why the gloom

[Kestutis.Kveraga@xxxxxxxxxxxxx (Kestutis Kveraga)]

--- You wrote:
 Anything less is failure.  Opinion:  
do you think that 44 wins and a loss in round one is enough to "make 
management take notice?"  A loss in round two?
--- end of quote ---

No and no. Only a failure to make the playoffs may - may - get their attention.
The BDT  will write everything else off to their three-pointers' not falling or
some such  specious nonsense.
 
--- You wrote:
     I come back to my usual comment:  this team is exactly where it was at 
this stage last year, yet last year's euphoria has become gloom.  Why? 
--- end of quote ---

Because:

1. It's become even more obvious that Walker isn't good enough, yet the team is
structured around his idiosyncratic game. Which leads to...

2. We now know beyond any reasonable doubt that we have a bunch of idiots
running this team. Last spring, in the aftermath of the 2001 draft
fiasco-masking trade for Rogers and Delk, and before the Vin Baker and Blount
swindles, it wasn't as obvious. 

3. Vin Baker. 

4. We have a team whose GM tries to forcefeed crappy or ill-fitting players to
the coach who doesn't want them, because they don't fit his system structured
around, and according to, a flawed player's wishes who thinks he's a lot better
than he is. Thus, the coach and the GM are at odds, and both of them are wrong.
Yet the team wins enough for them to survive in their jobs, which guarantees
that the team will not improve. 

5. We're greedy for more success, which, given 1-4, isn't very likely.

That's why the mood is gloomy. 
Kestas