Franchero MVP 391 Report post Posted January 25, 2015 Mark Jackson is a horrible coach he's not great but i don't think he's horrible by any means. he pretty much turned around a losing culture in GS and got them to the playoffs twice in a competitive western conference. he just wasn't the coach to take them to the promise land. vaughn certainly cant turn this team around. george karl is too old and his health wont survive the grind of a long season. skiles has a reputation of getting tuned out by his players and couldn't get anything going in the many coaching gigs he's had thus far. mark jackson is the only guy out of this group that has had some decent success turning around a losing culture. although, i would agree that the selection of coaches to choose from at this time leaves a lot to be desired. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Jay Magic 1,244 Report post Posted January 25, 2015 he's not great but i don't think he's horrible by any means. he pretty much turned around a losing culture in GS and got them to the playoffs twice in a competitive western conference. he just wasn't the coach to take them to the promise land. vaughn certainly cant turn this team around. george karl is too old and his health wont survive the grind of a long season. skiles has a reputation of getting tuned out by his players and couldn't get anything going in the many coaching gigs he's had thus far. mark jackson is the only guy out of this group that has had some decent success turning around a losing culture. although, i would agree that the selection of coaches to choose from at this time leaves a lot to be desired. Mike Malone, Kevin Ollie Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
JJZFL 619 Report post Posted January 25, 2015 A good, thoughtful post. My hope coming into this year was for the young guns to develop. Interestingly, I think that is actually happening. Payton, Dipo, Gordon, Harris and Vooch look very promising. For that reason and several other moves, I think Henny has done an excellent job, so we disagree on his job rating. However, to your overall point, the team has yet to become a consistent and successful team. In fact, like you, I can't see a clear identity or character. In my view, I put the responsibility for this predicament squarely on Vaughn. Watching Kidd have success in Milwaukee, and watching SVG do the same in Detroit, shows me Vaughn is trying but failing. I truly believe a Mark Jackson or Skiles would immediately make this crew of guys a dynamic team. I hope the Magic have the fortitude to make such a move. Thank you. I acknowledge that Henny came into a very tough situation, so I'm not sure we even disagree there. I'm just hoping to see that his moves lead to success, but it hasn't happened yet. That being said, I don't believe that this season is a write-off, as others are saying. IF we can start to show some development even at this point in the season, and start to develop an identity, this team could definitely still be fun to watch, and could make progress that would make us all more hopeful about upcoming years. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Franchero MVP 391 Report post Posted January 25, 2015 Mike Malone, Kevin Ollie Meh not impressed with mike malone. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Fultz4thewin 2,464 Report post Posted January 25, 2015 he's not great but i don't think he's horrible by any means. he pretty much turned around a losing culture in GS and got them to the playoffs twice in a competitive western conference. he just wasn't the coach to take them to the promise land. vaughn certainly cant turn this team around. george karl is too old and his health wont survive the grind of a long season. skiles has a reputation of getting tuned out by his players and couldn't get anything going in the many coaching gigs he's had thus far. mark jackson is the only guy out of this group that has had some decent success turning around a losing culture. although, i would agree that the selection of coaches to choose from at this time leaves a lot to be desired. Was it Mark Jackson? Or was it curry and thompson getting experience and signing Bogut? Scott Brooks isn't a good coach. Did he turn the thunder around or was it just Durant, Westbrook, and Ibaka? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Franchero MVP 391 Report post Posted January 25, 2015 Was it Mark Jackson? Or was it curry and thompson getting experience and signing Bogut? Scott Brooks isn't a good coach. Did he turn the thunder around or was it just Durant, Westbrook, and Ibaka? I think it has to be both the coach and the team. Good teams have them both on the same page. And it's about maximization of talent - a good coach knows how to maximize each players strength. I just don't see Vaughn getting the most out of these guys. I actually think we're a bad team despite our talent, not because of it. I'm not saying we are championship contenders, but I do believe we have the talent right now to at least compete for that 8th spot in the weak eastern conference. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Fultz4thewin 2,464 Report post Posted January 25, 2015 Mike Malone, Kevin Ollie Kevin Ollie isn't leaving UConn. Calhoun had to quit at the last minute to force the administration to give Ollie a shot. He's going to give them more than 3 years. Maybe year 6 or 7, not 3 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Fultz4thewin 2,464 Report post Posted January 25, 2015 I think it has to be both the coach and the team. Good teams have them both on the same page. And it's about maximization of talent - a good coach knows how to maximize each stars strength. I just don't see Vaughn getting it out of these guys. I think we're a bad team despite our talent. I'm not saying we are championship contenders, but I do believe we have the talent right now to at least compete for that 8th spot in the weak eastern conference. Jackson didn't maximize golden state. Skiles makes sense as the knock on him was always his intensity really wears on guys after a few years. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Catman 380 Report post Posted January 25, 2015 The kind of comments I see now don't really surprise me given the expectations people expressed over the summer. Basically, the consensus was that our strategy was to create a very young team that will lose a lot of games, get good draft picks, and then with some careful player management we would become a contender. The 2014 draft was felt to be especially loaded and could by itself be a ticket for making a team a playoff contender. Our team of "young guns", even though it might experience some problems on offense, would be a tough minded, athletic defensive team that other teams wouldn't want to play, even if they were able to beat us. By this season, we would be far enough along to compete for a playoff spot, especially since we were kind of tanking on purpose the last two years but this year we wouldn't do that anymore. Last summer, it was felt we were being badly under-rated by the so-called experts, and would win a lot more games than they predicted. The team was clearly getting better under Jacque Vaughn, and our exciting young talent meant you were blind if you didn't see how well this team was developing. Hennigan is clearly a great GM and every move he made is more proof of that, including the Frye signing. Despite almost every part of the above narrative turning out to be wrong, anyone who offered a dissenting opinion was blasted. See, for example: http://truebluenation.com/forum/index.php?