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I haven't seen this discussed yet, but the Suns hired Ty Corbin as an assistant coach last week.

I was outspoken against the Watson hiring because I though that a more experienced coach would be a better fit for our young team. I lambasted Sarver for refusing to spend money on a coach that could really help our young players grow.

I would like to take most of that back. Jay Triano and Ty Corbin are exactly the kind of coaches this young team needs. Between those two hirings and the draft, I'm much more optimistic about the Suns future. It seems like we're finally investing in building a basketball program instead of hastily cobbling together random parts.

Corbin spent seven years working under the great Jerry Sloan, and was the head coach of the Jazz from 2011-2014. Those certainly weren't glory years for Utah, but he still spent nearly a decade working with one of the greatest of all time. He took over interim coach duties during the 2014-2015 season in Sacremento, so he has experience handling some of the most dysfunctional players in the league.

It's good to see that Sarver is finally assembling a real coaching staff. Between Corbin/Triano, Watson will have a lot of NBA knowledge to lean on during his first full year. I'm bullish on his growth as a coach because of it.

wow. didn't notice this news-- i didn't even realize the suns had hired Jay Triano-- so thanks for the thread.

ty corbin didn't hav ea lot of success in Utah but I'm not holding anything atht happened in Sac against him. he stepped into the head coaching role after the most ridiculous HC firing in recent NBA history (firing of coach Mike Malone). I like the hire of Corbin because he has proven himself to be a professional even when the franchise employing him is run like a circus. I assume that's a trait Sarver looks for, now.

did Jay Triano's coaching time in Portland overlap with Earl Watson's playing time in Portland?

aIvin adams wrote:wow. didn't notice this news-- i didn't even realize the suns had hired Jay Triano-- so thanks for the thread.

ty corbin didn't hav ea lot of success in Utah but I'm not holding anything atht happened in Sac against him. he stepped into the head coaching role after the most ridiculous HC firing in recent NBA history (firing of coach Mike Malone). I like the hire of Corbin because he has proven himself to be a professional even when the franchise employing him is run like a circus. I assume that's a trait Sarver looks for, now.

did Jay Triano's coaching time in Portland overlap with Earl Watson's playing time in Portland?

Ya, Triano was in Portland when Watson was there.

A substitute teacher without a lessonplan. Just a disciplinarian to keep the youngins in check

Good pick up for you guys.

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... welcome back to Phoenix. Corbin came to the Suns from Cleveland at the trading deadline in late February 1988, along with Mark West and a twenty-one-year old rookie point guard named Kevin Johnson (plus the first-round pick that the Suns would use to select Dan Majerle). The following season, Corbin eventually became the Suns' starting small forward as they finished with just two wins fewer than the two-time defending champion "Showtime" Lakers and reached the Western Conference Finals.

http://www.basketball-reference.com/boxscores/198904220SAS.html

http://www.basketball-reference.com/boxscores/198905130GSW.html

http://www.basketball-reference.com/boxscores/198905160PHO.html

http://www.basketball-reference.com/boxscores/198905200LAL.html

Phoenix then left Corbin unprotected prior to the 1989 expansion draft, a decision that the Suns quickly came to regret. Corbin would later serve as Utah's starting small forward when the Jazz reached the 1994 Western Conference Finals.

Hiring an assistant with NBA head coaching experience made sense, so Corbin fits that bill. As a longtime NBA forward, I am sure that he will spend considerable time working with Bender and Chriss.

GetYourPHX wrote:I was outspoken against the Watson hiring because I though that a more experienced coach would be a better fit for our young team. I lambasted Sarver for refusing to spend money on a coach that could really help our young players grow.

I would like to take most of that back. Jay Triano and Ty Corbin are exactly the kind of coaches this young team needs. Between those two hirings and the draft, I'm much more optimistic about the Suns future. It seems like we're finally investing in building a basketball program instead of hastily cobbling together random parts.

... perhaps, but given Sarver's history of impatience, who knows how long any sort of blueprint will last? Will Sarver give this coaching staff, say, three years, or will he again one day scramble the assistants in order to place pressure on the head coach?

I love the Suns' draft haul from last week (regardless of how these players develop, I appreciate the approach), but Phoenix also obtained multiple first-round players in 2013 and 2014, so the Suns have been willing to usher in a lot of very young players in recent years. The question, then, is why Sarver seemed so impatient to win given Phoenix's manifest commitment to the draft under McDonough.

