NBA: GM vs Head Coach

[naturalborn103]

Would you rather your team has a great gm or a great head coach?

[peanut butter]

A coach who is a great GM



PEACE

[VideoKilledThe]

GM. If the coach sucks, but the GM has set him up with great players they can still achieve a certain level of success. Look at what the Clippers did this year. But if the GM sucks, and the roster sucks, it doesn't really matter who you have coaching.

[peanut butter]

And coaching matters the least in the NBA, because its such a talent driven league



PEACE

[alpha]

GM. But if I could have a coach like Pop or Thibs I'd probably go head coach.

[capable_keL]

VP of basketball operations

[Reason]

i went with head coach.

players don't go to teams just for coaches (with rare exceptions) but they definitely go for coaches more than they do for gm's. a coach has to do his job day in day out without fucking up in order to get a title. you can switch gm's from jerry west to mitch fucking kupchak and be okay. but if you swapped out rick carlisle the year the mavs beat the heat, literally no other coach but maybe two would have led that team to a win over the heat, just a quick example.

dont' come at me with figurehead coaches like larry bird of the late 90's pacers. rick carlisle and dick harter ran that team.

phil jax sways the argument into my favor as well imo. you can have all the talent in the world but someitmes the coach has to regulate it...the gm cannot.

head coach can maximize a roster adn take a great roster into championship territory. every gm misses but a head coach cannot...less room for error

and again, don't come at me with spoelstra/riley. spoelstra basically coaches like riley with a more statistical bent. he's a damn good coach who makes good adjustments (like game 2 to game 3 of this series). riley got the big three but they couldnt' even win with a more green spoelstra. now that spoelstra has gotten better the team is a well-oiled machine instead of an amalgam of effective parts that didn't have guidance.

and finally tom thibz wins this poll. you can give him any fucking player and he will mold that motherfucker into a winner. a gm can't do that

[Gregg Popabitch]

And coaching matters the least in the NBA, because its such a talent driven league



PEACE

i'd say baseball. I used to feel the same way as you but after reading David Thorpe and Pruiti the past 2-3 years, my opinion on that has shifted.

I went with a Coach.

Because a good coach can make due with a bad situation. Example? The Knicks were 10-9 with Van Gundy at the helm in 2000. After he quit, Don Chaney took over and went 20-43 the rest of the way.

Another example? Thibs this year without his MVP and losing Deng, Noah, and others for chunks of the season lead his team to a 5th seed.

[peanut butter]

Another example? Thibs this year without his MVP and losing Deng, Noah, and others for chunks of the season lead his team to a 5th seed.

Thibz is a great coach. The best, outside of Popp. But lets not pretend like 2013 should exemplify his greatness, nor why coaches are more important than GMs. The Bulls, with two all stars and a solid group of role players, earned the 5th seed in an eastern conference that saw the Bucks make the playoffs with six fewer wins than losses. And it took running Noah and Deng into the ground to get there. A lesser coach, without Rose, woulda packed in the season and taken the L. So Thibz did well. But I just dont see his most recent performance as a shining example of why coaches are so important to their team.



PEACE

[Gregg Popabitch]

A lesser coach, without Rose, woulda packed in the season and taken the L. So Thibz did well. But I just dont see his most recent performance as a shining example of why coaches are so important to their team.

So you recognize the fact that a lesser coach would have had suckier results but still don't see why coaches are important to their team?

Please elaborate.

[peanut butter]

Just because the season could have gone worse doesn't mean it was that great



PEACE

[PopeyeJones]

http://www.freakonomics.com/2013/05/30/ ... -outcomes/

[an-also]

Whichever pays more.

[alpha]

Jeff as a LAC
Stan in Memphis

[Gregg Popabitch]

Alright, well let me put it this way.

Since '90, the head coaches that have lead their teams to championships were Chuck Daly, Phil Jackson, Rudy Tomjanovic, Greg Pop, Larry Brown, Pat Riley, Doc Rivers, and Erik Spoelstra. All of them except Spoelstra are hall of famers and I also think pretty highly of Spoelstra.

The GMs in that span were Jack McCloskey, Jerry Krause, Tod Leweike/Bob Weinhauer, Greg Pop/Buford, Jerry West, Joe Dumars, Mitch Kupchak, Pat Riley, and Danny Ainge.

[peanut butter]

Thats obviously a terribly oversimplified argument, but whatever.



PEACE

[Gregg Popabitch]

DON'T GIVE UP

NEVER GIVE UP

[peanut butter]

Overrated



PEACE

[Reason]

Thats obviously a terribly oversimplified argument, but whatever.



