Friday, May 22, 2009

Watching Phil Jackson coach the Lakers...

... is like watching a rich kid with a new Lamborghini who just keeps grinding the gears because he doesn't know how to drive. From moment to moment the team lurches, spins its wheels, zooms ahead, veers off track, and stalls out as Phil Jackson aimlessly fiddles with buttons and instruments that he doesn't understand.

Jordan Farmar ran the offense more effectively last night than Derek Fisher and he guards Billups better too. But down the stretch Jackson went with Fisher. Furthermore, Bynum had a great first half and we could have used a big guy to clog up the lane in the 2nd half (to stop Billups and Melo from driving) -- but Jackson inexplicably benched Bynum for the entire second half in favor of the smaller Odom. I have no problem with Odom being in there -- he just needs to be in there as small forward rather than power forward.

Note to Kobe Bryant: Look dude, this is your team -- Jackson will do whatever you tell him. You need to tell Jackson to play Bynum for 35 minutes every night. Either Bynum succeeds or he fails. But you can't win a championship without a legitimate center (I love Gasol, but he's simply not a true center).

Player for player, the Lakers are the best team in the playoffs. But, in Phil Jackson, they have the worst coach. As such they barely got by the JV Houston Rockets and it's unclear whether they'll get by Denver.

4 comments:

Jeanne said...

now, now -- what's so bad about the lakers losing to the nuggets?

RFK Action Front said...

Phil Jackson is doing everything he can to help the Nuggets make it to the Finals. You can almost think of him as a 6th Man playing for your team!

Unknown said...

Phil Jackson sucks. His huddles are the equivalent of me listening to a phone conference at work from China. Absolutely no energy or sense of urgency. And I don't care what nobody says he cost us the championship last year where Doc Rivers clearly out coached him.

RFK Action Front said...

Thanks for the comment Dominic! You hit it on the head exactly! Doc Rivers was just flat out the better coach in last year's finals (the adjustments Rivers made at halftime in each game were incredible). It was the difference in the series. Jackson is the Mr. Magoo of coaches.