Wizards @ Spurs 8:30PM

[montestewart]

Monte stop posting on your phone while driving. It's dangerous.

Balancing safety and clarity, the key to the 21st century.

[payitforward]

The point payitforward was making (previous page) was NOT that coaching doesn't matter, but rather that the marginal difference between NBA-level coaches is small. In a study on NBA coaches, David Berri compared coaches to "principal clerks" in Adam Smith's "An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations."

...Why do "principal clerks" and coaches appear to be the same? Essentially, coaches appear to receive similar training, face similar information sets, and ultimately make similar decisions. The results -- perhaps not surprising when you consider these similarities -- are that outcomes with different coaches are quite similar.

Berri's 2009 paper on NBA coaches is here.

Right, and I'm familiar with Dave's paper. I didn't have the link handy, and I might not have included it anyway, since a) not much chance Hands (to whom I was responding) would read it -- he's convinced that he has some kind of clever skill at knowing what lineups produce a "chemical reaction" with what other lineups, pretty much a ridiculous notion IMO -- and 2) I had no idea the topic would have legs as it seems to have.

*Of course* coaching matters -- but in-game coaching is a small part of the job, and guys who make it to coach in the NBA have proved along the way that they are proficient at the skills of the job. I note that this team isn't better with Wittman than it was with Saunders.

Perhaps I'm wrong and Hands *will* read Dave Berri's paper. If so, I'd like to hear his response.

[Nivek]

And, in another one of life's little ironies, one of the coaches who showed up as statistically distinguishable from the worst coaches -- Flip Saunders. Which really isn't surprising if you look at the performance of Flip's teams throughout his entire coaching career.

[hands11]

I think just like everything there's some outliers out there when it comes to a coach's real impact.

If anyone doesn't think the Lakers situation is highly influenced by their coaching situation, then your not paying attention.

But for the most part I think coaches don't have a major impact unless their really bad or really good.

I think the Wizards had a bad coach in Eddie... But Gil's star was bright enough to overcome his coaches' faults.

I don't think Wittman is very good either, but honestly he may have only cost the team a game or two over the course of the season because the talent level dictates that were pretty bad.

Obviously an unprovable thing since we can't turn back the clock and do it differently. So neither side can prove they are right. Not definitively. But for one game, it looks like coaching helped. Webster and Trevor A at SG and SF produced results. They got looks for the kind of shots they can hit and they hit them. Now if we only could turn back the clock and see if it would have help win the SAC game that we lost by 2.

Also, Randy ran less of the offense through Nene in the post and instead did more high screen. Again, it looked like it produced results. Nene had a good game after looking pretty bad lately. Nene had zero turnovers and 10 rebounds 6-9 shooting. And the offense moved well.

Wizards also did really poorly when they had Kevin S and Singleton at the center and PF with Price at PG. Anyone surprised that was the case ? -9 in 1:30 minutes going against, Melo, Felton, Amare, Smith.

There have been a number of moves like this all year. And we have lost lots of close games.

Coaching between NBA quality HCs might not be much but who is saying Randy is a NBA quality HC. I think that is kind of the topic at hand.

Like I said. Randy has been mostly an assistant. Hopefully he learns now that he is getting minutes at HC.