dk7th wrote:once he got to the pros amare was only ever as good as the pick and roll point guard playing with him. guys who dominate at lower echelons of basketball often arrive lopsided when they reach the nba. high school coaches don't need to teach or push players like stoudemire. why work on other aspects of the game of basketball when you dominate already as it is? what coach is going to push amare to learn to defend? why learn how to actually play defense when you can push around or block smaller and slower and less athletic competition? he started playing ball only at 14 and then had two high school years. he's a classic "conveyor belt" player.

he shouldn't be castigated for simply speaking the truth. i wonder how much the goggles impair his peripheral vision.

One of the weakest arguments in support of where he's at today....

Let me throw a list of names at you...

Kevin Garnett

Kobe Bryant

Jermaine O'Neal

Lebron James

Andrew Bynum

Dwight Howard

Josh Smith

All guys who came into the league as babies with physical talents head and shoulders above the rest but guess what as good as any of them are offensively all of them showed signs of being great defensive players early in their careers and it wasn't all about who was and wasn't coaching them. It's who they are/were from the start, although some of them raw in the beginning like Amar'e...... once they figured the league out they took off from there. They didn't wait until their 10th 11th yr to start committing and focusing on D scapegoating coaching.

smackeddog wrote:

3G4G wrote:

CrushAlot wrote:

“It was taken out of context,’’ Stoudemire said at today’s morning shootaround at Amway Center. “It wasn’t meant to be as exaggerated as it was. For the simple fact: Woodson is a defensive coach. He’s known to be a defensive coach. So his strategies he’s teaching me now is different from what I learned before. He puts a lot of emphasis on the defensive end – more than I ever had before. It wasn’t a knock on any of my previous coaches. I had great success with Coach D’Antoni. He had to be doing something right because we won many games. It was more a complement to Coach Woodson.’’

Read more: Stoudemire says he meant no harm to D'Antoni with 'defense' comments http://www.nypost.com/p/blogs/knicksblog/stoudemire_meant_no_harm_to_antoni_4ylKmBLO7Hvs759WAP0mrO#ixzz2H7fo9kFv

Backpedaling something fierce now. Doesn't know how to talk to the press after all the seasons in the league?

After a season and a half being coached by Woodson, he's still no good at it....making a couple hustle plays past couple of games doesn't account for his overall ineptitude on D. Matter of fact he still missed more defensive assignments than made since coming back. It's not like Amar'e has never had a few games over the past 1 year and a half where he blocked shots or got steals or boxed out but nothing has even been remotely consistent with him though. This is more about him being exposed not giving the proper effort than not being taught any defensive principles. Everyone on this team for the most part puts forth decent effort to play D, although the past 3weeks we haven't been playing well together as a team defensively. Injuries and minutes played could be a factor for some but no excuses allowed anymore enough is enough.

Your desperation to be negative and critical leads you to blatantly skewering basic facts. Amar'e played about 15 games under Woody as head coach last season, and has played a total of about 36 mins this season, but yeah, carry on pretending he's played one and a half to two seasons under him!

No more excuses? He hasn't played a proper game in 8months- you've given him 36 minutes to become an elite defender? Hilarious.

Once again you learn defensive principles without having to be on the floor.

Like how to guard PNR

Like how to protect paint off dribble penetration

Like how to protect weakside

Like how to play position D

Like how to box out

Like when to play a zone and when not

Like when to provide a double team and when not

All these things can be learned in practice and during film study. So are you saying a player like Duncan and Kobe only learned to be good at shooting bank shots by playing real games under their coaches or did they learn this skillset offline from real games? Give me a break to is such a Farce of an excuse.

The only variable here when actually executing the defensive principles and schemes is learning opponents physical speed/strengths and the sets they like to run offensively. Amar'e has been in the league for a decade now he knows a lot more about other opponents than most coaches or at least he should because he's actually played the games against such players and not sitting in a suit tie from the bench barking orders.

Pablo has never played in the NBA and had very little exposure to Woody as a coach but Pablo has always played solid D from day 1 since being on this team

3G4G wrote:

smackeddog wrote:

3G4G wrote:

CrushAlot wrote:

“It was taken out of context,’’ Stoudemire said at today’s morning shootaround at Amway Center. “It wasn’t meant to be as exaggerated as it was. For the simple fact: Woodson is a defensive coach. He’s known to be a defensive coach. So his strategies he’s teaching me now is different from what I learned before. He puts a lot of emphasis on the defensive end – more than I ever had before. It wasn’t a knock on any of my previous coaches. I had great success with Coach D’Antoni. He had to be doing something right because we won many games. It was more a complement to Coach Woodson.’’

Read more: Stoudemire says he meant no harm to D'Antoni with 'defense' comments http://www.nypost.com/p/blogs/knicksblog/stoudemire_meant_no_harm_to_antoni_4ylKmBLO7Hvs759WAP0mrO#ixzz2H7fo9kFv

Backpedaling something fierce now. Doesn't know how to talk to the press after all the seasons in the league?

