Can we start the fired KOC campaign now?

[reapaman]

I know yall said July was too early to push the eject button but it should be clear now. Here we are only sitting 9th in the west with a surging lakers team and a team thats getting their best player back not far behind us while being tied with a team that has had one of the worse starting schedule I've ever seen.

KOC does not care about winning championships. He brought in more vets and kept the other vets like millsap/big Al to "win now" despite having major issues that prevented us from doing that. The Millers must not care either since they promoted this guy knowing his history (or should I say just unaware of what really going on with this team). Got corbin being the main scapegoat when he's just doing what KOC wants although he can be fired too for all I care. KOC could of gotten us more young talent and we couldve started trading vets (meaning Al and millsap mostly) before the lockout season so that we could start rebuilding then (plus we could have gotten more value for Al/Millsap) but he had other plans.

Our future is full of medicorness with this guy as the lead mind in the FO. FIRE KOC!!!

end of rant \

[DelaneyRudd]

Uh, he was already replaced. He's not the guy in charge of personnel anymore. Sure he gets a voice, but it's not a GM voice.

[StocktonShorts]

I think your concerns -- which I largely agree with -- speak more about the owners than they do about KOC.

[red4hf]

I think your concerns -- which I largely agree with -- speak more about the owners than they do about KOC.

I agree with that........

[reapaman]

Uh, he was already replaced. He's not the guy in charge of personnel anymore. Sure he gets a voice, but it's not a GM voice.

NO he has a huge voice, he is the Executive Vice President of basketball operations. This isn't like in OKC where Presti is both the VP and GM. The Millers seem to trust KOC's voice for whatever reason (probabley because we have won alot under him) and all they really did was move the day - to - day grind stuff to lindsey. KOC still has a major say of our direction.

And yes the Millers deserve blame too but even with deron and boozer it never seen like KOC would do anything to win a championship. Plus many of you said this summer that you loved the direction of the team so its possible that the Millers thought that too and mabey they are just now realizing like alot of you that KOC is fooling us all.

[Inigo Montoya]

how can you call for the head of KOC? he's done an excellent job.

1. he reacted very well and traded deron for good value, unlike any other team out there who had to do the same.

2. he drafted good and talented players with a lot of upside.

3. he addressed the team's weaknesses in the offseason by bringing in shooters and vets on good deals.

4. he filled the team with a lot of valuable trade assets

5. he lined up the team's payroll PERFECTLY for it to have maximum flexibility going forward and have plenty of cap space while keeping our promising young core on rookie deals.

he brought good vets to the team on good deals - it not his fault that giving vets to corbin in like giving drugs to a junkie - he just can't resist but to use them. he gave all the tools to the coach and it is up to the coach how to use them. if corbin isn't playing the young players it in not KOC's fault.

also, we don't know what deals are out there and what trades were proposed to the jazz. according to what KOC usually says, he gets offers all the time but they are really lopsided and bad deals. and yet, we don't know if we keep or trade paul and al - there is still time for either scenario to play out. saying we could have traded both of them before the lockout season, while probably true, completely disregards the value we would have gotten back, which is probably not a lot since no deal got made. there is also a benefit in letting one or both of them walk and use the cap space.

i think this roster can play much better than it showed thus far - and that's also not on KOC but on the coach and the players. and still, we are ninth i the west, but we played 18 games on the road and 11 at home. we had the toughest schedule in the league. houston is currently 6th with the same amount of wins, but with two less games played, while thus far they played 16 games at home and 11 on the road. we are in a good enough spot all things considered, and it is certainly not KOC's fault.

[StocktonShorts]

Just playing devil's advocate here on a few points:

how can you call for the head of KOC? he's done an excellent job.

1. he reacted very well and traded deron for good value, unlike any other team out there who had to do the same.

He traded away the team's only franchise player since Karl and John for lesser players and draft picks who haven't yet realized their potential. Deron wasn't holding the franchise hostage and to this day there's no evidence that he was set on leaving.

2. he drafted good and talented players with a lot of upside.

He passed on Paul George, going with the guy who looks like a missionary over the more athletic wing player.

3. he addressed the team's weaknesses in the offseason by bringing in shooters and vets on good deals.

Contrary to popular belief, this team's weaknesses were not on the offensive end of the floor, and KOC brought in Mo Williams and Randy Foye, who are probably the worst defensive back court in the NBA. At least Foye isn't getting paid much: Mo Williams and Marvin Williams are getting paid a combined $17M this year.

