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I watch a little bit of the Hello & Welcome podcast to the SAS game.
There Will has shown some plays he himself recorded (Thats why the quality isnt great, but enough)

While watching the game, i am not able to see everything at once, especially as i am concentrating on whoever the ball has.
Up til now, i wasnt really worried, as i thought that they simply need more time together to gel.
But Will has highlighted some things, that made me actually concerned about the season moving forward.
I will try to describe them as good as i can.

Defense:
1st Play:

Early in the game, Wemby has the ball and attacks Poeltl, who actually was able to stay in front of him, but for no reason or lets say far too early, Scottie left his man to help Yak in a situation that was under control as much it can be against wemby. Wemby is still driving with the ball towards the basket, Poeltl still in front of him and Wemby gets trapped by Yak, IQ and Scottie and BI has also left his man to be in the paint. 4 Players are around Wemby, with BI and Scotties man wide open on the 3pt line. Of course, wemby kicks the ball out to H.Barnes, RJ does the correct thing rotates to H.Barnes, BI at least rotates to RJs man a little, but scottie also runs to H.Barnes instead of running to Castle who is still open on the perimeter. In this situation, IQ needed to rotate to him and Scottie should then take over IQs man. But IQ just goes back to his man, Barnes is guarding nobody, and Yak makes the right rotation towards castle, but as hobbled as he is, he cant do anything and Castle scored.

To summarize: Scottie runs around like a headless chicken and leaves his man open, BI has left his man open for no reason, and IQ didnt rotate when needed and Yak simply unable to do anything because of health. Out of 5 Starters, only one did his job in this play and that was RJ.

2nd Play:

Harrison Barnes gets the ball on the 3pt line, BI is guardin him everything as it should be. But for reasons RJs comes to double him which leaves, Julian Champagnie wide open, of course Barnes passed the ball to him and Champagnie runs to the basket with an open lane, Yak has to leave Wemby open! to rotate, but of course he is not in time to stop the dunk.



Offense:

1st Play:

Yak gets the ball near the 3 point line at top on the right side of the, movement is very little IQ messes up the off-ball screen to get Barnes open. And the only thing that yak can do is a hand off pass, which in this situation does nothing for the offense. RJ then gets a switch to Wemby! while driving to the basket and Noone makes himself available at the 3 point line and just watches RJ. In the end RJ has to take a tough shot and misses.

There is no cutting, noone open anywhere, no real movement. This isnt an issue about spacing, this in an issue about simply not doing what you should do.

2nd Play:

Scottie and mamu play a two man game on the 3 point line which leads to scottie taking a contested mid range jumper with 15 seconds left. There was no need to take that. 15 seconds is enough time to do something.


To Summarize:

This is a big issue about BB IQ and communication and we have very little so far.

What the hell were they doing all summer and Training camp? They simply not doing what they should be doing. Forget spacing and fit and all that stuff. This is about doing the right play.

And that makes me very concerned, cause those Players should know it by now, what the right play is.

These were always concerns going into the season.

The starting lineup is at complete odds with Darko’s coaching philosophies and it’s not something that can be fixed. It’s why he’s searching desperately for line ups that can win their minutes.

Helping 1 pass a way is a concept you learn in elementary school. Not sure what first team defense Barnes is trying to do.

Barnes is not a guy that should be jogging back slowly so he gets beat back on transition.
And he does it too often. He needs a pointed mid-game benching for it to change that behavior.

I don't think there's anything that can ever be done with Grady on defense. He's just always going to be bad.

HumbleRen wrote:These were always concerns going into the season.

The starting lineup is at complete odds with Darko’s coaching philosophies and it’s not something that can be fixed. It’s why he’s searching desperately for line ups that can win their minutes.

Darko's job this season (by his own admission, as well as management and the players) is to win games. It's not to implement his own philosophies, especially if the roster is not suited to those philosophies. I wonder how much of this is Darko's inflexibility or the front office dictating an on-court strategy. The latter would explain the last two drafts.

In the SAS game I thought Castle didn’t back down when Scottie tried to bully him, and that put Scottie in his feelings for the rest of the night.

There were some concerns about Darko being too nice in his 1st year. I think those concerns are still valid. Do players like playing for Darko because he is "fun" and they experience less stress? Probably. Do they respect him as their coach and leader? I am not so sure.

I think a coach like Darko is the wost possible coach for a guy like Scottie. He already has major issues with accountability & disceplene. He needs a coach that will do those things for him. He needs a disceplenarian.

Scottie plays really really well sometimes but the truth is overall he has a lot of bad/ lazy habits that show up far too often. Having a guy like that as your "franchise player" or "leader" is a recipe for disaster. Many of our players have been babied too much & you can see the result on the floor. Especially Scottie.

Guys like MJ & Kobe became who they were because they were extremely disciplined & had excellent work habits. Their teammates followed them because of these traits.

