Re: Pitino's Problems?

[Kestas <Kestutis.Kveraga@dartmouth.edu>]

You're essentially correct in claiming that not everything Pitino did was
bad. I just tend to a certain negative bias towards him. I'm sure you
understand...:) 
Since we've discussed his performance ad nauseam on this list, I'll just
reiterate 2 quick points that have been made before about what you said: 

1) it didn't take a coaching genius to take the team from 15 to 36 wins,
with the amount talent they had on that team. Letting the players know that
tanking was over and now it's time to play for real, was enough. It's
generally accepted around the NBA that taking a team from horrible to
mediocre is easy. Taking it from mediocre to good is much, much harder.
This is partly the reason why the Celtics under Pitino peaked in his first
season.
 
2) it doesn't matter whether non-experts (fans, media etc.) agree with a
GM's moves. Many of the cleverest trades involve trading  a good,
well-known player for little-know players about to bust out on the scene
(e.g., some of the trades Pitino thought of, but *didn't* make, or aborted)
- i.e., trades that most fans don't like. Indeed, the greatest irony of
Pitino's reign may be that the trades that he did make (which the fans, for
the most part, liked) turned out to be mostly bad, while the trades he
didn't make (which  the fans were against) would've been good for us, in
retrospect. 
Kestas