PEACE

oversimplified maybe but it's a pretty damn good argument

whether taken at face value or analyzed more thoroughly...

carlisle won a chip in dallas after leaving the pistons but dumars signed villanueva and ben gordon. that's a good one too

[peanut butter]

In 2003, Joe Dumars also drafted Darko ahead of Michael Sweetney AND Jarvis Hayes



PEACE

[Reason]

In 2003, Joe Dumars also drafted Darko ahead of Michael Sweetney AND Jarvis Hayes



PEACE

in 2003-2004, a shitty coach got nothing out of sweetney and couldn't make him lose weight and another shitty coach couldn't get jarvis to improve his perimeter skills or ballhandling

meanwhile phil jax was inspiring another player with a novel. coaches > gms (obv half joking like u were)

[Tweak Da Leak]

Alright, well let me put it this way.

Since '90, the head coaches that have lead their teams to championships were Chuck Daly, Phil Jackson, Rudy Tomjanovic, Greg Pop, Larry Brown, Pat Riley, Doc Rivers, and Erik Spoelstra. All of them except Spoelstra are hall of famers and I also think pretty highly of Spoelstra.

The GMs in that span were Jack McCloskey, Jerry Krause, Tod Leweike/Bob Weinhauer, Greg Pop/Buford, Jerry West, Joe Dumars, Mitch Kupchak, Pat Riley, and Danny Ainge.

Doc is not a hall of fame coach, if we just saying hall of fame, larry bird is a hall of famer but not too great a coach.

[Gregg Popabitch]

Alright, well let me put it this way.

Since '90, the head coaches that have lead their teams to championships were Chuck Daly, Phil Jackson, Rudy Tomjanovic, Greg Pop, Larry Brown, Pat Riley, Doc Rivers, and Erik Spoelstra. All of them except Spoelstra are hall of famers and I also think pretty highly of Spoelstra.

The GMs in that span were Jack McCloskey, Jerry Krause, Tod Leweike/Bob Weinhauer, Greg Pop/Buford, Jerry West, Joe Dumars, Mitch Kupchak, Pat Riley, and Danny Ainge.

Doc is not a hall of fame coach, if we just saying hall of fame, larry bird is a hall of famer but not too great a coach.

I don't have beef with someone saying Doc isn't a hall of fame coach. It's definitely arguable. He still draws up some of the best sideline time plays in the NBA.

Larry Bird?

[naturalborn103]

I am not sure which I would rather have. The question was you rather have great coach or great gm, but obviously a bad GM can do a WHOLE lot more damage to your team then a bad coach.

[The Rapping Coffin]

stupid question.

Phill Jackson is the coach of the Bobcats and they will be in the lottery every year he's there. Make Masai Ujiri your GM and you'll be in the playoffs within a few years. A great coach is pointless without the GM. A great GM can fire his bad coach and hire a good one to put on his team.

Winning a title doesn't factor much because you need a top 5 player to get to the finals and that's more luck than skill.

Chuck Daly, Phil Jackson, Rudy Tomjanovic, Greg Pop, Larry Brown, Pat Riley, Doc Rivers, and Erik Spoelstra

Daly on the Magic? Rudy didn't do shit without Hakeem. Pop without Duncan. Brown should thank Kobe and Shaq for his, Pat didn't win a title without Magic, Doc without a healthy KG, and Spo without Lebron. They are great coaches because they helped put elite talent in the position to win, but they needed a GM to put that talent on their teams.

[VideoKilledThe]

Chuck Daly, Phil Jackson, Rudy Tomjanovic, Greg Pop, Larry Brown, Pat Riley, Doc Rivers, and Erik Spoelstra

Daly on the Magic? Rudy didn't do shit without Hakeem. Pop without Duncan. Brown should thank Kobe and Shaq for his, Pat didn't win a title without Magic, Doc without a healthy KG, and Spo without Lebron. They are great coaches because they helped put elite talent in the position to win, but they needed a GM to put that talent on their teams.

This. If you're gonna name the coaches you gonna name the players they were incredibly blessed to have coached.

[Cash Rulz]

A good GM can get you a rook, a queen and a bishop and you can still lose.

A good coach can win with a knight, three pawns and a bishop.

[Gregg Popabitch]

Daly on the Magic?

Are you saying he underachieved his two years on the Magic? Spit your game, talk your shit.

[Big Breeze]

Chuck Daly, Phil Jackson, Rudy Tomjanovic, Greg Pop, Larry Brown, Pat Riley, Doc Rivers, and Erik Spoelstra

Daly on the Magic? Rudy didn't do shit without Hakeem. Pop without Duncan. Brown should thank Kobe and Shaq for his, Pat didn't win a title without Magic, Doc without a healthy KG, and Spo without Lebron. They are great coaches because they helped put elite talent in the position to win, but they needed a GM to put that talent on their teams.

This. If you're gonna name the coaches you gonna name the players they were incredibly blessed to have coached.

For the record, Riley won without Magic in '06 when he pushed Ron Jeremy out of his coach's seat in Miami.

[Smithee]

A coach who is a great GM

Old school Don Nelson reference?