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djsunyc
Posts: 44929
Alba Posts: 42
Joined: 1/16/2004
Member: #536
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PLAYING COACH-UP
By PETER VECSEY
May 18, 2007 -- ENDING educated speculation that highly-coveted free agent coach Sam Mitchell may leave the Raptors for the Pacers or the Bobcats, the NBA's reigning Coach of the Year and Toronto team president Bryan Colangelo have come to terms, The Post has learned. According to a Canadian Mountie, the fully guaranteed agreement is for three years at $4 million per, a $2.4M raise.
This just in: Stan Van Gundy has emerged as the prohibitive favorite (over Brian Shawn and Jim Boylan) to replace Rick Carlisle in Indiana.
The Post also has learned the Rockets soon will announce Rick Adelman as their new coach, that more or less confirming my original Jeff Van Gundy-is-done story.
Adelman is a flawless choice for a team anchored by two superstars and two or three other key components. Never a self-promoter or one to demand players he must or must not have, he merely manages (never over-coaches) the personnel on tap and gets them to the playoffs - 14 out of 14 times as coach of Portland and Sacramento.
As expected, Van Gundy is back behind the microphone (for tonight's Game 6 Spurs-Suns telecast), where he has all the answers for everything that's wrong with the world and the game, and where his system always works perfectly.
It's interesting to note that the lone time one of his teams got anywhere worthwhile - the 1999 Knicks - is when players he diametrically resented coaching did their own thing.
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I love L.A.! There's nothing like squabblin' siblings/Lakers executives!
Yesterday, Jeannie Buss helped host a radio show and voiced disapproval of what her brother, Jim, said last week on another radio show about Jeannie's boyfriend/Lakers coach Phil Jackson. She said there are people in the organization who don't think the Zen Hen is the one to coach this group of players and is unsure whether an extension will be forthcoming though Jackson wants to continue. If her brother was upset with Phil for calling out Kwame Brown and Smush Parker in the press, Jeannie steamed, why did he call him out on the radio? Because what goes around, comes around! If only I could be tonight's guest at the Buss family dinner table.
I slouch corrected. I'm informed Larry Brown would gladly accept, if offered, the head coaching job for Charlotte or Memphis, and that family relocation and relatively low pay will not be obstacles.
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Is there any extraterrestrial scorer who's more fragile, and whose confidence can be shaken so summarily than Vince Carter? Presenting LeBron James, last seen slightly limping off the court - bailing out on the Cavaliers - near the end of the Game 5 lost cause.
For the sake of King James' sanity, shaking hand (while drinking a Gatorade) and nail-biting during team huddles at crunch time, please cease his incessant commercials. Imagine the endorsement power of this mortal man-child should he ever actually achieve anything momentous.
In the meantime, until James proves he can play more like Tayshaun Prince and mow 'em down at the free throw line when they count like Manu Ginobili, I strongly suggest, in the best interest of Cleveland, Zydrunas Ilgauskas be utilized for technical fouls vs. LeBron.
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Something is radically muddled with David Stern's league when the most competitive and compelling playoff series seemingly will be decided by an injudicious imprudent that punished two Suns for springing several steps away from their bench; no contact made or damage done. Yet Bruce Bowen (knee to Steve Nash's stomach), Jason Richardson (clothesline of airborne Mehmet Okur), Matt Barnes (hammer-headed a driving Matt Harpring) and Baron Davis (elbowed Derek Fisher) were absolved of suspension.
As Danny Fortson just got finished explaining to me, only when rules are written in cement in the National Bureaucratic Association - making decisions for the unthinking thoroughly straightforward - do they apply.
How can the league afford (allow itself) to self-flagellate like this?
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5/18/2007 11:21 AM