Re: Coach's accountability

[Hironaka <j.hironaka@unesco.org>]

Thomas Murphy wrote:

> I don't agree with his philosophy and for that reason hope he isn't
> extended, but I CAN appreciate why the players respect O'B. The last comment
> by O'B represents a refreshing display of responsibility. I take my hat off
> to him.
> --------------
> Walker stands first in the NBA for 3-pointers made, though he ranks 47th in
> accuracy at 37.1 percent.
>
> When the season started, Walker said he planned to take fewer 3-pointers.
> But that has not been the case. He has attempted 416 this season. Walker's
> willingness to hoist 3-pointers leads to criticism, though Jim O'Brien finds
> those remarks unfair.
>
> ''The criticism is misdirected because he's playing for somebody who wants
> him to take them,'' said O'Brien. ''He is a tremendous inside-outside weapon
> for us. We want him to shoot threes, and we call a lot of plays to get him
> to shoot threes.''
>
> http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/067/sports/Walker_answers_the_call+.shtml

I'm with Tom and Kevin etc. on this. I think OBrien deserves to be an NBA head
coach, but we should wait awhile before we sign our next coach.

On the subject of Obie and Walker, I was thinking maybe not having a vocal,
high-stress coach all year will give Walker and others (like Williams, Waltah,
Kenny etc.) less reason to burn-out and use the offseason for R&R and
unstructured, playground ball. Clearly Walker seems to love the game, but
playing for a high maintenance coach all these 7 or 8 years could burn out even
a committed player to the degree that it makes basketball less fun and more like
a job you need a vacation from. I do think that Walker is going to develop
further in this league if he switches to small forward. If that's what he wants
to do then he'll need to get in shape for it this summer.

It isn't just the perimeter shooting (BTW, I don't think I've even seen Bird
take 14 trey attempts in a game, and this trend does freak me out a wee bit)
that makes the small forward thing a fit. He has also averaged 2.73 steals in
the months of February and March and I'm starting to doubt if any Celtic will
catch him for the team lead in assists this year, which would make for a fairly
rare occurance (how many forwards have ever led a team in assists, or for that
matter how often has a player led an NBA team in both assists and rebounds?).

Granted he's no Nomar Garciaparra or something, but Toine's NBA.COM page lists
him in the NBA top-20 in twenty freaking categories. Think about it, top-20 in
twenty positive categories. Sure a lot of it is "3-point shots attempted" or
variations on a common theme (e.g. minutes played, average minutes) but still
that must be some kind of league record (at least among non All Stars).

So where was I? Yeah like Tom I do appreciate Obie for not passing the buck on
Antoine's 3-point love affair. In general, I've always felt that Celtics players
were guilty only of doing more or less what the coaches directly asked them to
do: whether it was running the headless chicken charge of the light brigade
defense or setting up for 3-pointers too early in the shot count.

-------