Xatticus wrote:I don't think there is really much of an argument to be made that he is above average.
Malone
Stevens
Snyder
Popovich
Spoelstra
Budenholzer
Nurse
Carlisle
Monty Williams
I think these guys are clearly better. There is a strong argument for many more. I don't know that you could name more than a handful that are clearly worse. I'm not really advocating that we move on from Clifford for this reason. I think you could do worse. I don't think he is doing a ton of harm if he is in line with where the organization wants to go. I'd have a short list though and if someone that I wanted came available, I wouldn't hesitate to move on from Clifford if they were willing to take the job.
I wouldn't pushback much on that. If I was doing a tiered list of coaches (S,A,B,C,D,E,F), I think he would wind up in upper to mid C tier for me. All of the coaches you named are clearly better in my opinion, && that's the upper echelon level that Clifford will never reach. But that's only 9/30 && after glancing at the remaining coaches, Doc is the only one I can definitively say without having to think about it that I'd rather have over Clifford.
The rest are retreads (which you could argue Cliff is) or unproven. I'm willing to concede that he's just average, but my point is average in my books is more desirable than the awful level that many of these up-and-comers wind up being.
Is he better than Vogel? Probably not. But it's also tough to say because he's never had the rosters Vogel had in Indy/LA and Vogel was horrendous in Orlando. There is also the argument that Vogel is more suited to elevate an elite roster to contention, while Cliff is more suited to elevate a middling roster to the playoffs. I'd probably take Mcmillian. Van Gundy has the better track record but has struggled mightily since Miami/Orlando. Donovan is meh. Thibs is right on par with cliff imo, but probably edges him.
Lue is fine, but it's splitting hairs. I guess the point is I'm not in love with Cliff either, but he's average enough for me not to blindly push him out the door in favor of one of the hot new young assistants that come out every year. I'd rather poach a proven college guy.
