Posted by Pharzeone:
Paladin, Riley acquired defensive players for his Knick team and remove guys who didn't contribute defensively like Jackson. D'Antoni does the opposite. Also, Riley is capable of adapting to the current players he has around him better than D'Antoni. When your coach says in pre-season that he will not change but the team has to adjust is your first hint that the coach maybe one dimensional. I think D'Antoni cares about defense but is clueless how to coach defense. Losing Weber to the Kings will hurt D'Antoni a lot.
I understand that there were some player changes- especially Jackson, but Riley began with a defensive framework of players that make the group MDA started with on the Knicks look like a bunch of children. He started with 2 young guards, Anthony and Starks, who had their problems as players, but were excellent and intense on the defensive end. He had a Hall of Fame center in Ewing, and in Oakley had had the ultimate blue collar banger. And what about a guy like Mason who was able to play almost every position on the court and could bang guys and lock down certain smaller players.
You don't think that MDA wouldn't die for an offensive/defensive stud iike Ewing, who in his youth run the floor, hit the J and also block shots, or a banger like Oakley who regulated in the lane and later improved his value by learning how to hit the midrange shot?
You also need leaders on your team who can lead by example and get into the face of players who are not pulling their weight on D. (Garnett proved the value of a team leader and made Allen and Pierce into better players.) What do you think Oakley, Jordan, Magic, Bird or Garnett would have said to Lee if they were on his team and Lee had moved away from a player going to the basket instead trying to block the shot or knock the guy onto his butt?
I think that if MDA came to a young veteran Knicks team with the talent that Riley came into with the Knicks, he might have made some tweaks in his system to allow for the skills of the excellent playes he found in his lap. What did MDA inherit in terms of talent? Do you think it was of the same quality that Riley found himself with when he came to the Knicks?
There were very few "keepers" on the Knicks that Walsh and MDA inherited from Thomas- no functioning center or rational PG, and certainly no team defense. Think about it- at or after 2010 you might only have 2 or 3 players, at most, from your 07-08 team playing on the Knicks! An amazing turnover, and indicative of a poorly designed team by Isiah Thomas.
I am not saying that MDA is some kind of defensive genius, but in terms of overall success, he did a pretty good job on a Phoenix team that had a 6'8.5" guy playing center most of the time, and I expect that he communicates to players and coaches his basic concepts about D, while leaving the specifics to his coaches. Perhaps he needs a dedicated D coach who can shape up the team, but as I said above, I think what he really needs the kind of floor leadership that he simply does not have on the Knicks at this time. Hopefully, both MDA and Walsh will recognize this need and address it at some point.
[Edited by - Paladin55 on 04-24-2009 7:40 PM]No man is happy without a delusion of some kind. Delusions are as necessary to our happiness as realities- C.N. Bovee
4/24/2009 2:57 PM