Mike D'Antoni - How do you like him now?

[Chocolate City Jordanaire]

http://basketball.realgm.com/wiretap/22 ... r-Dominant

Mike D'Antoni believes the Lakers should not have to be reliant on Bryant to play one-on-one basketball when he returns, because they have proven to be much more balanced playing together and sharing the ball.

"We don't have to be one-player dominant," D'Antoni said. "The ball has to move, and when it does, we're really good."

I really like what is going on with the Lakers. They are fun to watch now and they have a swagger. Some of the credit has to go to the man not named Phil, but named Mike D.

[LApwnd]

D still blows, as for your backhanded compliment inregards to our team play w/o Kobe, not speaking for others but I really hate it when non-laker fans chime in on our team play as if we take in solice in your appreciation of our team play because deep down inside all non-laker fans want to see us do badly but when we dont w/o Kobe you just get more ammo to hate on him.

[Slava]

Mike has done well. He got an unfair amount of criticism in the sense that he was essentially chosen ahead of Phil Jackson, which is pretty much how Mike Brown got a lot of his flak as well for.

The biggest positive to happen to Mike is that Dwight has now bought into his system and therefore there is a difference of night and day on our defense primarily, which was my biggest concern moving forward on if we will be able to keep D12 if he does not see eye to eye with a coach that has a 4 year contract and will be here for much of Dwight's prime.

I like his substitution patterns and the way he can manage the subtle variations in offense. He has to ride Kobe a little too much but still he had no other valid option until first Nash and now Blake returned and Meeks started to play well.

He has also done a good job of getting the best out of Jamison and getting our players to be a lot more aggressive than they have been in the past season.

If he can integrate Pau into his system while keeping the momentum going into the playoffs, he will get a solid A from me for the season.

[Speedlot]

Sorta disrespectful to Kobe. Passive aggressive BS, but hey if we win i can't complain. Though it's kinda backstabby to Kobe's carry.

[swag2011]

He's OK. No better or worse than mike brown. I am really concerned about his in game coaching though. When Toronto kept going at Jodie Meeks, he didn't take him out. We could've legit lost that game because of that

[Rox_Nix_Nox]

Didn't understand his jab at kobe, when kobe already completely change his game to get "the ball moving", yea that got them REALLY far. Point is they've hit a soft-spot in their schedule, thats it.

[ArC_man]

I don't even pay attention to D'Antoni anymore, dude's been taking jabs at Kobe/Pau in interviews all year.

[LApwnd]

isn't his comments sorta hyprocritical considering his Sun team offensively was dominanted by what Nash did and didn't do with the ball? I dont recall anyone saying get the ball out of Nash hands during those times and having more ball sharing all around, I understand what he means as in passing more often than having Kobe heavy iso but having the ball in Nash hand all the time during his Pho tenure suggest otherwise to his comments.

[DEEP3CL]

Great post LApwnd....was thinking the same thing. Then the OP takes a backhanded pot shot at Kobe. But I'm not surprised at all it's what he does whenever he post here. If I were him I'd be worried about how his Wizards suck and look to be going nowhere no time soon.

Further more MDA was thrown into the fire, smart fans with some sort of IQ realize this. But us Laker fans aren't just going to anoint MDA over Phil just because we finally jumped over 500. That's kinda dumb and stupid to be real about it.

[The Skyhook]

After the win last night I mentioned something similar to this in the game thread. Lakers can be most dangerous when everyone is involved. This team has too many weapons on offense to only rely on Kobe. This time with Kobe out could be beneficial for the Lakers as the rest of the guys build confidence n themselves so that when Kobe returns this team could be clicking on all cylinders.

[XtotheDeezy]

If Kobe realizes this, then we become #1 with a bullet.

[crazyeights]

Anyone else thinking we're being a little sensitive here?

Kobe's a big boy, he can handle hearing a fact. The Lakers needed Kobe when we were a mess, but now the ship has been righted. Kob doesn't need to go one-on-five for us to win. He was playing phenomenally and willing us to win, but it's probably for the best that the team is getting a little more swagger right now.

It'll only help in the playoffs. Jamison and Blake have been relevantions the past few games.

I agree with Slava, integrate Pau and MDA has been solid.

[dockingsched]

Anyone else thinking we're being a little sensitive here?

just a little, lol? crazy how saying kobe doesn't have to dominate the team is somehow a dig at him.


anyway, mike d has been very impressive in terms of his flexibility. he doesn't hesitate to change up the lineup/rotation, and for all the complaints about his stubbornness about his system, he's totally adapted it to what makes the team win games.

i'm still eager to see how he handles the pau situation, more so in terms of the media, not so much on court. he already said he'd start pau, and honestly i had no issue with coming off the bench. my main issue with him was his sort of lack of knowing how to show some respect for pau. not try to be a smart ass with the media regarding pau, something he started off doing on day one.

[Slava]

Just reading the quotes it did not occur to me that this could be a slight at Kobe. I felt more in the sense that he's complimenting the role players for stepping up.

[TyCobb]

Here was Ding's following tweet: D'Antoni said Kobe "has come a long way toward facilitating and all that. We just have to keep reinforcing that and getting better at it."

[Laker0916]

He's just speaking the obvious. This team is supremely talented and not relient on one player or atleast we shouldn't be.

[Kilroy]

Like his flexibility. It's refreshing after years of Phil... But then again, Phil really didn't need to be flexible.
Don't like how we can't figure out how to play solid team D.

Honestly the real mark of a Lakers coach is how they adjust to the playoffs. But right now, I don't think we're good enough to go very far in the playoffs, so I don't think there will be much chance for D'Antoni to show a lot there.

The main knock on D'Antoni for me has always been that he was a great regular season coach but not a very good post season coach. So for me, there's still a lot to be shown.

[TruSkool]

He's OK. No better or worse than mike brown. I am really concerned about his in game coaching though. When Toronto kept going at Jodie Meeks, he didn't take him out. We could've legit lost that game because of that

how do you lose a game legitly? is it like losing on paper and on tv...or can they just lose on tv and still be a legit loss?

[Asianiac_24]

We won last game because Jamison dropped 27 and Blake dropped 21, and as a team shot lights out from 3. Thats not going to happen every game, and it was against Sacramento. I still don't like MDA. This whole season all he talks about is our offense when the real problem is on the other side of the ball. Our offense is good enough to be one of the top offensive teams in the league, its our defense that is letting us down. Quite honestly, except for effort I really don't see any improvements on defense at all, we are just playing harder. We still don't guard the P&R well, we still get killed by fast PGs, and our transition defense still sucks. We are still running our main players (Nash, Kobe, Dwight) to the ground. Until MDA installs a defensive system that could at least lessen these woes, than I'll call him a good coach.

[BEazy]

Defense still bothers me a lot...Offense is good but I've seen that before...I give Mike D a B- at most.