Bob Berger: Pitino Keeps Firing Up Air Balls

[Way Of The Ray <wayray@ix.netcom.com>]

     http://www.nh.com
     Posted Friday, Aug. 13, 1999

     Pitino keeps firing up air balls


     By Bob Berger, NH.com columnist
     and host of "The Press Box" on
     WSMN-AM 1590

     I have to admit that I was skeptical
     from the start. It was during Rick
     Pitino's first press conference
     introducing him as head coach and
     president of the Boston Celtics, when
     he answered a reporter's question
     about who was going to sit on that
     goofy panel in a New York television
     studio during the NBA's draft
     lottery, that the b.s. meter inside
     me went off. Not all the way to red
     alert, mind you - merely halfway to
     "uh-oh". What set it off was that
     Pitino, shooting strictly from the
     hip and with the self-satisfied smile
     of someone who realized right then
     and there just how clever he was,
     decreed that M.L. Carr would go and
     bring home the number one pick which
     we all knew would be Tim Duncan.

     My jaw dropped. M.L. Carr? Wasn't he
     just banished? Wasn't this the new era, when the great new coach
     - the one that everyone was waiting for - had arrived to make
     people forget the Celtics recent dark past and return them to
     their rightful place as one of the NBA's elite? Now, here was
     Pitino sending the guy he replaced to New York to return with the
     franchise savior?

     It was unseemly and the look on Carr's face said it all. How
     could Rick commit someone else's time like that publicly without
     first speaking with him? Wasn't the plan for M.L. to fade from
     the scene after his "failure" as a coach? If the Celtics didn't
     get the first pick, would people then blame M.L.? What, in the
     spur of the moment, appeared as a magnanimous gesture was in
     reality the worst kind of media grandstanding. And while everyone
     was praising Pitino and comparing him to Bill Parcells as a
     master of the media, I thought I was looking at a rank amateur.
     Parcells always knew precisely what was going to say. This new
     guy had no idea what was coming out of his mouth next.

     Nothing since that press conference has made me change my mind.
     What has happened over the past two years makes me think that
     Pitino makes it up as he goes along. There are the well
     documented insults about listeners to talk radio ("fellowship of
     the miserable", "people who don't have a clue", etc.) that, had
     he been just a little more reflective, would not have been made.
     But what's even more troubling is that he seems to manage the
     team the same way he speaks to the media - from the hip. I never
     thought anyone could top Dan Duquette in the amount of players
     moved on and off a roster. I was wrong. The Celtics turn over
     personnel more than even Duquette would dare.

     Two years ago Ron Mercer and Chauncy Billups were the backcourt
     of the future for the Celtics. Along with Anoine Walker, the
     three were the rock solid foundation for a new Celtics dynasty.
     Today, Mercer and Billups are with the Denver Nuggets and word is
     that Pitino is shopping Walker all over the league, less than one
     year after giving the unproven and very unpolished 22-year-old a
     $71 million contract. Two years ago Travis Knight was a great
     young player who would blossom under Pitino's system. One year
     later Rick dumped him and the ridiculous $22 million dollar
     salary he gave him. The list goes on and on with players with
     whom Rick falls in and out of love very quickly. Where's the
     genius?

     Rick opened his mouth when he first arrived in town and said that
     he'd have a playoff team within a couple of years and a
     championship caliber team within five. It seems to me that ever
     since then he's been scrambling to make what everyone thought was
     an unrealistic deadline. Rather than taking slow and steady
     improvement in building a winning program, Rick's frequent moves
     seem the result of him trying - almost desparately - to save
     face. While I agree to an extent with those who say that in
     today's NBA you can't build for the future like could be done in
     years past, you still need a plan. Pitino gives the impression
     that he either has none or, worse yet, that he has a different
     one every month. Red alert on my b.s. meter has been reached.

     So now Danny Fortsen, Calbert Cheney and Eric Williams (yes, the
     same EricWilliams who Rick praised, then traded and trashed
     before Eric ever played one minute for the Little Big Man) are
     the current "flavors du jour" that will put the Celtics into the
     playoffs this year, which Rick had guaranteed yet again this past
     spring. While that is certainly possible I, for one, won't hold
     my breath. I just wonder how long it will take for word to come
     out that Pitino is shopping one of these guys all over the
     league. Mid-September, I'm guessing.

     But, hey, maybe these guys will be the right combination. Maybe
     Antoine will stay here and be the All-Star we think he can be.
     Maybe the new guys will give the C's the power inside they sorely
     need. Maybe Paul Pierce will make the leap to MVP candidate in
     just his second year, the way Nomar did while leading the Celtics
     into the playoffs. I certainly hope so. It's way past the time
     for Rick Pitino to throw one up from the top of the key and have
     it go in.