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Do you see Jim O'Brien coaching beyond this season? He wasn't offered an extension entering into the last year of his contract. Personally, let him continue what he started. He gave the team an identity with his offense even if the D needs work. Call it a case of laying down the foundations in this rebuilding program, or birth pains if you will, but I really think he can coach this group to the next level.

What do you guys think?

Nope, I sure don't. I think he was a stopgap coach. If I had to guess, I'd say he gets axed midseason if we have a slow start. Unless we overachieve, I don't see him coming back for another season.

No he's not. Yes he will finish this season. He will have a job somewhere in the Pacer organization. Larry will bring in the full time future coach next off season. If Larry can't get the guy he wants or likes. Then JOB will get a 1 year contract.

I say Jackson would be on Larry's top 3, but not number 1.

Gimme Mike Brown or Byron Scott next year.

As for O'Brien, I don't see him coming back unless the team severely overachieves this season. He's a good guy and a decent coach, but I don't think he's the guy to coach us to the next level.

I think its pretty clear that O'brian's commitment to defense and letting Harter put his stamp on the team are both not happening. As a result I don't seem lasting past this season.

PR07 wrote:Gimme Mike Brown or Byron Scott next year.

As for O'Brien, I don't see him coming back unless the team severely overachieves this season. He's a good guy and a decent coach, but I don't think he's the guy to coach us to the next level.

I'm cool with Brown. Don't think Scott is the right man for the job. I like Jackson, Thibodeau, and Jeff Van Gundy.

I want Avery Johnson and I think he would be the right guy to hand pick our PG of the future.

Not saying he will stay but Bird has been loyal to guys like Carlisle, Croshere, Foster, and Obie could be on that list too.

Yes.

Jim O'Brien was good for what we needed, but he is an awful coach. I feel like that is an insult to awful because O'Brien is a moron. Granted, after the All-Star game, he really only had a bad game or two, but his rotations are terrible, his defensive strategy is awful, and he can't draw up a decent last second play to save his life.

That being said, he was a good coach for a rebuild. He put points on the board and is a player coach, so in that sense he was what we needed - but there is no way he should have coached past last season. Ideally, we should have hired Mark Jackson and let him grow as a coach while the team grew together, but it is what it is.

I think Larry Bird should hire Mark Jackson as an assistant coach that will eventually take over for O'Brien either mid-season or after next season. Before that, he should trade Foster for a package based around Lawson, and Mark Jackson could mentor Lawson until next season when both can step up. Thats just what I would ideally like to see, but it won't happen.

The only way he isn't the coach at the end of the season is if they completely implode, but I don't see that happening. We should at least finish near the playoff cut like we have the last few years, in which case he won't be fired during the season, if only for $$$ reasons. I think he's done better than what could be expected during this rebuilding phase where he has had to coach two different teams the last two seasons. I don't know if it is a credit to O'Brien or the players, but the team always played hard every night, and the young player improved as the season went on. I think whether he gets an extension is less dependent on how the team does this year and more on whether the front office thinks he is the right coach to take the team forward.

I don't think you can say he's awful. He gets a lot more out of his players than he should. I mean he coached a Celtics team of Pierce and Antoine "Chucker" Walker to an Eastern Conference Finals with a mediocre veteran cast. Last year's team essentially had Granger, Murphy, Foster, Ford, and Jack as the only proven talent on the team, and that's not exactly the most talented bunch when it's all said and done (I'm not counting Rasho since he never really showed signs that he wanted to be here).

As for Scott, I think he's a really, really good coach. The ex-Pacer is a guy I think the Pacers could hire and would take them to the next level. The reason is defense, look at how Scott's teams have ranked defensively:

08-09: 9th
07-08: 7th
06-07: 14th
05-06: 19th
04-05: 21st (Started with Hornets)
03-04: 4th
02-03: 1st
01-02: 1st
00-01: 23rd (Started with Nets)

What this tells me is that Scott knows how to get his teams to improve defensively, and as we've seen more often than not is that the best teams are generally the ones that play the best defense game-in and game-out.

He's not a guy that I'd hand raw talent too as he's clashed with raw players like JR Smith, Brandon Bass, and Julian Wright in the past; but I don't think the Pacers will have that problem as all of their young guys are pretty mature and were all 3-4 year college players.

Scott cited his playing days under Pat Riley in Los Angeles and Larry Brown in Indiana, and his time as an assistant under Adelman in Sacramento as key influences in his coaching career.

"I've had three guys that have taught me how to approach this game from a coaching standpoint," Scott said. "It's kind of rubbed off. I always though, if you didn't take something from those guys then you were doing yourself an injustice."