4. he filled the team with a lot of valuable trade assets

5. he lined up the team's payroll PERFECTLY for it to have maximum flexibility going forward and have plenty of cap space while keeping our promising young core on rookie deals.

I'm not going to give him credit for "valuable trade assets" and cap space until he does something good with them.

[Inigo Montoya]

He traded away the team's only franchise player since Karl and John for lesser players and draft picks who haven't yet realized their potential. Deron wasn't holding the franchise hostage and to this day there's no evidence that he was set on leaving.

we don't know what happened behind closed doors. we can only speculate one way or the other, but let's use our common sense here - the GM is the one with the most info on the subject, and later we found out he set the groundwork for the trade for months. obviously he talked to deron and his reps and couldn't get a straight answer on whether or not he'll sign and that was during an extended period of time. we'll never know for sure, but given all that happened in the league at that time - i'd say it is a fair statement to say he read the situation well. and while we'll never know for sure if deron stayed or not (especially after sloan resigned and he'd have to carry that on him every day if he stayed with the jazz), at least we can say he got a decent deal for him, and made out much better than other teams who had to go through the same thing. also, we know now that deron was injured, and we see he isn't the same since we traded him, due to health issues among other things. up until now with the nets he hasn't looked like the franchise player he was for us.

He passed on Paul George, going with the guy who looks like a missionary over the more athletic wing player.

athleticism isn't everything. and it's not like gordon is unathletic - he is actually under-rated in this regard. and no one knew that george will grow by 2 inches in one summer after he was drafted. i think now we can say that while unpopular, gordon's pick was a good one - he'll be a solid\high level role player at the very least. george has more upside, but he still need to realize it. also, KOC dodged some other players who where thought to be drafted at the same range, like babbitt, aldrich and henry who are busts, or just players who aren't as good like davis, patterson and others. it doesn't matter that hayward looks like a missionary - the kid can ball.

Contrary to popular belief, this team's weaknesses were not on the offensive end of the floor, and KOC brought in Mo Williams and Randy Foye, who are probably the worst defensive back court in the NBA. At least Foye isn't getting paid much: Mo Williams and Marvin Williams are getting paid a combined $17M this year.

he brought players who fit the system we played last year. and then corbin went and changed the system.... foye is a bargain at 2.5M - that's what CJ makes. you say defense was an issue that wasn't addressed, but marvin is a good defensive player. and koc isn't the one who put foye with mo in the starting lineup to form a weak defensive back court - that's all on corbin. mo's contract has value since it is expiring and we only got him for one year. we had to get someone, and his contract doesn't hurt nobody. on the contrary - it is another trade asset. mo's, foye's and marvin's contracts doesn't hurt the jazz flexibility so how much they make shouldn't be an issue, especially when all of them have pretty reasonable contracts.

I'm not going to give him credit for "valuable trade assets" and cap space until he does something good with them.

well, that's lindsey's job now. but KOC left him the franchise in excellent condition to make whatever moves he thinks he should. you can't have it both ways - either he'll use his trade assets or he'll end up with cap space - either way he positioned the jazz well. now it's up to lindsey to do something with it, but give KOC his due for putting him in the best possible position to succeed and leaving him plenty of options to choose from.

[Inigo Montoya]

btw, reapaman - you should change the wording of the poll question to something similar to the thread headline.

as currently presented, if you ask: Is it too soon for the fire KOC campaign?

then according to the answers provided the first and second answers should start with no, and the third and fourth answers should start with yes.

[reapaman]

btw, reapaman - you should change the wording of the poll question to something similar to the thread headline.

Well your right about the title, ill change it but I strongly disgree with your other statements.

1) As corbin said himself, he wants to play the young guys more but he was put into the situation to "win now" and has to build consistency w/ the vets even if there playing bad because they more ready to "win now". I mean if KOC wanted the young guys to play more then why bring in more vets especially ones that are use to play major minutes on top of keeping current vets like AL/Millsap? Doesn't make any sense why he would do that unless he wants corbin to play more vets which is what corbins doing.

2) Cap flexibilty doesn't mean much if theres no one good to sign. The free agent class the next couple years is crap. And as I said expiring contracts hardly ever yield you anything good and our only good assets now are the young guys who are suppose to be our future. I mean if were gonna keep competeting now then we gonna resign Millsap, Mo and Jefferson since there not much better options to do that (plus sign and trades are extremely hard under new CBA) and that still leads us to being not good enough to win a championship if we do that. If were gonna rebuild then we couldve did that when Kanter was drafted and not missed on the chance to draft/sign good young talent. Plus you have probley have a much better opinion of our young guys than I do. IMO, our situation is not a good one that he left lindsay in and the cap flexibility/assets is decieving.

