Official Randy Wittman Thread - It's Playoff Randy Time LOL

[dobrojim]

He was stubborn and antiquated in his approach during the reg season and was justifiably criticized for this.
But if his thinking has evolved and he has adapted more or less to what his sage critics were saying, should
he still be fired? I don't know the answer to that. I can see arguments either way. I wonder what the players
would say privately. I wonder what opposing coaches would say speaking candidly.

[hands11]

He was stubborn and antiquated in his approach during the reg season and was justifiably criticized for this.
But if his thinking has evolved and he has adapted more or less to what his sage critics were saying, should
he still be fired? I don't know the answer to that. I can see arguments either way. I wonder what the players
would say privately. I wonder what opposing coaches would say speaking candidly.

If you want to know what the players would say.. go to the Gortat thread.

Gortat was the most affected. It affected Wall as well, but Wall is the franchise player #1 pick max'd out and young. He was still a major part of what they were doing.

Gortat is the one who was most effected and he had a miserable year dealing with Randy.

But if they go to the ECF playing S4 like they are now and Gortat continues to beast, he may good solider it and keep his public thoughts to himself post season.

But they better play more S4 next season.

[dckingsfan]

Regardless of what Wittman has done - he is set for next year. Regardless of how bad Grunfeld has done he is set for next year.

So it is a bit of a moot point arguing it... it is what it is. An average coach and an average GM muddling their way through.

Just really happy we have Wall - but I think he is the one that is really suffering - just think where he would be with a good GM and coach - talent wasted in my opinion.

[gambitx777]

Mark Jackson got GS past the first round and still got canned. Playoff randy is not real randy. He is what he is.

[Doug_Blew]

Over the last 30 years, every coach before Wittman has done worse and sucked. The Wizards are a cohesive unit and enjoy playing for him. He has them playing strong defense, which is the most important part of playoff basketball. Wall and Beal have developed under Wittman. Now it seems like Porter has a good shot at it as well.

The talk last year (before the playoffs) was that Thibodeou was a great coach. That seems to be a lot different now. Hornets fans were talking about how awesome their coach was. I'm guessing that is different now too. Fans tear apart their coach when they lose. They yell at their TV to play a certain player when the other team goes on a run. That would happen no matter who the coach is.

This is the second year in a row that the Wizards have looked strong in the first round. If they can continue this against Atlanta, the team has made significant progress and Wittman deserves his due.

[Kanyewest]

Mark Jackson got GS past the first round and still got canned. Playoff randy is not real randy. He is what he is.

The year Jackson got fired, the Warriors did not get out of the first round. Also, Jackson had clashed with ownership because Jackson refused to stop preaching at his church when he became a head coach. He also refused to give credit to his assistant coaches and often fired them including Mike Malone. Yes, Jackson also ran a bad offense but it would be interesting to see if the Warriors would have just pushed him out had he just run a below average offense.

[Kanyewest]

He played a flawed bulls team last season and what seems to be an extremely unsound TOR team. He does deserve defensive kudos tho for shutting the TOR attack down offensively. I still don't buy the pierce was saved for the postseason s4 role. They coulda spotted him 16 mins there all season and helped out a ton, as well as actually trusting Porter along the way (Porter's advance stats were good to start the RS...no? So why only play him at the end? Playing Webster and butler as long as he did was folly, that and playing Seraphin at all this season.)

I'll believe in "playoff randy" if we thoroughly handle the Hawks. Cause they are a 60 win team, if we beat them due to creative Xs and Os I'll be impressed.

What evidence would be required for you to believe it ?

Would it take Paul Pierce himself saying it ?

From my understanding, Pierce had to basically beg Witt to go small. Wall said they had been asking Witt all year to put Pierce at the 4 but Witt wouldn't budge.

Source?

[Kanyewest]

He was stubborn and antiquated in his approach during the reg season and was justifiably criticized for this.
But if his thinking has evolved and he has adapted more or less to what his sage critics were saying, should
he still be fired? I don't know the answer to that. I can see arguments either way. I wonder what the players
would say privately. I wonder what opposing coaches would say speaking candidly.

It's an interesting problem. Rick Carlisle for instance got fired from the Pistons because his offense was unimaginative and he was also late towards putting Tayshaun Prince into the regular rotation. That season, the Pistons got to the conference finals, but ultimately got swept by the Nets. The Detroit Pistons ultimately parted ways and hired Larry Brown- who led them to a championship but also had more talent with the addition of Rasheed Wallace.

