Official Head Coach Search Thread

[Fultz4thewin 2,464]

Those are two rather big assumptions. I get what you're saying, I do. You believe he's a builder not a winner, and you believe that free agents wouldn't like his personality (though I'm not sure what that is based on, other than pure conjecture and maybe a comparison of his personality to that of Stan VG, who Dwight didn't like). But no options out there have championships as head coach of an NBA team. Rick Carlisle bounced around a few times before winning a title in Dallas, and his attitude and supposed lack of player-friendliness were the reasons he was fired in Detroit and his reputation was hugely questioned after everything that went down in Indiana. Skiles may be in a similar situation in his career as Carlisle was after the Pacers gig.

 

Empirical evidence shows that Skiles is a task master that gets the most out of his players by being demanding. His teams take large steps forward in year one, another step forward in year two, and a major step back in year three once his players get burned out with his ways.

 

Skiles belongs in college where players are constantly shuffling through the program.

 

We'll have a playoff team in year one with him and probably a 4 seed in year two but we'll probably barely make the playoffs in year three and fire him.

[Magic4Ever-more 4]

Bottom lines is Players want to play for coaches with a proven record of winning! Players will listen to those coaches because they know they will lead them to greatness! Somehow I don't think a Kevin Durant for example would be like.....ooooh Scott Skiles, I want to play for that guy he is championship caliber!

[Nyce_1 311]

Good argument for Skiles from Eyriq on RealGM:

I don't mind Skiles at all. We arguably have the best talent he's ever coached besides the first two Phoenix teams he had. This is my first time combing through all the teams he's coached, and I have to say it is damn impressive what he has done. Our team is perfect for him, I really hope we hire him.

 

His first two seasons with Phoenix he had the 3rd and 2nd best defenses in the league with a core of Kidd/Penny/Robinson 1999-00 and Kidd/Marion/Robinson 2000-01. Had Penny not broken down those teams would have been better but relying on an aging Robinson and a rookie Marion is tough business. He was fired in 2001-02 after they traded Kidd for Marbury and he started ~.500 for the season.

 

With the Bulls he came into a situation similar to our own; a lot of youth though they had better veterans sprinkled throughout the roster. His core in 2003-04 was Crawford/Hinrich/Curry and they finished 16th on defense. Vucevic/Harris/Oladipo kills that core, imagine what Skiles could do...

 

2004-05 is one of his best seasons imo, and is one of the reasons I think he belongs in the discussion with Thibs if not even as preferable to Thibs. A roster built around 24 year old Hinrich is the #2 defense in the NBA. Zero players older than 25 in their top 5 MPG.

 

2005-06 the same young Bulls team finishes 7th in defense and wins .500 of their games. Not a single player with a PER above Harris' 16.7 let alone a player as productive as our Vucevic on any of these Bulls teams.

 

2006-07 Deng/Hinrich/Ben Wallace headline the #1 defense in the NBA and go to the 2nd round.

 

2007-08 The Hinrich era crashes to an end and Skiles is booted after 25 games.

 

2008-09 He takes a Jefferson/Sessions/a Moute core (again, two players on rookie contracts among his most played, a consistent theme in all his stops) to the 15th best defense in the NBA and a 41% winning percentage.

 

2009-10 Jennings/Delfino/Bogut, 2nd best defense in the NBA.

 

2010-11 Salmons/Bogut/Jennings, 4th best defense in the NBA.

 

2011-12 Jennings/Ilyasova/Delfino, 16th best defense in the NBA. Ellis for Bogut trade happens in March. Border line all-star production from Jennings and Ilyasova and subsequently one of the only times a Skiles team was better on offense vs defense.

 

2012-13 Fired 32 games in with a .500 record.

[Fultz4thewin 2,464]

Bottom lines is Players want to play for coaches with a proven record of winning! Players will listen to those coaches because they know they will lead them to greatness! Somehow I don't think a Kevin Durant for example would be like.....ooooh Scott Skiles, I want to play for that guy he is championship caliber!

 

Skiles hasn't made it out of the first round

[Nyce_1 311]

Skiles hasn't made it out of the first round

2007-08 season he got to the 2nd round, sweeping the Heat, then losing to the Pistons.

[Magic4Ever-more 4]

Skiles hasn't made it out of the first round

My point exactly, what has he proven, why would players listen to him?

[Fultz4thewin 2,464]

2007-08 season he got to the 2nd round, sweeping the Heat, then losing to the Pistons.

 

Yeah I have no idea why I said first round when I totally meant second

[Magic4Ever-more 4]

Brooks has made it to the Finals and Thibs has proven he can draw free agents....like Gasol

[Mauro Pedrosa 1,032]

[Murphy13 185]

It's completely fine having legitimate concerns. Skiles certainly isn't my first, second or third choice. I even have legitimate concerns about Thibs. But saying "Henny will be gone in 2 years because we'll under achieve" isn't raising any concerns it's just making a grand statement because you don't like Skiles as the candidate.

 

A legitimate concern is "he seems to wear out his welcome after 3 years" or "his offenses have never been great even when he had Jason Kidd". See how I did that without ever saying "Henny should be fired if we hire this guy".

 

If we have another down season it won't matter who the coach is, Hennigan will still be in trouble.

[Miller4Prez66 545]

If we hire Skiles, it would be his FOURTH stop as HC in the NBA. He's never made it 5 full seasons with anyone and has never even been to a conference finals. He's just not that good of a coach. If we were to pass on him, I also think he'll probably never get another serious crack at a HC gig again. We're only looking at him because of his history here as a player.

[JJZFL 619]

Coach contracts are weird, and most of them actually do allow coaches to "just quit." It just means that, unless the team lets them out of their contract, they can't coach anywhere else.

 

OK, fair enough, I didn't know that. Based on what you said, though, it still remains true that he could not "just quit" and choose to go coach somewhere else, which is what the poster I was responding to suggested.