they basically said that he's been overly critical of the players in the media and he needs to realize that today's players are more sensitive and that not everybody responds to criticism. some players need to be coddled and encouraged. they mentioned curry as an example.

personally, i grew up with the old school, meaning that i used to catch major asswhoopings from moms. so i don't believe in the coddling and encouragement of grown men playing a game and getting paid millions to do it. if they need to be coddled, then they aren't going to win playoff games for you b/c you need to be assassins to be primetime performers.

what are your views?

I totally agree with you. My dad use to whoop on me when I did something stupid. It is called getting disciplined.

My questions is how come we have cornered the market place for ingrates and prima donnas?

I think in the modern day NBA, coaches need to be a mixture of both - yeah it sucks, but you need to tell guys who have never had college coaching, "hey, I'm trying to make you the best we can be, you succeed, we succeed."

remember when Larry Brown told the media Eddy Curry was the Knicks franchise player and the media went to Eddy and Eddy said, "I'm surprised he woudl say that."? why can't Larry go directly to Eddy and say, "Eddy, you are our franchise, I need you to box out, stay in front of your man and grab some boards." Larry needs to mix in some compliments with his criticism to keep guys working for him. Everyone knows Larry is a great basketball mind, but an abrasive personality. Look at Greg Popovich in SAN. He is one of the most laid back coaches in the league, never calls out a player in the media, compliments his guys, but he's a total hard ass in practice and on the court. Greg learned from Larry, but he seems to be better at player relations. Hey, it's a business and most of Larry's troops are making more than him and have egos. He can't just come in and act like they've never done anything. Treat them with respect. There's no reason you can't treat them with respect and still ask the things he's asking. If they don't do it, bench them, but don't let them know in the NY Post. Let them know face to face.

There's no reason not to.

edit: how would you feel at work if your boss told the company mail man to tell you you weren't doing your job? it's embarassing and it doesn't build trust or respect. obv, I'm outside the situation, but knowing what I know of Larry, if he treated me like that I would have zero respect for him.

[Edited by - crzymdups on 04-19-2006 10:14 PM]

Posted by NYKBocker:

I totally agree with you. My dad use to whoop on me when I did something stupid. It is called getting disciplined.

My questions is how come we have cornered the market place for ingrates and prima donnas?

Yes, Larry should be able to "asswhoop" the players. Preferably in front of the media.

Posted by Killa4luv:

its not one way or the other and its not one size fits all. different guys respond differnetly. Hes being paid 10 mil per to figure that out, and has sucked horribly at it.

this is all truth. Brown is no different than any other over paid under achieving knick.

[Edited by - rvhoss on 04-20-2006 01:02 AM]

Posted by Killa4luv:

its not one way or the other and its not one size fits all. different guys respond differnetly. Hes being paid 10 mil per to figure that out, and has sucked horribly at it.

the problem is that laid back lenny sucked horribly at it also. it comes from within. you have laid back coaches like rick adelman that continue to make playoff apperance after playoff apperance, not to mention advancing. then you got drill sargeants like riles and lb that do the same. none of these coaches changed.

breen said last night that the coach needs his players but sometimes, that's not always possible and would have to "make due" with what he has. in this situation, i don't buy it. he's trying to fix the team and it's losing culture. to do this, he can't change his ways as it's been proven to work before. (i would be saying the same thing if it was nellie, riles, or whomever.) this is how lb coaches and ALWAYS coached. everybody knew that coming in. and that's why isiah repeatedly said that this is "lb's team" and that he AND dolan are behind him...and if you don't want to listen to coach, you're gone. so if some of the players don't respond, that's tough. anybody and everybody can be traded in this league...and sometimes, you take a talent hit to get a better fit. and that's what's gonna happen this summer.

again, this is based on my philosophy that in the grand scheme of things, wins don't matter this year. i know i'm in the minority here but if you believe that, then this season makes sense on many levels.

[Edited by - djsunyc on 04-20-2006 09:51 AM]

i think it's about damn time someone got on these players & held them accountable for their lackadaisical & gutless play on the floor... i'm sick of gutless head coaches like Lenny Wilkens & Don Chaney who refused to call out anyone on this team for underachieving & instead chose to act as the whipping boy for all of the team's ills... LB knows what it takes to win in this league, & he won't settle for anything less than full effort night in & night out... if you can't take that heat, get out of the freakin' kitchen i say.

Hey i'm old school, but when I had my own kids I slightly altered the way I disciplined my kids. I didn't always beat the hell out of them like my parents. I also used different tactics and you know what it worked! What made me change? I was shocked that my oldest son was actually SCARED of me. One day I went to reach out to him and he flinched. I wasn't going to hit him, but he was so fearful that he thought I was. I appeal to my kids conscience and sense of pride and its just as effective. Tho I still let them know that i'm not above physical means, its not the only way to teach them.