After a season and a half being coached by Woodson, he's still no good at it....making a couple hustle plays past couple of games doesn't account for his overall ineptitude on D. Matter of fact he still missed more defensive assignments than made since coming back. It's not like Amar'e has never had a few games over the past 1 year and a half where he blocked shots or got steals or boxed out but nothing has even been remotely consistent with him though. This is more about him being exposed not giving the proper effort than not being taught any defensive principles. Everyone on this team for the most part puts forth decent effort to play D, although the past 3weeks we haven't been playing well together as a team defensively. Injuries and minutes played could be a factor for some but no excuses allowed anymore enough is enough.

Your desperation to be negative and critical leads you to blatantly skewering basic facts. Amar'e played about 15 games under Woody as head coach last season, and has played a total of about 36 mins this season, but yeah, carry on pretending he's played one and a half to two seasons under him!

No more excuses? He hasn't played a proper game in 8months- you've given him 36 minutes to become an elite defender? Hilarious.

Once again you learn defensive principles without having to be on the floor.

Like how to guard PNR

Like how to protect paint off dribble penetration

Like how to protect weakside

Like how to play position D

Like how to box out

Like when to play a zone and when not

Like when to provide a double team and when not

All these things can be learned in practice and during film study. So are you saying a player like Duncan and Kobe only learned to be good at shooting bank shots by playing real games under their coaches or did they learn this skillset offline from real games? Give me a break to is such a Farce of an excuse.

The only variable here when actually executing the defensive principles and schemes is learning opponents physical speed/strengths and the sets they like to run offensively. Amar'e has been in the league for a decade now he knows a lot more about other opponents than most coaches or at least he should because he's actually played the games against such players and not sitting in a suit tie from the bench barking orders.

Pablo has never played in the NBA and had very little exposure to Woody as a coach but Pablo has always played solid D from day 1 since being on this team

3G4G wrote:

dk7th wrote:

3G4G wrote:

dk7th wrote:once he got to the pros amare was only ever as good as the pick and roll point guard playing with him. guys who dominate at lower echelons of basketball often arrive lopsided when they reach the nba. high school coaches don't need to teach or push players like stoudemire. why work on other aspects of the game of basketball when you dominate already as it is? what coach is going to push amare to learn to defend? why learn how to actually play defense when you can push around or block smaller and slower and less athletic competition? he started playing ball only at 14 and then had two high school years. he's a classic "conveyor belt" player.

he shouldn't be castigated for simply speaking the truth. i wonder how much the goggles impair his peripheral vision.

One of the weakest arguments in support of where he's at today....

Let me throw a list of names at you...

Kevin Garnett

Kobe Bryant

Jermaine O'Neal

Lebron James

Andrew Bynum

Dwight Howard

Josh Smith

All guys who came into the league as babies with physical talents head and shoulders above the rest but guess what as good as any of them are offensively all of them showed signs of being great defensive players early in their careers and it wasn't all about who was and wasn't coaching them. It's who they are/were from the start, although some of them raw in the beginning like Amar'e...... once they figured the league out they took off from there. They didn't wait until their 10th 11th yr to start committing and focusing on D scapegoating coaching.

every one you list started playing at a much younger age than stoudemire and all played 4 years of high school ball. stoudemire didn't pick up a ball until 14 and played 2 years of basketball.

perhaps this is a good place to mention that stoudemire's footwork in general substandard and his court vision is almost non-existent. kind of tough to find open teammates and rotate on defense when you can't see peripherally.

anyway what i am saying is that he came to the game relatively late, perhaps too late to have genuine fundamentals cultivated. i am a firm believer in fundamentals and he lacks them. there is, however, no substitute for will and desire and hustle.

Poor excuse of when he started playing basketball because as late as he started he knew how to play offense right? Well he could have learned and taught himself defense.

Go look when Samuel Dalembert started playing basketball I think he didn't start until age 19. Very good defensive big in Philly. Yao Ming another foreigner who had no understanding of our language or NBA style of play his learning curve was rapid both sides of the ball.

Amar'e has natural physical tools that maybe only 1% of NBA athletes possess at least early on he did, that in of itself is what should have allowed him to be great defensively not in case you're lumping Amar'e into the mental midget category?

low basketball iq? yes stoudemire is not a smart player... is that news? lets not forget another thing about defense: (1) instinct, which stoudemire clearly lacks and (2) anticipation through studying the assignment(s) which it seems clear he doesn't do enough.

this is reminding me of when i read Red and Me by Mr. Bill Russell. he was the apotheosis of both instinct and studying the opponent.

but i'm all about going hard on d every time, because even when you fail you get better so that over the long term you lock guys down more than they score on you,