GMATCallahan wrote:

GetYourPHX wrote:I was outspoken against the Watson hiring because I though that a more experienced coach would be a better fit for our young team. I lambasted Sarver for refusing to spend money on a coach that could really help our young players grow.

I would like to take most of that back. Jay Triano and Ty Corbin are exactly the kind of coaches this young team needs. Between those two hirings and the draft, I'm much more optimistic about the Suns future. It seems like we're finally investing in building a basketball program instead of hastily cobbling together random parts.

... perhaps, but given Sarver's history of impatience, who knows how long any sort of blueprint will last? Will Sarver give this coaching staff, say, three years, or will he again one day scramble the assistants in order to place pressure on the head coach?

I love the Suns' draft haul from last week (regardless of how these players develop, I appreciate the approach), but Phoenix also obtained multiple first-round players in 2013 and 2014, so the Suns have been willing to usher in a lot of very young players in recent years. The question, then, is why Sarver seemed so impatient to win given Phoenix's manifest commitment to the draft under McDonough.

Let's hope our old-dog owner has learned to sit.

It'd be a refreshing new trick.

Interestingly enough, Corbin was one of the finalists for the job in 2008 after MDA quit that eventually went to Porter.

The finalists that year were Elston Turner, Mike Budenholzer, Corbin, and Porter.

If only Kerr hired Budenholzer instead...

GMATCallahan wrote:... perhaps, but given Sarver's history of impatience, who knows how long any sort of blueprint will last? Will Sarver give this coaching staff, say, three years, or will he again one day scramble the assistants in order to place pressure on the head coach?

Yes - I really hope this staff is given time. I caught a few minutes of the Suns summer league semi-finals game this afternoon. At one point Earl Watson was interviewed from the crowd as he spectated, and sounded like a coach who feels as though he has plenty of time to develop this group. He spoke about the Suns cultivating a 'program', and routinely talks about building a culture of family in the Suns organization.

Watson certainly talks the talk, and I'm inclined to buy it.

Planting the Hayward seed?

YFZblu wrote:

GMATCallahan wrote:... perhaps, but given Sarver's history of impatience, who knows how long any sort of blueprint will last? Will Sarver give this coaching staff, say, three years, or will he again one day scramble the assistants in order to place pressure on the head coach?

Yes - I really hope this staff is given time. I caught a few minutes of the Suns summer league semi-finals game this afternoon. At one point Earl Watson was interviewed from the crowd as he spectated, and sounded like a coach who feels as though he has plenty of time to develop this group. He spoke about the Suns cultivating a 'program', and routinely talks about building a culture of family in the Suns organization.

Watson certainly talks the talk, and I'm inclined to buy it.

The "program" label is certainly appropriate given the college-like youth that permeates the current roster.

I am sure that Watson believes in what he is pitching; Sarver and management probably believe in it for now. The question is how patient Sarver and management will eventually prove in handling what should be a long-term rebuilding plan. The Suns may have already assembled their starting lineup of the future, but it is probably a few years away from being ready to win on a consistent basis. Phoenix will need to trade either Brandon Knight, Eric Bledsoe, or both over the next couple of years, which means that the basic rebuilding chores are far from over. After three seasons in the NBA, Alex Len remains a long-term question mark. Dragan Bender and Marquese Chriss are more talented, but they are entering the league at even younger ages. Devin Booker is much more advanced because his father played in the NBA, but overall the Suns epitomize the conundrum of the contemporary league: there is more money and technology invested and perhaps more impatience than ever before, but the players need more time to develop than ever before.

I have either viewed the Suns' Summer League games or I have DVRd them and will watch them later. (There are two that I still need to catch up with.) If Bender and Chriss had spent three or four years in college (or if Bender had entered the draft in three or four years' time, after becoming a seasoned professional overseas rather than a kid playing sparingly), I would be really excited about how much the Suns could improve within a couple of years. I still love the Suns' draft (and Ulis, although undersized, is a better playmaker now than Bledsoe or Knight will ever be), but this process could prove long and slow. (Even surprising initial success could stagnate or regress in subsequent years.) Yet many of these filthy-rich owners, like Sarver, come in and seem to believe that just because they made a ton of money in one sector of the economy (finance, real estate, whatever), their basketball franchises should automatically be successful. When their presence fails to 'magically' translate to success, they blame the people around them and impatiently overturn the roster or the organization. The truth, however, is that they do not know basketball and do not really understand what they are watching. They may, in that case, fall back on media hype, which is not the way to acquire basketball knowledge.