Round 1 Game 5: LA Clippers (2) vs Portland Trail Blazers (2)

[nickhx2]

yeah i must have misremembered or misunderstood the cap thing with hawes.

definitely still remember though that hawes was garbage on offense though. i'm generally of the idea that a guy who is crappy on offense will figure it out if you stick with him long enough (though we did give hawes plenty of chances). and i'll always believe we should have kept trying to get his confidence/ability up because playing with what depth we had last year just did not work out for us. i would have rather gambled regular season play time in the hopes hawes could contribute. but meh, whatever, it's done.

whatever the case, he was a giant mess overall.

[QRich3]

Yeah it angers me most because the little times he was doing well, you could see that by having him planted at the three point line the Paul/DJ + Paul/Blake P&R was so freakin deadly. Goes to show you how lucky are the Thunder with a guy like Ibaka who can do that an be a key defensive player on the other side.

[og15]

Well yeah, but let's not act like we all saw the Hawes thing coming, all of us here were happy that a guy like Hawes took a paycut to come here, and I didn't see anyone talking about his lack of defensive mobility at the moment. Not in this forum, and not around the league, when every post-trade analysis out there was talking about how he'd open things for Blake and DJ offensively. And it's not as easy as watching film and projecting the exact fit of every guy you're thinking of adding, if it was that easy there wouldn't be bad signings every year around the league, including the "well managed" teams. This one, like the Pierce move, is the classic hindsight bad move you have to live with, and I think it's dishonest to say anyone should've seen it coming.

The rest, yeah, there was a bunch of obvious bad moves that have been talked about ad nauseum here, but like I've been saying, perspective is important. I don't want to take the heat out of those bad moves, but they need to be balanced with the good stuff that's kept us being a top 5 team in the league for half a decade, otherwise you're just setting yourself up for disappointment after disappointment.

The Dudley thing with the hard cap is an unprofessional stupid mistake that should have gotten people fired the instant it happened, I said this when it happened, and I think it's been the single move that's generated the need to make a few of the other bad moves that followed it.

I didn't see the Hawes thing coming at all, but every year since Vinny I'd expected the team do adjust the way they defended the pick and roll, so I was also being naieve in a sense. I also had mentioned how Indiana had a hybrid where they played zone up when Hibbert guarded pick and rolls, but would show when it was David West or anyone who could actually move their feet guarding the pick and roll.

Of course Doc is the coach, not just the GM, so he should know what he has planned, but the other confounding problem was that okay, fine, Hawes is slow, not that mobile, you can accomodate. You pair him next to a more mobile PF who can block shots and move around better. Problem is that Doc went to one of his safety options and paired him with Glen Davis.

It was very early into his tenure, but we were already sour on Doc as a President of Basketball Operations in December of 2014: viewtopic.php?f=18&t=1362715

Just like players, I'm of the thought that coaches, GM's, all these positions can improve, and hopefully will. I think Doc and his crew are better than they were back in the 2013 off-season. You can see from their signings this past off-season that they at least went after players that logically fit what they considered the teams needs as opposed to the first season where it was like getting players and trying to make them do things they've never proven they could do.

They probably won't make any crazy cap managing blunders like the 2014 off-season again, at least I hope, but all their little moves have compounded to not give the team as much of a chance of improving as they could have. The room for error is really not that large.

My thing now though is that Doc the coach is still good despite what people say. Sure he might be overrated if you think he's the best coach or something crazy like that, but who really does? The Clippers players also seem to respect him and follow him. I just can't really see how Doc just gets that role taken from him and is still the coach. I suppose he could be pressued internally to step down and then Ballmer goes after another person as GM, but I don't really know how that would work, and I'm not sure if firing him as a coach accomplishes anything. Firstly because who is the better coach the team plans to get, and secondly because of the relationship he has with the players, but I don't know, I'm not the owner.

You guys are correct though, the Dudley move was the one that started it, and sadly it was one of those tunnell vision roster moves where the front office wasn't looking at the big picture. I really hope they've at least gotten past that mentality. If we at least have that, it is better.

[nickhx2]

i think it's an issue of not just lacking the the big picture, but the picture is flawed in and of itself.

i know it's been mentioned ad nauseum by now, but doc's view of a team has thus far has not changed much at all:

surround an elite offense with more offense while mostly ignoring defense
forsake guys who can run the point because we already have ballhandlers (jamal/austin)
develop a second unit identity even though all conventional logic points to staggering your starters, especially when you have multiple stars
as a result mostly ignore the second unit's offense to let jamal crawford freelance. despite his inadequacies.


and here's the thing, i don't see any of this changing. like he legit believes in this stuff and to me it's extremely flawed. this is part of why i can never accept this dude as a GM because up until this point, it's been a lot of the same stuff hurting us over and over.

maybe he gets better at some things, i don't know. but i don't see him adjusting his entire mindset on how he sees team composition and a few other things that hurt the team. if doc stays on i am of the belief they will always be glaring weaknesses.

[QRich3]

i know it's been mentioned ad nauseum by now, but doc's view of a team has thus far has not changed much at all:

surround an elite offense with more offense while mostly ignoring defense
forsake guys who can run the point because we already have ballhandlers (jamal/austin)
develop a second unit identity even though all conventional logic points to staggering your starters, especially when you have multiple stars
as a result mostly ignore the second unit's offense to let jamal crawford freelance. despite his inadequacies.

Surely the fact that he played Luc a lot and ended up taking Pierce out of the rotation, plus having Cole lead the 2nd unit, is proof that he's learning to value defense in the second unit? he's taken his sweet time and is way too stubborn, yeah, but he's not stupid. Also, I know you've been saying that all year, but it's not true that he doesn't have a system for the 2nd unit. He runs a lot of very nice stuff that helps enhance the players strengths actually, he runs pindowns for Jamal, he runs specific P&R sets for Aldrich depending on if he's playing with Pablo, Austin or Jamal, he runs some misdirection stuff for Pierce/Green, etc. He does put a lot of thought on how the 2nd unit plays, it's just that having players like Jamal and Austin handling the ball will have many possessions ending up in a simple isolation. He needs to be less of a 'players coach' and get on their ass when they don't do what they're supposed to though, that's for sure.

My thing now though is that Doc the coach is still good despite what people say. Sure he might be overrated if you think he's the best coach or something crazy like that, but who really does? The Clippers players also seem to respect him and follow him. I just can't really see how Doc just gets that role taken from him and is still the coach. I suppose he could be pressured internally to step down and then Ballmer goes after another person as GM, but I don't really know how that would work, and I'm not sure if firing him as a coach accomplishes anything. Firstly because who is the better coach the team plans to get, and secondly because of the relationship he has with the players, but I don't know, I'm not the owner.

Problem is Ballmer doesn't seem to be a guy with enough character to force his employees to do things like they're supposed to (much like Doc with the players). If he was, you just fire his FO guys and hire competent people. Then force everyone to debate and trace the long term plan together, like good teams do, not everyone working under Doc's lone vision. And when there's disagreement, or someone (Doc) wants to force specific decisions, it all goes through the owner. You know, like every freaking good team does! I don't get why this hasn't been the way since day 1, and Ballmer is to blame for this as much as Doc, I think.