/topic/254148-goodbye/page__view__findpost__p__984920 http://truebluenation.com/forum/index.php?/topic/254181-is-really-good-good-enough/page__view__findpost__p__989278 http://truebluenation.com/forum/index.php?/topic/254168-magic-fanbase-needs-legitimate-playoff-hopes-bleacher-report/page__view__findpost__p__989260 And there are many many more examples. I'm not angry or unhappy currently like many of the other regulars who are posting threads like this because I didn't buy into the assertions listed above to begin with. My concerns have been all along: Creating a really bad young team is no guarantee of having that team become good just because the players get older and get more experience. We have an unproven young GM and an unproven young coach. Neither one deserves much credit for anything yet. There should be milestones to be met even in unsuccessful years to show that the team is at least moving in the right direction. I didn't see any. This idea that we were losing games on purpose for a couple of seasons but that we would turn that off this year always struck me as ridiculous. There are risks in allowing ourselves to become very bad for an unknown number of years. This is not NY or LA, and the fan base is already shrinking (see season ticket numbers and tv ratings). Depending on getting great draft picks is a low probability strategy. We were lucky a few times, and now that seems to be evening out in the last few years. So far, I'm not seeing the team develop any kind of identity or specific character. Are we an offensive team? Defensive team? Fast paced? Slow paced? Who are the starting 5? Do we see them moving towards some goal in a coherent way? Are they better now than they were 2 months ago? So while I'm not surprised about where we are right now, I am disappointed. I can only hope that things start to look up for us. Tomorrow would be a good start, since I'm taking my son to the game. Let me get this straight - you use an "I'm done with this team because we drafted Aaron Gordon" thread as an example of legit post? I just want to be clear what I am reading here because I don't really see anything that out of line with what we projected. Most of us said this team would possibly compete for an 8th seed, and if they get things going again, it's not outside of the realm of possibility. The main problem with the summer whiners was how they complained about things they knew nothing about. They didn't know a damn thing about Elfrid or AG and decided they sucked anyway. They didn't realize that a rebuild takes 4-5 years so they whined that we didn't get star X or Y and demanded us to fast forward the process since they deserved it as "loyal fans". Most said the Ben Gordon signing was terrible as well. So let's not try and justify these people like they made a valid point off of their wishy washy, hedging opinions that allow them to bandwagon the team if it gets good or bash them to death if it doesn't. On to your points: - Correct. Creating a young team is no secret to success but it is still THE BEST strategy to succeed long term. The only way to get stars when you are bad is via draft and talent acquisition. In other words, Vuc went from a throw in trade piece to a guy who people vehemently beg that we keep despite that fact that he could most likely fetch us a true star in a trade soon. Essentially this concern is in line with "there are no guarantees in life", and thats a given. - The Hawks had an unproven coach too and the only reason people are singing his praises is because he has a more established roster with the pieces to fit his scheme. Steve Kerr - unproven coach. Plenty of teams have "unproven GMs". Let me give you one - Stan Van Gundy. Pretty sure he had never run a team before from the Executive level and he is doing just fine. Difference is the cupboard was not absolutely bare when these guys got their jobs. For Rob, it was depleted. - How do you know there aren't milestones? Because Rob doesn't email you a personal report detailing his future plans for the team? Here's a milestone for you - we had nothing at all when he took over. Now we have multiple tradable assets and are considered a team loaded with young talent. - Sure there are risks, but that is NBA basketball. Why don't you talk to a Bucks or Hawks fan about that? They've had it way worse than us, and the Hawks have almost been sold multiple times. The Magic have had 2 finals runs since the Bucks have even been relevant. Last time I checked, the teams have fans showing back up after decades of failure. DECADES. And you are worrying about 4 years. It's not realistic or knowledge based emotion. - Yes, the team does not have character yet. This is what happens in rebuild. You acquire assets, you develop them by playing them and then you build their value to create the team you want. Once that occurs, the team will have character. We are in stage 2 of 3. You're disappointed? That's on you. Realistic study on team rebuilds should have you expecting this team to be at best a playoff 8th seed this year. The problem is people either don't grasp the NBA rebuild process or just want to plug their ears and scream "I DONT CARE. I WANNA WIN NOW!!", and then they get made when it doesn't happen. Win or Lose tomorrow, I think you will have a great time at the game with your son. It's not always about the game, its about the moments you create. Have fun and enjoy it. 2 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Franchero MVP 391 Report post Posted January 25, 2015 Jackson didn't maximize golden state. He definitley started the process. He may not have gotten them to championship calibur, but he sure turned around that team from bottom dwellers to playoff bound -- and doing that in the West is a hard thing to do. And they gave the Spurs alot of trouble in the first year they made it. Lets give him some credit here. The guy looks like the best candidate out of the bunch right now. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Secretly Space Jesus 670 Report post Posted January 25, 2015 Snipped At this point, I know you're a clear and obvious troll, but I'm curious: Do you REALLY want people to go back and find every single post where you've been hilariously wrong about stuff? I mean, I get that you only show up to complain and that if this team were to suddenly go on a 10 game win streak you'd disappear completely, but still, I just can't figure... You know, what? It's easier just to say that you're not worth listening to and put you on ignore. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
My 6th Rebuild 6 Report post Posted January 25, 2015 The true issue with the Magic is the ownership. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