Some coaches can better as they age, Carlisle is now considered in the upper echelon of the coaching ranks. Now, we have to wonder is it possible that Wittman is improving as a head coach, or if it's not worth the Wizards while to have him develop on the job.

[Kanyewest]

What evidence would be required for you to believe it ?

Would it take Paul Pierce himself saying it ?

From my understanding, Pierce had to basically beg Witt to go small. Wall said they had been asking Witt all year to put Pierce at the 4 but Witt wouldn't budge.

Seriously if it was Witt's idea why did he wait so long to try it, especially when he was on the hot seat? And of course Ted will pretend that this is a slap in the face to Witt's critics even though it really confirms Witt's incompetence.

SMH

I know a guy who is willing to play small ball!

[Dat2U]

What evidence would be required for you to believe it ?

Would it take Paul Pierce himself saying it ?

From my understanding, Pierce had to basically beg Witt to go small. Wall said they had been asking Witt all year to put Pierce at the 4 but Witt wouldn't budge.

Source?

http://www.csnwashington.com/basketball ... ice-game-1

This isn't the first time that Paul Pierce has said that he discussed playing more at power forward with coach Randy Wittman. It supposedly happened during training camp going into his first season with the Wizards but was used sparingly en route to 46 wins and a No. 5 seed. Now, with the Toronto Raptors ahead in a first-round series that begins Saturday, the conversation has been revisited (CSN, CSNwashington.com and NBC Sports Live Extra, noon ET).

"We talked about it. We talked about it today," Pierce, 37, said after Thursday's practice. "That’s a possibility but whatever the task at hand, I’m ready for it. Coach told me to be prepared for it so today I’m not only at the three position on offense, I did some four stuff in dummy offense that I’m prepared for."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/pi ... story.html

“We’ve been asking all along to put him at the four a little bit,” point guard John Wall said. “We’ve been talking about it. He came here to make big plays.”

[queridiculo]

I find it funny that millie is out there trying to serve up extra helpings of crow, when the teams playoff performance so far validates the criticisms that many posters on this board have had with Wittman's coaching, and Ernie as a GM.

It's bordering on the absurd that given how well Pierce played at the four in the second half of the 2013/14 season, that it took Wittman until now to finally make some adjustments.

People want to point to the weak schedule to open the season as a reason for Washington's success, but the run Washington had with Nene out of the lineup also should have been a lesson on how much more effective Wall is directing the Wizards offense when he has more room to operate.

Butler being played over Porter in the second half of the season is just another in a series of awful decisions made by Wittman.

I'm glad that he's apparently seen the light, but given his history (telling Love not to shoot threes?), is there really any reason to believe that he's going to do things much differently going forward?

Time will tell, but I'm still firmly in the camp of taking advantage of the team option, and moving in a new direction in the front office, and with the coaching when the time comes to rebuild this roster.

[Chocolate City Jordanaire]

He was stubborn and antiquated in his approach during the reg season and was justifiably criticized for this.
But if his thinking has evolved and he has adapted more or less to what his sage critics were saying, should
he still be fired? I don't know the answer to that. I can see arguments either way. I wonder what the players
would say privately. I wonder what opposing coaches would say speaking candidly.

If you want to know what the players would say.. go to the Gortat thread.

Gortat was the most affected. It affected Wall as well, but Wall is the franchise player #1 pick max'd out and young. He was still a major part of what they were doing.

Gortat is the one who was most effected and he had a miserable year dealing with Randy.

But if they go to the ECF playing S4 like they are now and Gortat continues to beast, he may good solider it and keep his public thoughts to himself post season.

But they better play more S4 next season.

Why didn't Randy Wittman use Pierce at stretch four earlier? Very simple answer: Kris Humphries and coaching preference.

Before this season began if you simply looked at the roster, there were several power forwards. With Humphries, Gooden, and potentially even Blair all behind Nene it was apparent that Pierce would see few minutes at PF. I posted this before the season began.

Humphries in particular was a Wittman favorite. He played hard all season, and had one 20-rebound game. How would Randy Wittman have benched him to play Pierce?

Coaching preference was obvious when Randy failed to even try Ariza at stretch four or even use Gooden much at PF in the playoffs against Indiana. Long twos and two traditional bigs is what Wittman preferred. Last playoffs Atlanta took Indiana seven games and made Hibbert a liability. Washington should have done the same. Instead they let Hibbert and West dominate. The Pacers clogged the lane.