MEDIC wrote:There were some concerns about Darko being too nice in his 1st year. I think those concerns are still valid. Do players like playing for Darko because he is "fun" and they experience less stress? Probably. Do they respect him as their ciach and leader? I am not so sure.

I think a coach like Darko is the wost possible coach for a guy like Scottie. He already has major issues with accountability & disceplene. He needs a coach that will do those things for him.

Thibs and Scottie would be entertaining to say the least. It would either be great or a train wreck, but hey.. at least you’re taking a swing.

They suspended Pascal, an actual legit qulaity player) for the same offense (leaving the bench early) that they said nothing to Scottie for, and then Darko was caught lying to the media about raising it with him. That episode told us a lot. And none of it was encouraging.

Scottie sulking after being played off the bench under Nurse was a red flag too. Sad that all the habits Kyle built into the org were pissed all over for someone’s potential. Only for those things to be what that player would need to reach it.

TeamDisgruntled wrote:

MEDIC wrote:There were some concerns about Darko being too nice in his 1st year. I think those concerns are still valid. Do players like playing for Darko because he is "fun" and they experience less stress? Probably. Do they respect him as their ciach and leader? I am not so sure.

I think a coach like Darko is the wost possible coach for a guy like Scottie. He already has major issues with accountability & disceplene. He needs a coach that will do those things for him.

Thibs and Scottie would be entertaining to say the least. It would either be great or a train wreck, but hey.. at least you’re taking a swing.

That's most likely the next move if the season goes sideways right? Either Thibs or Malone?

I don't think we're a great trade partner because of the massive contracts we've given out so a coaching change seems more realistic.

HumbleRen wrote:These were always concerns going into the season.

The starting lineup is at complete odds with Darko’s coaching philosophies and it’s not something that can be fixed. It’s why he’s searching desperately for line ups that can win their minutes.

A coach's job is to devise schemes are strategies optimized to the roster he is. These ridiculous never ending excuses for Darko's poor record need to stop

TeamDisgruntled wrote:

MEDIC wrote:There were some concerns about Darko being too nice in his 1st year. I think those concerns are still valid. Do players like playing for Darko because he is "fun" and they experience less stress? Probably. Do they respect him as their ciach and leader? I am not so sure.

I think a coach like Darko is the wost possible coach for a guy like Scottie. He already has major issues with accountability & disceplene. He needs a coach that will do those things for him.

Thibs and Scottie would be entertaining to say the least. It would either be great or a train wreck, but hey.. at least you’re taking a swing.

As an organization, you can't always be worried about how Scottie is going to react to things. You have to set the tone. Set the culture. If Scottie can't step up & perform within that culture........well, you know who the problem is. Someone who is that inflexible can be toxic.

It's like annointing Dennis Rodman as your franchise player, then hiring a full coaching staff to make sure he is "comfortable" all of the time. It would be a complete train wreck.

I would still love to know what Fred and Pascal experienced that first year with him. Hearing those stories would be very telling.

Masai/Casey

vs

Bobby/Darko

it's night and day in terms of a culture of accountability, discipline and "tough love"

It would be intereating to know if the defensive philosophy has changed from the end of last season to now. Are the players simply confused & inexperienced, or are they unwilling and incapable of doing what is asked.

I am a big believer in building a roster that fits what your coach wants to do. If you don't respect your coach enough to do that, then you probably made a huge mistake hiring that coach.

It is much worse than I thought as well..

Poeltl has been the worst player in the league

DelAbbot wrote:Masai/Casey

vs

Bobby/Darko

it's night and day in terms of a culture of accountability, discipline and "tough love"

We went from the school of hard knocks to a baby faced surfer & a birthday party clown.

Perhaps another cobra staff would help

Nature wrote:

TeamDisgruntled wrote:

MEDIC wrote:There were some concerns about Darko being too nice in his 1st year. I think those concerns are still valid. Do players like playing for Darko because he is "fun" and they experience less stress? Probably. Do they respect him as their ciach and leader? I am not so sure.

I think a coach like Darko is the wost possible coach for a guy like Scottie. He already has major issues with accountability & disceplene. He needs a coach that will do those things for him.

Thibs and Scottie would be entertaining to say the least. It would either be great or a train wreck, but hey.. at least you’re taking a swing.

That's most likely the next move if the season goes sideways right? Either Thibs or Malone?

I don't think we're a great trade partner because of the massive contracts we've given out so a coaching change seems more realistic.

100%. If Darko can't aget this team to play close to.500 ball by January, then you need to go a vastly different direction. It will be close to impossible to overhaul this roster at this point.

Stromile12 wrote:Perhaps another cobra staff would help

Maybe you would prefer a large boulder that symbolized hard work and constant improvement.

When we can’t steam roll teams I have a feeling they just stop fighting. Unless it’s tank time when they have nothing at stake and they play hard. It’s maddening actually. We’ll see if my theory is true with more games to come. We can probably stay .500 and sneak into the play-in by beating up bad teams.