dunleavy appreciation thread

[Neddy]

yeah i know. most of you guys hated duns. for the record, i was NEVER a part of fire dunleavy crowd. i defended him to the very bitter end. but i will tell you why.

by the end of 2002-2003, when alvin gentry was fired and dennis johnson inherited the roster to finish the season, we ended up with a record of 27-55. albeit we had been worse under bill fitch, gene shue, or chris ford, we did not have a roster that could hang with the rest of the NBA at the time. by the time when larry brown was here, it was between his genius as a coach and the roster that sported manning, harper, jackson/rivers, norman, smith, and stanley roberts. we were a loser to the T during this time period other than the larry brown era. then came mike dunleavy senior.

mike managed the roster and in 3 years, we had the best CLIPPER record to the date, going into second round of playoffs on the back of the "jockey" sam cassell and the "horse" elton brand. even the following season with injuries to key players, he managed to win 40 games. his last 2 years granted him to be fired, but surely, it was HIM THAT CREATED THE FOUNDATION for the winning clipper franchise attitude that nobody prior to him had created. we got lucky and drafted blake griffin, and if he wasn't injured, I am sure blake alone could have saved mike's job here in lala land.

now here comes vinny del africanamerican. he was at the right place at the right time, and was able to cash in on blake's sensational rookie season, then gets a golden egg in CP3. now here we are, fighting for a position that is favorable to go into playoffs this year. what if we still had mike D? a guy who can actually execute a play coming off a time out? a guy who had won the coach of the year award? a guy who's playbook was so thick, that a bonehead like corey maggette fell a sleep during the video session? a kid like bledsoe who has become a student of the game could have learned so much from a coach like mike D.

finally, don't forget that it was mike D that allowed DTS to reluctantly divorce the cancer that was elgin baylor.

i would like to salute mike dunleavy senior for providing the stepping stone for what we have become, and letting us have the type of success that we the fans deserve for the last few decades.

[Quake Griffin]

didnt he sign baron?

i went to a game where Dan Dickau was our starting PG.
i don't care about 6 degrees of separation or w/e wrinkle changed the pond forever.


get out dunleavy and stay out forever.

[JayClips92]

get out dunleavy and stay out forever.

this.

[ejftw]

Great thread. Dunleavy made all of the roster moves that gave Tokowitz a taste of winning and changing the franchise around. He wasn't flawless as a coach, nor as a general manager, but was definitely above average and I'd take him over 1/3 of the current head coaches, most notably D'Antoni. The draft choice of Korolev really put us a step back Had we taken Granger, we'd be better of, but not many people expected him to blow out. Even Nate Robinson or Jarrett Jack would have been big. Thornton over Afflalo, Sushi and Rudy stunk too. He signed Baron to keep Elton and that backfired.


I think he deserves more respect then he gets, though I understand why many dislike him.

[adiedanny]

Not many of you can appreciate what Dunleavy did for our team. I have been a fan for close to 25 years and Dunleavy made the biggest changes to this team. More than any one individual has ever. It all truly started with the signing of Mobley. At that point we started turning in the right direction. Kobe Bryant came so close to signing with the Clippers because of Dunleavy and thank God and I mean you have no idea how greatful I am that we finally got rid of the worst GM in the history of all pro sports.

[PG3]

Imo overall i give him a B- on his tenure with the Clippers. Though its really interesting to speculate what kind of season it would be with a healthy rooki Griffin. Maybe we wouldnt have traded Baron and kept our 1st round pick.

[azncorruptedo17]

i appreciate him as a GM, not as a coach. lol

[Neddy]

It all truly started with the signing of Mobley.

yes indeed. many younger clipper fans do not remember the days when we could not, and i mean we COULD NOT sign a decent free agent regardless of what we offered. for decades only way we could sign a decent player was to draft them, then match an outside offer when they turned restricted free agents, or trade our contacts for other contracts. no unrestricted free agent who had another option stayed with us. no outside free agent ever wanted to come to us. having jackasses like jay leno relentlessly using us as a punchline did not help, DTS' reputation as a slumlord who discriminated against black tenants in his apartments did not help us. as great as larry brown was, he could not sign a player to come to us. it was mike dunleavy sr who sold mobley the future of the clipper organization and being the first to join us as a big name free agent. ron harper called being a clipper a prison sentence. dominique chose to play in europe rather than resign with us. lamar cried on the phone to our GM not to match his miami offer when he was a restricted FA. danny ferry flat out refused to report to work when he was drafted by us. antonio mcdyess told reporters that he would never show up to LAC and would force a trade, or go play in europe if drafted by clippers. the list goes on and on and on.

mike D, and cat mobley, this one is for you.

[mkwest]

I give and have given Dunleavy a lot of props for what he has done for this franchise and laying the groundwork towards legitimacy/competency. I also give him credit as a coach for being a very intelligent basketball mind.

After he "stepped down" from coaching, I was in full favor of keeping him on as GM or at least within some facet of the organization. Around the time of his departure, I was strongly concerned with the direction of which the franchise would head. He was able to get Donald to spend and he was a decent talent evaluator imo. There was a coaching vacancy and there was Neil who we didn't know what to expect from (outside of hearing that he'd been involved in some of the player personnel decisions like Sacks was).


When Dunleavy and the organization un-amicably parted ways, change was certainly needed at the time. As a head coach, you can have the mind and experience, but must also be able to relate to your players and have their respect and attention. That's hard to maintain especially when things aren't going right. One thing that the Clippers have written in bold letters at the training facility (which Dunleavy is largely responsible for) are the words "No Excuses." I felt that he leaned on the excuses at times (although some of it was justified). You look around the league and other teams overachieved in the face of adversity, but we just didn't seem to have that going for us.

I hate that Blake was injured for the entire 2009-10 season. Dunleavy was getting a lot of heat, but I just wanted to see it work out for his sake. He never got to really coach Blake outside of 6 or 7 preseason games. He lost Brand to a ruptured Achilles and the season prior he had to witness his point guard of the future obliterate his knee. It wasn't fair. I still feel we underachieved, but he was dealt a bad hand many times. He didn't get to coach his guys.

I'd love to see Dunleavy get another shot in the league with a decent team in some capacity. His name has been thrown around in recent years. When there was talk of him being part of the ownership group for the Hornets, he would have been a decision-maker in the FO.

[thanumba2clippersfan]

I do appreciate what Dunleavy did for us. He helped to build a solid foundation and got free agents to sign with us. And before we traded for Chris Paul we had our best season ever under him. However I did grow tired of him as our coach. I felt fine was he was just the GM and then I was surprised when he was let go. He did some good things that really helped the franchise.