Mike Cranston @mikecranston1 3h
Larry Brown and Screamin’ A. Fantastic. “They dismantled our team,” on getting fired by MJ.
lets dissect that statement, shall we?
"dismantled" - three rotation players from that 2010 playoff team did not return in 2011 - raymond felton, tyson chandler and theo ratliff.
raymond felton - was offered a very fair long-term deal, which he turned down for more money from the knicks. poor larry brown was left with 2nd year lottery pick dj augustin as his starting point guard - a player that larry begged the front office to draft instead of brook lopez. shaun livingston was signed as the 2nd string point guard, and played well that following season.
tyson chandler - tyson, even when healthy was often relegated to the 3rd string center spot behind ratliff and nazr mohammad. its no secret that tyson was upset with larry and wanted out of charlotte as a result. meanwhile, larry wasted a pick alexis ajinca, another player larry begged the front office to draft, going so far as to say that if ajinca stayed another year he would be a top 5 pick. the front office brought in kwame brown, who was more than adequate as a replacement that following year.
theo ratliff - first of all, theo should never have been in the rotation to begin with, but he was at least serviceable when he played. he was replaced by eduardo najera (part of the chandler/dampier trade). najera was at least as good as ratliff.
back from the 2010 team: the three best players on the team - gerald wallace, stephen jackson and boris diaw - as well as rotation players from the previous year - tyrus thomas, nazr mohammad, dj augustin.
larry brown had tyrus thomas for a full year after, a player that we traded for to please larry's demands for more frontcourt help - a player we resigned for larry, at the expense of losing chandler, a player larry didnt get along with and didnt play.
and then there was little used lottery pick gerald henderson, a player buried on larry's bench for no good reason.
and how could we forget the fact that we still had gana diop, another player larry wanted to trade for.
larry also convinced the front office to sign dominic mcguire that summer, a player larry loved and played heavily in 2010-11.
its amazing how larry's mind rewrites history so that nothing is ever his fault. everything on that roster was absolutely his fault, with the exception of losing raymond felton, the one player that apparently meant the entire world to larry.
"dismantled"? not really an accurate portrayal of what happened.