Paul said Scott "really understands players because he's a players' coach."
"Guys on our team can really respect him and understand him because he played in this league and was successful," Paul said. "He was a great player in this league and that's why we listen to him and we understand we can learn a lot. Coach has made me into the player I am today and I'm forever grateful to him."

http://www.sportingnews.com/nba/article ... coach-year

To read about Scott from a Hornets' fan perspective:
http://www.hornets247.com/blog/2009/05/ ... n-scott-go

OBrien isn't too bad of a coach. He has guided a team that was given the death penalty, to a respectable level of play. It could be a lot worse. Jim is directly linked to the births of Granger and Dunleavy, and the rebirth of Troy. I think O'brien is the person who finally made JO realize that his wide-open offense implies that everyone is an option. Soon after the blackhole vanished, but JO's defense remained stellar. I respect the way he coaches.

Larry said coaches in general have a 3 year shelf-life. To be fair I'll wait and judge him after 20 games, but Bird will atleast give him next season then evaluate the situation and make a decision. I think if he leads the team to a competitive playoff series, win or lose, he comes back.

PR07 wrote:Gimme Mike Brown or Byron Scott next year.

As for O'Brien, I don't see him coming back unless the team severely overachieves this season. He's a good guy and a decent coach, but I don't think he's the guy to coach us to the next level.

I used to really like Mike Brown as a coach, but not anymore. I would love him as an assistant coach (which he won't ever be again), but I don't love what he is doing in Cleveland. With Lebron you are at least going to the 2nd round.

I like defensive oriented teams. Those teams win championships. I think JOB is gone, and I really hope we can get a good coach. I beleive we will get a good coach. We have MANY former players turned coaches who are very good coaches. One of them would work for me. I still really like Carlisle, too. Don't be surprised if he is gone, Mark Cuban doesn't have the most patience. I doubt Carlisle would come back, but he would be towards the top of my list.

We need a coach who preaches DEFENSE! Then a semi-star to go along with Granger (hopefully Rush)that Ds up well and we have a nice start.

Hansbrough is the kind of guy that is great for a championship team. It seems like we are almost building a team backwards. I just hope Bird and company know what they are doing. But it looks like they are filling up the role players. We still need a very good player to pair with Granger soon, though.

I personally want O'Brien to stay until Larry's rebuilding is done. If Larry would fire O'Brien with his plans in half-bloom then it's all a waste of the whole "rebuilding" process. I'd say let's see first how this team will perform once we have all the players that Obie needs for his system. The thing that worries me is that we might re-build again under a new coach. We're basically trying to make a running team for a fast-paced system, just like Obie's. Under a new coach, the system could change into haf-court sets, which revolves around an efficient post player and a playmaking point guard.
Though i have no problems at all if Larry would hire Brown or Byron Scott or whoever there is, i'm just saying maybe we could give Obie at least another full season or maybe two, just to see if we could really excel in his system.
You don't wanna fire the engineer in the middle of construction. Well, unless you have Gustav Eiffel as a replacement.

Well, I'm sure Bird would consider what type of offense any future coach would use before hiring him.

Without a particular point to argue, I just want to point out a few of my opinions.

What might have been lost amidst the anticlimactic Finals is that the Lakers just won with one of the more high-scoring teams, which did play great defense, but had no standouts in that area besides Kobe and Ariza. I don't think a team should orient itself on either end of the court. What gets overlooked in the Spurs championships is that, yes their defense was good, but they also had tremendous firepower, and 75% of the reason they held opponents to low scores was because they held the entire game to a low score by grinding things to a halt.

Now the Pacers are undoubtedly a bad defensive team, but a part of it was also the fact that we tweaked the lineup so much that there was little consistency. In a man-to-man, you have to rely on switches and sometimes help defense, and teammates feeling comfortable with each other while on the floor is a very important part of defense. The current Pacers have more defensive potential than they are given credit for, meaning the answer may not lie in getting a defensive specialist. Granger and Rush and Jarrett Jack/Ford (on PG's) are very good options, and now with scrappy inside men with Hansbrizzle and Feisty, the team may surprise many people with an above-average defense.

Getting to the subject at hand, Jim O'Brien had good defensive teams in his previous tenures, and with one more season, he may get this squad to perform well on that end of the court, but his focus was definitely on improving the team's scoring with fewer viable options, especially with Dunleavy and Quisy out for chunks of the season. I give him credit for managing to get TJ, Jack, Rush, Granger, Murphy, and Hibbert over 100 points night in and night out.

I am willing to give him one entire year, but I would very much like to see someone take over once we've come upon some playoff success.

I will say one thing for Obie: He gets effort out of his players. They don't quit on him. That may sound like something small, but in today's NBA, it's a pretty impressive feat. Part of that could be the character of the guys on our team, but it's worth noting nonetheless.

Is JOB the right guy for the Job?

Yes. He's cheap, Players like him, Media hates him, and the team is getting better.

are their upgrades? yep. If Avery Johnson wanted to make Indiana his home, and coach the pacers while being a presence in the community? SURE!

I would not want avery or brown. scoot and jackson are on my list. i would love to bring in jackson as assistant but he wouldnt do that.