Randy was sticking to the same philosophy until about the last 25 regular season games. What happened? See next post ...

[TheSecretWeapon]

It makes total sense that Randy Wittman is better than any coach in NBA history at winning road playoff games.

[dobrojim]

Not just better, WAY better

/green font?

[Chocolate City Jordanaire]

Kris Humphries got hurt.

Drew Gooden began to see minutes and suddenly, as hands11 has pointed out, Gortat's numbers improved.

Next thing that tool place was Otto Porter played extremely well towards the end of the season. Butler slumped. Pierce played like he had tired legs. Otto performed so well that he gained Wittman's confidence.

The Wizards luckily got Toronto in round one. Pierce beat them playing PF last season. Gooden and Porter took away all the minutes Humphries and Seraphin would have played.

I believe a confluence of things forced Wittman to see the light. However, he's still not a superior tactician. I want to see his coaching next round.

I think he learned that three point shooting is better than shooting long twos. He now sees just how devastating small lineups can be.

I want to see what happens when Wall and a Gortat are far less overwhelmingly good next round.

[TheSecretWeapon]

Kris Humphries got hurt.

Drew Gooden began to see minutes and suddenly, as hands11 has pointed out, Gortat's numbers improved.

Gortat's numbers were pretty good all season. They bottomed out at a PPA of 144 on February 5, and improved to a final number of 166. But, he was in the 170s through December and declined in January. I guess we could decide to attribute Gortat getting better from February 5 on to Humphries getting hurt, but Humphries got hurt on February 25. Gooden didn't really enter the rotation until then.

[queridiculo]

Why didn't Randy Wittman use Pierce at stretch four earlier? Very simple answer: Kris Humphries and coaching preference.

Before this season began if you simply looked at the roster, there were several power forwards. With Humphries, Gooden, and potentially even Blair all behind Nene it was apparent that Pierce would see few minutes at PF. I posted this before the season began.

Humphries in particular was a Wittman favorite. He played hard all season, and had one 20-rebound game. How would Randy Wittman have benched him to play Pierce?

Playing Pierce at the four didn't necessitate benching Humphries.

Wittman easily could have started Pierce at the three, and had lineups featuring him at the four, with Porter playing minutes at his natural position.

[McFilthy]

From my understanding, Pierce had to basically beg Witt to go small. Wall said they had been asking Witt all year to put Pierce at the 4 but Witt wouldn't budge.

Seriously if it was Witt's idea why did he wait so long to try it, especially when he was on the hot seat? And of course Ted will pretend that this is a slap in the face to Witt's critics even though it really confirms Witt's incompetence.

SMH

I know a guy who is willing to play small ball!

Maybe the Wiz don't have to look too far to find a new offensive guru. Could the Bullets pry him away from Rutgers?

Okay so playoff Randy channels his inner John Wooden and makes us wonder who the boob was who was coaching the Wizards in the regular season. Randy changes at a glacier-like pace, but I'll give him credit for his coaching during the Toronto series. I am so pleased at the Wiz sweeping the Raptors that I'm not as mad as expected knowing now that coach Wittman will be likely be returning next season. I still think Wittman seriously needs a new assistant (not EFJ) who can help with his offensive sets.

[fishercob]

From my understanding, Pierce had to basically beg Witt to go small. Wall said they had been asking Witt all year to put Pierce at the 4 but Witt wouldn't budge.

Seriously if it was Witt's idea why did he wait so long to try it, especially when he was on the hot seat? And of course Ted will pretend that this is a slap in the face to Witt's critics even though it really confirms Witt's incompetence.

SMH

I know a guy who is willing to play small ball!

Damn you.

[gambitx777]

Mark Jackson got GS past the first round and still got canned. Playoff randy is not real randy. He is what he is.

The year Jackson got fired, the Warriors did not get out of the first round. Also, Jackson had clashed with ownership because Jackson refused to stop preaching at his church when he became a head coach. He also refused to give credit to his assistant coaches and often fired them including Mike Malone. Yes, Jackson also ran a bad offense but it would be interesting to see if the Warriors would have just pushed him out had he just run a below average offense.

He made it to the second round the year before last. He got canned after making 2 straight playoff appearances. Randy is about the same, My point is if mark Jackson was canned, we should have hope that Randy could go too. Unless we take the cav's or bulls to 7 in the ECF or we make it to the NBA finals.