|
Killa4luv
Posts: 27769
Alba Posts: 51
Joined: 6/23/2002
Member: #261
USA
|
Brown hopes to meet with Marbury in L.A.
Sunday, July 31, 2005
BY DAVID WALDSTEIN
Star-Ledger Staff
SOUTHAMPTON, N.Y. -- Point guards are to Larry Brown's teams what gasoline is to engines -- the juice that makes them go.
So the new Knicks coach plans to meet face-to-face with Stephon Marbury next week to begin the process of persuading the talented guard to buy into Brown's basic hoops philosophy, and it seems he will ask Marbury to play two-guard at least some of the time.
Brown is headed out to California to take his son to Michael Jordan's basketball camp in Santa Barbara, and he asked Marbury if could meet him out there. Marbury spends his summers working out in Los Angeles and seems eager to get on the same page with Brown. He telephoned the former Detroit coach a few times already and reached out to Pistons guard Chauncey Billups to find out what's in store for him.
"He spoke with Chauncey and called me the other day," Brown said yesterday at a clinic here called Hoops 4 Hope to benefit youth development in southern Africa. "I told him my schedule and he said he would try to see me out there."
The meeting is an important first step in the new relationship between star player and star coach. Marbury played on Brown's disappointing bronze medal Olympic squad last summer in Athens, and Brown asked Knicks president Isiah Thomas, who was also at yesterday's event, to intercede to get Marbury to accept Brown's style of play.
Brown said he is convinced Marbury is eager to be coached by him. But he would not say if he even considers Marbury a point guard and hinted he may be asked to play a dual role of point and shooting guard next season.
"With Stephon, it's important for a coach to maximize what a player does best," he said. "If we need him to score the ball, hopefully I'll recognize that. If we need him to be a combination of both, we'll explore that."
Brown has very clear ideas of what he wants from his point guards and he will usually ride them mercilessly until they provide it. He considers the point guard the "extension of the coach on the floor," and Billups, who led the Pistons to the 2004 championship, is a great example.
"He's got to make everybody on the team better," Brown said. "Your best player usually ends up with the ball at the end of the clock, so I always think that if you don't have a point guard who doesn't give up the ball early, he doesn't make people better."
Brown was asked if Marbury, who had a marvelous statistical season in 2004-05 with 21.7 points and 8.1 assists per game, made his teammates better. He did not say yes.
"I think he has the ability to do that," Brown said. "I thought his growth in Athens on a daily basis was tremendous. But you've got to know about people's personalities in order to coach them, you've got to know how far you can go in terms of pushing them. But as long as I know somebody wants to be coached and he cares, you've got a heck of a shot. I get that sense about him."
Brown seemed pleased Marbury had called Billups. A marginal player before hooking up with Brown, Billups had his difficulties with the coach early on, but quickly grooved on the coach's mantra and became a leader and a champion by doing so.
"The thing that unnerves me is that is the only questions I get are about Stephon Marbury," Brown said. "They didn't win (only) 33 games because of him, or lose 49. This is a team game, so collectively we've got to figure out a way to get better and it's going to start with defense and sharing the ball, rebounding and playing smart. Everybody's got to do it. If your best player buys in, then you've got a heck of a shot."
Thomas said
he was "comfortable" with his team as presently constructed, but remains on the lookout to improve it. The Knicks have used up their $5 million exception to the salary cap by signing Jerome James, who will be introduced Tuesday at the Garden. So the only way to go now is through a trade, and Thomas didn't sound as if anything was imminent.
"We'll keep beating the bushes," Thomas said. "We've always been in an opportunistic mode. You've always got to be out there seeing who's available and what's going on because no team is perfect."
Brown said
he wants to meet with the members of Herb Williams coaching staff, including Michael Malone, Mark Aguirre and George Glymph, before settling on his staff. He said he wants to bring in his assistants from Detroit, including Dave Hanners and Phil Ford, and that Paul Westphal was also under consideration.
"I want guys who are loyal to me and care about me on our staff," he said. "No way you can do it if everybody is not on the same page."
Brown told
the kids at the camp he thinks the Knicks have a chance to win a championship within the next few years.
"If (the players) play hard, play defense, share the ball and have fun," he said, "we have a chance to win a championship."
There is no way Steph is gonna blow this oppurtunity, no way. |
