gave him a team of all-nba defenders.

You could have said that of Riley after he finished coaching the Lakers too, right?

yes you could have and he would have put it to rest after game 1 of coaching the knicks. riley didn’t try to recreate showtime when he saw what he had here.

mda came here and tried to replicate phoenix without the offensive players to do it. that system was based on outscoring the opponent with a faster and more efficient offense. So that’s what he went for here instead of trying to make up for offensive deficiencies by balancing out with an equal emphasis on D.

didn't MDA put it to rest after game 10?

how so?

i thought i remember d'antoni saying he scrapped the SSOL after like 10 games because Duhon couldn't run it.

and then did exactly what with coaching defense? that's the whole point of this discussion.

how come d'antoni played jeffries so much though? i mean he's clearly not the type of offensive player that he usually plays so what was his point in playing him if he didn't atleast care about the d? who else on this team is really going to anchor down and play d? maybe douglass and gallo that's it? i saw them both playing real solid d all year long too.

td showed at the beginning of the season that he was the team's best defender. he then got sat for the majority of the season.

while yes i agree he did show to be the teams best defender and he did sit for extended periods, but who knows what that had to deal with. probably the same reason hill was sitting. jeffries is an awful offensive player and d'antoni started him and played him 30mins a game becuase he was the defensive anchor.

nyk4ever wrote:

Marv wrote:

nyk4ever wrote:

Marv wrote:

nyk4ever wrote:

Marv wrote:

martin wrote:

Marv wrote:

martin wrote:

Marv wrote:

martin wrote:

Marv wrote:

BRIGGS wrote:

unstopaball12 wrote:point guard is the most important position in his system and rubio i believe would be the best bet(if minnesota wins the lottery and lands john wall). He has good defensive instincts and is a magician with the ball. Not only will rubio solve our problems in the backcourt he saves us money. by getting him we wont run after felton, livingston or ridnour nand offer 4-8 million of capspace

That s all and good but if we dont put defense as a priority--we will not win championships or in our case win 41 games.

we will never put defense as a priority with mda coaching. maybe we should accept this and drop the "if's" from these statements.

i am trying to wrestle with this type of assessment. For the most part, we all know MDA's history with his PHO team; none of us have really tried to draw any type of conclusions from his many multiple Euro league wins (was it SSOL with no D? or SSOL with masterful D?), for better or worse.

If we take Riley and JVG snapshots of their time in NY, we could come to the conclusion for both of these coaches didnt know how to run up on offensive play, as demonstrated by their lack of offense and emphasis on defense. Generally speaking, both JVG and Riley emphasized what their personnel excelled in, namely defense, while eking out the best they could on the other end. Can we say that the coaches didn't know how to coach on the offensive end or that they focused on getting the best out of what their players were good at? Seems like Riley throws off the theory that he didn't know how to coach a team that could put up points - LA Lakers and whatnot - so why couldn't he make the Knicks a better offensive team?

During MDA's coaching reign in PHO, did he EVER have a defensive center to put next to Amare? Was this his fault or the GMs? Also, we know that 2 of his main cogs were Amare and Nash. Were either of those guys known as defensive players? Are they today? I'd say No and No. 2 out of 5 and nary a defensive presence at the center position. Steven Hunter, Lampe, Bo Outlaw, Thomas, Pat Burke, Brian Grant. That's who MDA had to work with.

AND, to top it off, MDA's teams were battling against perhaps the 2 most dominant centers of all time: Shaq and Tim Duncan.

Was this a bad defensive coach or a coach who just didn't have the pieces to play with?

My belief is that he feels that if his offensive system is run correctly then it will just take adequate, average defense to produce a win. I think he’s inherently much more interested in coaching offense than defense, and that he believes a superior offensive scheme will produce more for him than an emphasized defensive one.

I also believe that if he had superior defensive players who didn’t play offeanse the way he wanted – he wouldn’t play them.

I think he’s an offensive coach specialist. That’s what he brings to the dance, it’s made him millions and millions of dollars, and that’s what he’s going to go with. I couldn’t envision him being a defensive coach if you gave him a team of all-nba defenders.

You could have said that of Riley after he finished coaching the Lakers too, right?

yes you could have and he would have put it to rest after game 1 of coaching the knicks. riley didn’t try to recreate showtime when he saw what he had here.

mda came here and tried to replicate phoenix without the offensive players to do it. that system was based on outscoring the opponent with a faster and more efficient offense. So that’s what he went for here instead of trying to make up for offensive deficiencies by balancing out with an equal emphasis on D.

didn't MDA put it to rest after game 10?

how so?

i thought i remember d'antoni saying he scrapped the SSOL after like 10 games because Duhon couldn't run it.

and then did exactly what with coaching defense? that's the whole point of this discussion.

how come d'antoni played jeffries so much though? i mean he's clearly not the type of offensive player that he usually plays so what was his point in playing him if he didn't atleast care about the d? who else on this team is really going to anchor down and play d? maybe douglass and gallo that's it? i saw them both playing real solid d all year long too.

td showed at the beginning of the season that he was the team's best defender. he then got sat for the majority of the season.

while yes i agree he did show to be the teams best defender and he did sit for extended periods, but who knows what that had to deal with. probably the same reason hill was sitting. jeffries is an awful offensive player and d'antoni started him and played him 30mins a game becuase he was the defensive anchor.

hill got sat because he was the BAD rookie so it couldn't have been that.

if mda's one nod to defense was playing jared jeffries then i question whether that qualifies for demonstrating any valuing of D or any ability to coach it.