3) And it wasn't the fact that KOC picked hayward over george that made me so dissapointed, it was that I knew he was gonna do it (BTW Geroge is better than hayward at 6'9 or 6'11, and as I said back then I would still pick sanders, davis or bledsoe over hayward. Bradley and Seraphin wouldve been good picks too but I wasn't too sure on them at the time). He's too predictable. I wasn't suprised he traded deron. I wasn't suprised he picked Kanter or burks. I wasn't shocked he added more vets and Millsap/Al are still here. Getting Korver was no suprise especially when ESPN made like 50 articles saying KOC should get him (I'm going all over the place but bare with me). Even getting the pick to get deron was as savvy as it sounds. Over paying for boozer and Okur when he was bidding against himself (which many media outlets laughed at him about it). Keeping Okur and boozer together when it was clear they didn't work together. Not getting an upgrade at wing when we clearly needed one. Getting young guys during the boozer/deron era instead of vets and doing the opposite now. Letting many of our guys walk for nothing or almost nothing. I know I'm all over the place but he's done so much (or not done so much I should say) that clearly shows he just doesn't care to build a championship level team.

4) And look our moves in the off-season suck and didn't address our main issues. This team is not made to win now. Marvin man-to-man defense sucks (which is the most important type of defense), he gets destroyed off the dribble and screens like everyone else on the team does. Besides no upgrade defensively, he brings in the anti-pg in mo when our playmaking sucks. He brings in the wrong type of 3 point shooters. I can go on and on.

Look if many of you were saying that we were gonna suck in the off-season due too corbin and/or our current players then I can take your opinion serious but most of you didn't think that. People thought everything was gonna be fine but its not and your trying to find a scapegoat and I'm telling you that you are as wrong as some of you were in the off-season. KOC is the main culprit, the millers liked his direction just as many of you did but you need to wake up an realize that this guy direction is towards mediocracy and you were fooled.

[QuantumMacgyver]

This is unbelievable. So you want to fire KOC, but who in the world would you replace him with?! Remember everyone calling for Sloan's head, and now we have Corbin. Let's fire KOC so we can replace him with a great GM like.... uh.... hmmmm.

The Deron trade was brilliant. People can speculate all they want but if you think there was a chance Deron was staying, you're fooling yourself. He's said that the reason he stayed in Brooklyn was the acquisition of Joe Johnson. The Nets had to build one of the most expensive payrolls just to keep Deron, who has fallen off sharply since his wrist injury.

KOC chose Hayward over George because there is a higher probability of Hayward staying in Utah than George. Culture and character issues are big factors in Utah Jazz team building. Would you have rather KOC drafted George just to see him develop and sign elsewhere? I'm not saying that isn't possible with Hayward, but the chances of Hayward staying in Utah are better.

Unless you have a better option, claims like this are crazy. No offense. You've had some solid points recently, but this makes no sense. Now, if neither Big Al or Millsap are traded AND additionally we make no move to bring in an actual PG, then I may see KOC as a problem.

[reapaman]

This is unbelievable. So you want to fire KOC, but who in the world would you replace him with?! Remember everyone calling for Sloan's head, and now we have Corbin. Let's fire KOC so we can replace him with a great GM like.... uh.... hmmmm.

Once again some people have a problem with corbin, doesn't mean everyone does. Wasn't like sloan was winning with deron, Jefferson and Millsap, so how do you expect Corbin to win alot with Jefferson, Millsap, Harris/Williams? I don't put alot of blame on corbin for our struggles, I put it on the lack of talent.

KOC chose Hayward over George because there is a higher probability of Hayward staying in Utah than George. Culture and character issues are big factors in Utah Jazz team building. Would you have rather KOC drafted George just to see him develop and sign elsewhere? I'm not saying that isn't possible with Hayward, but the chances of Hayward staying in Utah are better.

This is complete BS and should not be uttered from the mouth of a true fan. Were only supposed to pick guys who we "feel" (and not know) have the best chances to stay here? We would never have a contender if we did that. He should be fired and no one should ever hire him if that was his thinking. Thats the same thing with deron, you don't know what he was gonna do; he can say anything because I seriously dought he was gonna leave all that money on the table. His agent wasn't gonna have it. Plus if KOC was as good as some of you say he was then why couldn't he have built a team to make deron stay. Its better than this medicore crap we are headed towards.

