Re: Bird's record as talent evaluator

[Kim Malo <kimmalo@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

At 12:16 PM 9/29/02 -0400, Josh Ozersky wrote:
>Bird has never, to my knowledge, made a major mistake
>about talent. 

Ummm, I like Larry and respect his skills, but just off the top of my head - you don't classify Montross that way?

>He felt that Eric Montross had the potential to be a very good
>player, but that his constantly being traded, and implicitly his
>being coached by ML Carr for the first two years of his career,
>crippled his career.

Maybe. However, to start with, his first year was under Chris Ford and not under ML. Admittedly he definitely looked more useful then than at any other point in his career, but still with some pretty clear physical limitations. I agree that he turned out to be less than I think he honestly could have been, based upon that first year  and expectations for normal development. But a lot of the problems he has had in the NBA are consistent with the physical imitations people thought he had going in - S-L-O-W and not particularly mobile for a start- and can't be just a matter of ML and trades.

Kim