It is not just the eye test. His teams ranked statistically in the middle defensively, despite great athletes and the big Greek guy. He played a blitzing defense that was considered a joke (https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-bucks-great-defensive-experiment-is-over/). Now playing a standard switching defense the Bucks are ranked #1 in the NBA.MSaviolives said:I will not disagree with you about "other reasons" being a legit basis not to consider him. On coaching ability, I am more ambivalent, given that he did turn the Bucks around big time in his first season there and was the third highest vote-getter for Coach of the Year, for which the voters are sportswriters. I guess he failed your eye test, but others thought they saw good coaching.sluggo said:Watching a Kidd coached Bucks team was like watching a Jones coached Cal team. It looked different, of course, but somehow the same. Like there was no plan and no one knew what to do.socaltownie said:Again, I don't follow the Bucks (or really the East) to understand the difference. It is true that the Bucks didn't make many moves - and so a big strike on JK's resume is that Budenholzer is getting so much more out of a pretty similar roster than JK was able to get.sluggo said:Last year they brought in an assistant who had no training camp or time to do anything. This year, with a good NBA coach and training camp to implement his system, you see how much they improved. Jason Kidd was a terrible NBA coach. Watching his Milwaukee team in the playoffs in 2017 was painful.GMP said:BearSD said:The Bucks are not mediocre now -- they have the best record in the NBA, 5 wins better than the Warriors.bearister said:oskirules said:What does Greg Popovich, Pat Riley, Phil Jackson, and Doc Rivers have anything to do with Kidd? Did they coach at the college level before? I don't know. Kidd has 5 years of mediocre NBA coaching experience, all I'm saying is I'd rather have someone with some success coaching college ball.GBear4Life said:LOL Greg Popovich has no college experience, would you tell him to go away with a straight face? What about Pat Riley? Phil Jackson? Doc Rivers? Or the hundreds (thousands?) of reputable NBA coaches who have never coached in college.oskirules said:
No JKidd for me, loved him as a player but no college level experience. I don't know if Steve Kerr would be an effective college basketball head coach either.
If you're gonna be critical of hiring J Kidd, you won't be right but at least avoid objectively specious arguments.
Kidd may not be the answer, but if he had been the coach of the Warriors for the last 5 years instead of the Nets and the Bucks you wouldn't be using the adjective mediocre.
Last season, at the time Kidd was fired, they were only one game above .500.
Different team this year. The more fair comparison: After firing Kidd last year, they improved a small amount (23-22 vs 21-16) the rest of the season.
All of which should not matter because he punched his wife in the face.
Sluggo
But again, who cares, because he should not be considered for other reasons, right?
Sluggo
Bad coaches learn a system and stick to it because it is all they know. Cal's last two coaches have been bad in this way, and I would hate to have a third.
Sluggo