Unless you have a better option, claims like this are crazy. No offense. You've had some solid points recently, but this makes no sense. Now, if neither Big Al or Millsap are traded AND additionally we make no move to bring in an actual PG, then I may see KOC as a problem.

Believe me thats what is gonna happen. As long as this guy has any power with the jazz we will be predictably medicore. I'm just using the same thought process I have been using the last couple of seasons to predict what KOC would do and how this team would perform and it has worked so far. Mabey lindsey changes things but if I'm right than Millsap/Jefferson/Mo will all still be in the starting line up come march if healthy. We are not gonna be out the playoff hunt this season even though I made it sound like I thought we will be so there won't be a big "X' on his head but we will be medicore, the young guys will still not get enough burn and the vets will still be on the roster and some of them will likely be resigned in the off-season or walk for nothing (or almost nothing).

[Inigo Montoya]

1) As corbin said himself, he wants to play the young guys more but he was put into the situation to "win now" and has to build consistency w/ the vets even if there playing bad because they more ready to "win now". I mean if KOC wanted the young guys to play more then why bring in more vets especially ones that are use to play major minutes on top of keeping current vets like AL/Millsap? Doesn't make any sense why he would do that unless he wants corbin to play more vets which is what corbins doing.

i agree with the claim that corbin wants to win now and build consistency. but did anyone think that foye will be a starter? everyone thought he'd be a backup and he's paid like a backup. and he is new. if corbin wanted to build consistency, he shouldn't have started foye who is most likely gone after this year and certainly a temporary solution, while moving hayward in and out of the lineup during the past two seasons. you want to build consistency, so you play the new guy who is likely gone after the season instead of your young core who have been there longer? KOC brought vets, but it is up to corbin how to use them. also, you can only have so much youth on one team. do you expect KOC to bring 3 more rookies instead of mo, marvin and foye?

2) Cap flexibilty doesn't mean much if theres no one good to sign. The free agent class the next couple years is crap. And as I said expiring contracts hardly ever yield you anything good and our only good assets now are the young guys who are suppose to be our future. I mean if were gonna keep competeting now then we gonna resign Millsap, Mo and Jefferson since there not much better options to do that (plus sign and trades are extremely hard under new CBA) and that still leads us to being not good enough to win a championship if we do that. If were gonna rebuild then we couldve did that when Kanter was drafted and not missed on the chance to draft/sign good young talent. Plus you have probley have a much better opinion of our young guys than I do. IMO, our situation is not a good one that he left lindsay in and the cap flexibility/assets is decieving.

i actually agree with you on this point. i wrote similar posts myself, but i also said that i can see both sides and i'm fine with either course of action. yes, i am willing to have a losing team for a while if it will help in the long term and improve our chances to get a championship. but as a fan i also can't complain that my team is trying to win and actually wins more games than it loses. i do like our young players more than you i guess. btw, while it is true that this FA class sucks, it was hard to foresee. but still howard and cp3 are unrestricted FA's. not that we have a shot.

3) And it wasn't the fact that KOC picked hayward over george that made me so dissapointed, it was that I knew he was gonna do it (BTW Geroge is better than hayward at 6'9 or 6'11, and as I said back then I would still pick sanders, davis or bledsoe over hayward. Bradley and Seraphin wouldve been good picks too but I wasn't too sure on them at the time). He's too predictable. I wasn't suprised he traded deron. I wasn't suprised he picked Kanter or burks. I wasn't shocked he added more vets and Millsap/Al are still here. Getting Korver was no suprise especially when ESPN made like 50 articles saying KOC should get him (I'm going all over the place but bare with me). Even getting the pick to get deron was as savvy as it sounds. Over paying for boozer and Okur when he was bidding against himself (which many media outlets laughed at him about it). Keeping Okur and boozer together when it was clear they didn't work together. Not getting an upgrade at wing when we clearly needed one. Getting young guys during the boozer/deron era instead of vets and doing the opposite now. Letting many of our guys walk for nothing or almost nothing. I know I'm all over the place but he's done so much (or not done so much I should say) that clearly shows he just doesn't care to build a championship level team.

