dougthonus wrote:DropStep wrote:I think some of our young players develop, but unfortunately it's usually not our highest draft picks. Javonte came of age here and has stuck. I think Dalen Terry is quietly showing something lately. Julian Phillips looks good sometimes. Ayo, obviously, although he seemed like he had some utility from early on. I have a hunch that maybe it's some of the staff that works with the bench guys and makes them into NBA players, but Billy still should get some credit for some growth at the fringe.
We did also have a most-improved player sometime in the not-too-distant past. And, I think Matas is showing positive signs in his limited minutes, and is better now than his tape from G-league and the beginning of the season. I'm pretty optimistic about him in a not overly optimistic time for the franchise. But the bigger bets haven't really blossomed here historically, Lauri and Pat at the top of the list, which is very frustrating, especially when Lauri blew up elsewhere. If Lauri didn't become an all-star in Utah, more of that blame may be headed toward the GM for his pick, rather than the coach for lack of player development. Coby has also taken a step back this season. I guess it could just be that our more valuable coins have come up tails a few times in a row, but eventually something needs to go right with a big investment, or somebody else will get a chance to try.
One thing I would say:
Your head coach is not the primary guy developing players. You have a whole staff of guys who look at people one on one, and to the extent your HC has responsibility for player development is in hiring the right guys to do it.
The other thing is that the players themselves all have their own trainers and workout in the off-season on their own and do most of their own skill development as well. The vast, vast majority of player development is on the player themselves to put the time in combined with their inherent gifts and not some radical difference in super genius coaches that just teach orders of magnitude better than others.
From a head coach position, probably the most a head coach can do is put a guy in rotations with a chance to succeed, and not give them too much too fast and be consistent with what they tell them about how they will earn time and not overly penalize them for mistakes. BD seems to give young players a regular amount of burn and generally doesn't seem to have a quick hook, and seems relatively stable with rotations (injury permitting).
I think a coaching staff has maybe a little more ability to teach players things they didn't learn elsewhere (defensively, certainly), and also to say "you need to develop a three point shot, so go shoot 100 per day with Peter Patton" or whatever, but I generally agree with your point.
I also think if you want to pin blame on BD about Lauri, it may be more accurate to say that he failed to find quite the right offensive role to free Lauri, rather than that Lauri didn't "develop" here enough to have the tools to be a good player and suddenly found them in Utah. Cleveland, too, failed to find that threes-and-dunks scheme that he loved in Utah, so it wasn't just us.
Also, it turns out that in Lauri's age 27 season when he should be in his prime, his current PER is actually down 4 points from his career high two years ago, and is only one point higher than his sophomore season here, for whatever PER is worth. So maybe that narrative will turn out to be more complicated than it seemed, in any case.
nice trolling aka sarcam..