LB was a HORRIBLE communicator from all the evidence. I just don't think he ever really liked this team and it showed. The players aren't stupid and they can sense that he didn't like them. You want a coach that the players can be inspired by and who they feel in on their side. LB made it a them and us type scenario. The players on one side and him and his coaches on the other. I like tough coaches, but LB made it too personal all the while saying that it was just coaching. COME ON!

Posted by djsunyc:

Posted by Killa4luv:

its not one way or the other and its not one size fits all. different guys respond differnetly. Hes being paid 10 mil per to figure that out, and has sucked horribly at it.

the problem is that laid back lenny sucked horribly at it also. it comes from within. you have laid back coaches like rick adelman that continue to make playoff apperance after playoff apperance, not to mention advancing. then you got drill sargeants like riles and lb that do the same. none of these coaches changed.

breen said last night that the coach needs his players but sometimes, that's not always possible and would have to "make due" with what he has. in this situation, i don't buy it. he's trying to fix the team and it's losing culture. to do this, he can't change his ways as it's been proven to work before. (i would be saying the same thing if it was nellie, riles, or whomever.) this is how lb coaches and ALWAYS coached. everybody knew that coming in. and that's why isiah repeatedly said that this is "lb's team" and that he AND dolan are behind him...and if you don't want to listen to coach, you're gone. so if some of the players don't respond, that's tough. anybody and everybody can be traded in this league...and sometimes, you take a talent hit to get a better fit. and that's what's gonna happen this summer.

again, this is based on my philosophy that in the grand scheme of things, wins don't matter this year. i know i'm in the minority here but if you believe that, then this season makes sense on many levels.

[Edited by - djsunyc on 04-20-2006 09:51 AM]

you never run out of ways to apologize for LB's actions.....he should hire you. NO, really. If some of the players don't respond......NONE of the players responded. When you have AD the ****ing 37 year old president of the players association speaking out against him, there is a problem. Wins don't matter if we have accomplished something else, which we definitely have not. But if this take makes you feel better about being a season ticket holder, so be it. How exactly did he fix the team and their losing culture? Alienating players, mindless rotations and lineups? HOw?

LB did a bad job here, the culture hasn't changed and I don't see how anything he did has helped it to change. Maybe Crawfords trade value is higher now, but outside of that I don't see it. him saying "I've got to do a better job" is not enough. He's actually got to do a better job and he has not.

Posted by djsunyc:

lb did do a bad job here. i agree 100%.

but any other coach...and it would still be just as ****ty under the guise of a few more wins. but in reality, it would just be spinning wheels and we'd be right back to where we were. if lenny could get usurped for letting them play to their "strengths", so can anybody else.

but i disagree about the culture not changing. you think clyde + breen, on their home network, would've ever said that there are players on this team that are not playing hard and have settled b/c "they got their money"? that's a big first step.

everything you say about the lineups, the rotations, i agree with. i'm not defending that at all.

but i agree with bip when he says it goes beyond lb. but lb has been like this before he got here. isiah KNEW that before he hired him.

so killa, why don't you start some "let's get rid of isiah" threads because according to you, he F'ed up ANOTHER coaching hire.

I think Isiah has made some mistakes. I don't think hiring LB was a mistake in this way. No one on this earth thought we shouldn't get him, and no one, not even islesfan thought we would be this bad, so hindsight is 20/20. Find me anyone anywhere who thought hiring LB was a mistake, and that we would win less than 30 games. But the concensus among us all was that we would be better. Lenny Wilkens, was a clear mistake in my mind, I never liked it from the onset, this guy was retired and just because he's from BK and won the most means nothing. He hadn't won in years, there wasn't enough of a good reason to think he would turn things around. BTW, he wasn't usurped for letting them play to their strengths, he was 'retired' because he was old, was forgetting things mid-sentence, and the team didn't do well. They still did better than LB's team with less talent.

I don't blame Isiah for LB, because LB didn't have to do this and no one thought he would. We thought there would be some trouble, but we never thought it would be like this. No one did, so you can't blame him for a move that everyone thought was a no-brainer. There are other moves that you can blame him for though, thats another discussion. But I am not some Isiah proponent, I just don't get as emotional about him as guys l;ike islesfan do. I try to look at things cooly and objectively, I don't see that from many others here, and by 'many others' I MEAN YOU!!! LOL!

What Clyde and Breen say on air is almost of no consequence at all. They are powerless to effect anything, but I do give Clyde props for some of his insights, one of which was that LB needs to shut his trap. But I dont think you can take what they say to mean the culture is changing. Things have to change before we can say they are changing, and thus far, nothing has changed, except we are much worse than we were 1 year ago this time.



[Edited by - Killa4luv on 04-22-2006 05:28 AM]