KOC does not exist to surprise you. if you want to be surprised, you can be a fan of the cavs, where players ditch for larger contracts after they came to terms with the organization (boozer), or leave their team after stringing an entire city along for a whole season all the while knowing they are gone (LBJ), or where they make crazy unexpected reaches in the draft (thompson, waiters), or just sign CJ...

davis is not better than hayward. neither are seraphin, bradley or sanders (who you don't need with favors). bledsoe is over rated. and although george is probably better than hayward, right now it is not by a lot, and it's not like he's a star just yet. we got a good player in that draft, be happy for that.

the only reason he was bidding against himself with boozer was because the entire league thought he came to an agreement with the cavs (including the cavs themselves). and still, in the end he lived up to his contract. okur lived up to it as well.

you are not all over the place - you're just going too far back in time. i'm not saying KOC is perfect and flawless, but i do think he's one of the better GMs in the league. but for this point in time, we don't need to go back 10 years to say he leaves lindsey in a good position. and we can complain all we want that he wasn't appearing to be active enough when deron was here, but he was very active in order to get deron in the first place, and he was active in putting a team together around him with the signing of boozer and okur. i don't think it is a coincidence that while jerry was here there wasn't much personnel movement activity, and once he was gone suddenly we see a lot of activity in that area.

4) And look our moves in the off-season suck and didn't address our main issues. This team is not made to win now. Marvin man-to-man defense sucks (which is the most important type of defense), he gets destroyed off the dribble and screens like everyone else on the team does. Besides no upgrade defensively, he brings in the anti-pg in mo when our playmaking sucks. He brings in the wrong type of 3 point shooters. I can go on and on.

all of last season everyone complained that we can't hit a 3, and they were right. weren't we 28th in that area? now we are 14th, so how can you say he didn't address a main issue? we couldn't hit a 3 and couldn't punish teams when they packed the paint. i too have an issue with the defense, but that's on the players and on corbin more than it is on KOC. KOC didn't tell corbin to start with a back court of mo and foye. and KOC didn't come up with the defensive scheme either. there are a lot of reasons why the defense sucks, but i would argue that the main one is that corbin chose to put up a defensively weak back court and chose to keep our best defender (favors) on the bench. aren't you the one who's complaining every game about how much millsap sucks and that he can't defend? well, it is corbin who chooses to start him and foye, not KOC. and as for mo, he would have fit very well if we continued to play like last year, because then we wouldn't rely on his poor playmaking ability - he would only have to cross half court and make an entry pass to big al and then make the defense pay when they pack the paint on him. but corbin chose to change the system, so that's his fault too. the way we are playing this year, harris would fit better.


and as for winning now - this team is not built to win a championship now. but it built to win now enough games to make the playoffs. and still, i don't think we suck, and i do think that considering our schedule and other factors, we are in a decent shape.

[finnegan]

I think your concerns -- which I largely agree with -- speak more about the owners than they do about KOC.

We had a Rookie Owner and a Rookie Coach last year. They are doing OK in my book. However; I am glad that Greg is keeping his trap shut and is stepping more in the background. His public tantrum with Karl Malone last year, was no more than a spoiled rich kid pretending to be like his dad. It was Dan Gilbert-esque.

[erudite23]

I am dissatisfied with the current direction of the team. Is O'Connor to blame? I think there is good case to be made that he is. Is that grounds for firing him? Not even close.

What people in our shoes fail to realize is that value of a .500 ball club. While it is excruciating for us, it is a pretty decent situation for ownership. They can sell this team to the community. They can pay the bills and stay afloat. But if the bottom fell out and we were winning 20 games a year for 3 years, the situation could turn dire pretty quickly. If you trade Al, Paul, Devin Harris, and the other vets away and turn the keys over to the kids, you run the risk of everything falling apart, and if that happens this franchise could be in trouble in a few years.

It might suck, but its the reality of rooting for a team in Utah. Its safer to be in the middle. Still, we are in position to make the team over substantially if we want to. We can dump Paul, Al, Mo and Marvin. Take on some bad contracts in return for assets. Pull off some trades of well priced vets on salary burdened teams. What we really need to do is be in position to get one of the top 4 players in the 2014 draft. Its very top heavy, with two great wings and a great PG prospect. Add that to our stable of young vets and we could be in contention fairly quickly.

But right now, we seem to be going nowhere, and its hard to know what to do about that. I do know that you don't fire a guy with the expertise and skill that KOC has, though. And that's even before you acknowledge the fact that he isn't our GM anymore. So, yeah.

[StocktonShorts]

I am dissatisfied with the current direction of the team. Is O'Connor to blame? I think there is good case to be made that he is.

When you look at the Jazz's moves after signing Deron to that extension, it tells a pretty bleak story.

[Neon Black]

It's too soon for this. Wait until after the trade deadline - if nothing happens then feel free to post another freak-out thread.