fatlever wrote:even if its someone playing devil's advocate. What are some reasons for keeping Clifford around?
Devil's advocate:
1) The players seemingly like him and play hard for him;
2) He's managed to create us into a top3 defensive team (after one summer, by the way) despite the fact that we have a sieve masking as a center. Look at the other good defensive squads. The majority have two real big men who are good at defense, Splitter and Duncan, Nene and Gortat, Randolph and Gasol, etc. We've got past that and still been elite at defense.
3) All of our recently drafted players have at least fulfilled their defensive potential. You might argue that MKG and Biz would have done it either way, but Cody, per example, has noticeably improved while playing for Clifford on defense.
4) The point above bodes well for the development of Noah Vonleh.
5) It's easy to point at our offense and say that "well, we're going to Al too much. we don't cut enough or run creative stuff, etc."
But you got to understand that it goes hand in hand with having real threats out there. Dallas can run funky stuff with Dirk as a decoy every time down the court. Or, you know, actually go to Dirk for real on a off-ball screen. Cleveland's Irving-LeBron, Irving-Love pick-n-rolls are practically unarguable.
We, meanwhile, seriously lack offensive threats and creativity on both parts (admittedly, both from the coaching staff and in our player skillsets). I mean, you can create so much by simply having dangerous offensive players, like Dirk, a shooter having some side-action on the weak-side off the court that keeps the defenses attention, a guard on whom you can't go under the screen, etc. you catch the drift. Players who have a certain skill at a good level have to be respected when put in screen situations.
In the case of our starting five, it seems like nobody's concerned about any of our players. Nobody cares that Hendo is coming off a pin-down, worst thing that can happen is an open mid-range shot. Nobody cares about Zeller in "horns". Let him have that 18-foot look.
The sets aren't creative but I think people have to acknowledge that you need certain players to execute them. They lose their appeal and don't force defense to make difficult judgements when the players involved aren't ones that you are concerned about leaving.
Just look what a difference Mo has made when being on the court, a real threat from all over the court:
ON: 102.5, OFF: 90.6
since Kemba returned:
ON: 98.6, OFF: 92.4
we have the best offense with him on the floor and the worst with him on the bench, among the ratings of our players (Biz has been a tad better in the period after Kemba's return)
6) Consistency is good, period. NBA teams change coaches at a rapid rate. Nothing wrong with maintaining a culture and developing it if you find a somewhat decent coach (we can at least agree that Clifford could be called that, even if he tops out in your opinion as someone who should be a "defensive coordinator"). Just look at the teams who've achieved success. You know, once upon a time Popovich was also almost fired. Or how about Rivers who also was awful at his rotations before learning on the job.
