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Ryan: Pitino Has An Idea, Since You Can't Have A Plan; No More Babying of Antoine
Impossible to have a plan these days in the NBA - too many
intangibles is the gist of Ryan's column, but Pitino does have an
idea for next season: pass first and shoot second. And Antoine and
Kenny better get with the program.....
[The Boston Globe Online][Boston.com]
[Boston Globe Online / Sports]
Plain truth is a Pitino plan not possible
By Bob Ryan, Globe Columnist, 08/06/99
Ron Mercer went to Denver. Six
seconds later the moaning began.
''Pitino has no plan!'' they shrieked.
''All he does is react.''
Plan. That sounds good. The Marshall Plan.
Stalin's Five-Year Plan. The Slim-Fast
Plan. It always sounds so great, so
organized, so authoritative, so brilliant.
Life will be great if only you stick to
your plan.
''Plan?'' inquires Rick Pitino. ''I had a
plan when I came out of Kentucky. My plan
was to get [Tim] Duncan or [Keith] Van
Horn. Now my plan is to get 10 good
players.''
A plan was possible in Ye Olden Days. Red
Auerbach never announced any plans, did
he? He had Bill Russell (getting him was
the entire plan). But Red had a plan, all
right. The plan was to keep Bill Russell
happy. Everything else took care of itself
because the players he got weren't going
anywhere if Red decided otherwise. There
was no free agency. There were no agents
whispering in players' ears.
Opponents were free to implement one,
three, or five-year plans, if they chose.
With full control of player movement,
management actually could build a team,
step by painstaking step.
It's a seller's market now. Good players
have the leverage. They go where they want
to go and leave when they want to leave,
sometimes in advance of a contract
expiration by making themselves a poison
pill who must be traded.
A good team cannot count on maintaining
any long-term plan, because recent NBA
history teaches us that there is an
inevitable squeaky wheel. Just being an
integral part of a very successful team is
no longer a primary goal. No matter what
they say, most players are far more
interested in getting the Big Score than
in getting The Ring. When an accomplished,
but ringless, player gets to be 30 or so,
he sometimes decides he'd like the
jewelry, usually because ''I've got all
the money I need.'' Even then, you don't
see too many guys go for really short
money.
It's a different talent pool, too. All
drafts aren't created equal, except in the
sense that the typical NBA draft these
days is overpopulated with immature kids
who really aren't ready to be
professionals in any sense, be it
technical or emotional. Anyway, people are
very upset that Pitino has now dealt away
both his 1997 No. 3 pick (Chauncey
Billups) and his 1997 No. 6 pick (Ron
Mercer). What kind of madness is this?
Pitino shrugs. ''When you look at the
draft this year,'' he says, ''would I be
surprised if any player in it is traded
when his time is up?''
The answer, of course, is no. It's a very
so-so draft, starting with the No. 1 pick
(Elton Brand, in case you've forgotten
already). There will be lots of movement
among these people over the next two or
three years, as GM after GM will say,
''Hey, let's see if your guy looks better
in my uniform, and my guy looks better in
your uniform, because it certainly isn't
working out the way it is now.''
Looking back at the '97 draft, everyone
knew it was top-heavy. You had a 100
percent guarantee in Duncan and a 98
percent guarantee in Van Horn. The
drop-off after that was Niagara Falls.
Pitino, it turns out, made a mistake in
Billups at No. 3 and a very good decision
in Mercer at No. 6. Now Mercer and his
agent team have major delusions of
financial grandeur, and he is an ex-Celtic
as a result.
This just isn't the same NBA Pitino left
in 1989, and give the guy credit for
trying to adjust. Two years ago, he
couldn't understand why a team could no
longer average 116.7 points a game, the
way his '88-89 Knicks did. He knows now.
Two years ago, he decided that in order to
win a championship you needed three
All-Stars. We now have a champion with
just two, but the right kind of two.
''I did think you needed three,'' he
admits. ''San Antonio proves you can do it
with two great ones surrounded by the
right people.''
Pitino may not have what you call a plan,
but he most certainly has an idea. He
knows how he wants to play next year.
''We had too many guys who wanted to score
last year,'' he points out. ''We have
changed. People will have their roles.
Antoine [Walker] and Paul [Pierce] will
get shots. Vitaly [Potapenko] and Danny
[Fortson] want to kill people and get
rebounds. [Tony] Battie wants to block
shots.''
Now comes Calbert Cheaney. He is a
28-year-old midsized talent whose career
has slid continually backward after a
promising start. ''He turned down a
sign-and-trade for more money to come
here,'' beams Pitino. ''If we can get him
back where he was ...'' Having played for
Bob Knight, Cheaney should have no trouble
adjusting to the volume level at practice.
The two key players remain Walker and
Kenny Anderson, each a highly-flawed
diamond.
''I've given Kenny an ultimatum,'' says
Pitino. ''I said, `You've got yourself a
track coach; now get yourself into the
best shape of your career. This has got to
be your bust-out year. Either that, or
you're going to be a bust, period.' We
know he has offensive talent, but there is
no reason he can't play better defense.
He's got the foot quickness and hand
speed.''
As for Antoine, Pitino sounds threatening.
''If he comes in great shape and totally
changes what I feel needs to be changed,
great,'' Pitino coos. ''But there will be
no more babying. It's either [excrete] or
get off the pot. I will not hesitate
benching anyone who doesn't play with the
idea of pass first and shoot second and
who isn't willing to work.''
(This doesn't sound like something Antoine
wants to hear. Perhaps he should, how you
say, plan to be somewhere else next year.)
Anyway, does any of this constitute a
Capital P Plan? Nope. He's talking a team
for next season, not a concept for 2002.
You and I may disagree, but he thinks it's
a team that can compete in the Eastern
Conference in 1999-2000. Forget about a
Plan. The original Plan A is playing in
San Antonio. The original Plan B is
playing in New Jersey. Rick Pitino's Plan
C is waking up every day looking for
someone who might make you 1 percent
better than you were yesterday.
Bob Ryan is a Globe columnist.
This story ran on page E01 of the Boston
Globe on 08/06/99.
© Copyright 1999 Globe Newspaper Company.