Ha-Ha Orlando!

[indeedproceed]

Mike Bianchi of the Orlando Sentinel: "They are like the guy who dumped his girlfriend and then watched her blossom into Halle Berry, marry Bill Gates, move to South Beach and become the first female president of the United States. They still can manage a smile, they will tell you everything worked out best for both parties and they act like it doesn't bother them. But I'm not buying it. Deep down you know it has to eat away at the Orlando Magic that the likable coach they fired five years ago -- Doc Rivers -- is now playing for the NBA championship."

Orlando said they are really really happy for Doc...but they didn't mean it.

[Eja117]

It must be even tougher since they couldn't get Billy Donovan

[Roy Hobbs]

Hmm...  I guess that's the first time I've ever heard Doc compared to Halle Berry.

Orlando made the right call at the time, and deep down, I think they're perfectly okay with that decision.  Doc has some positive qualities, but he also has some negatives.  It's not like the primary reason the Celts are in the Finals is because of Doc.

[Redz]

Hmm..Doc's getting more love in Orlando than he is Boston.

Kind of a silly idea.  It's not like Doc is the first coach ever to make it to the Finals after leaving another team.

[Who]

Orlando made the right call at the time

I thought it was a terrible decision at the time. Doc was doing a solid job on mediocre team. They'd struggled out of the gate, it was a gross overreaction at a terrible time that doomed the rest of their season.

It's one to thing to fire a guy because you can get someone better, it's a whole othher thing to fire someone with absolutely no replacement available. Johnny Davis was an absolute joke of an appointment. Chris Jent .... then Brian Hill who followed up his terrible performance in Memphis with a terrible performance in Orlando. Four years it took Orlando to find a coach that was superior Doc. Four wasted years.

Just like their decision to trade Tracy McGrady despite having the No.1 pick. That wasted 5 years and possibly up to 10 years if they continue to fail to replace him. If Orlando had Tracy now instead of Lewis .... Tracy is the exact type of perimeter player Dwight Howard needs and doesn't have.

I'll very likely be saying the same thing about their decision to sign Rashard Lewis four years from now  ..... and their decision not to trade that 12mil of expiring contracts they had this season.

Their management is a joke and what do they do? They give Otis Smith an extension.

Orlando made the right call at the time, and deep down, I think they're perfectly okay with that decision.

Just to finish of the rest of your thought and I agree they're happy now. Stan Van Gundy is an excellent coach.

It's that in-between period that bugs me

[CelticsWhat35]

Hmm...  I guess that's the first time I've ever heard Doc compared to Halle Berry.

Orlando made the right call at the time, and deep down, I think they're perfectly okay with that decision.  Doc has some positive qualities, but he also has some negatives.  It's not like the primary reason the Celts are in the Finals is because of Doc.

When is it ever the case otherwise?

[Roy Hobbs]

Orlando made the right call at the time

I thought it was a terrible decision at the time. Doc was doing a solid job on mediocre team. They'd struggled out of the gate, it was a gross overreaction at a terrible time that doomed the rest of their season.

They were, what, 1-10 at the time, the fans hated Doc, and he was losing his team.  The team hadn't progressed in three seasons, despite spending a ton of money on free agents.  The team desperately needed, as Joe Dumars might say, a "new voice".

[Vermont Green]

I think Doc developed as a coach in much the same way that a young player develops.  Orlando's big player acquisition was Grant Hill and he was injured for like 4 years.  Doc the very young and inexperienced coach who was fired by Orlando probably couldn't lead a team to the finals but Doc the coach today seems to be doing just fine.  I don't think Doc is done getting better as a coach either (which can be taken as a compliment or not).  He now has a legitimate playoff run under his belt and I think that means a bunch.  Orlando apparently didn't want to wait while Doc grew up but Danny did (we had a horrible team at the time so why not).

[Who]

Orlando made the right call at the time

I thought it was a terrible decision at the time. Doc was doing a solid job on mediocre team. They'd struggled out of the gate, it was a gross overreaction at a terrible time that doomed the rest of their season.

They were, what, 1-10 at the time, the fans hated Doc, and he was losing his team.  The team hadn't progressed in three seasons, despite spending a ton of money on free agents.  The team desperately needed, as Joe Dumars might say, a "new voice".

It's hard to make progess when your best or second best player is injured and your GM consistently makes bad decisions. As Doc said at the time he had to have two training camps and two different plans every year/game, one for Grant being fit and one for the team without Grant Hill.

Darrell Armstrong should never have been let go, he was the team's leader and a quality point guard. Their GM never even bothered to replace him. Bad draft picks like Reece Gaines. Or maybe it was Curtis Bochardt, Steven Hunter, Jerryl Sasser that were meant to lead to progess. They also allowed Troy Hudson to leave, again unreplaced. Then they trade Tracy's only decent sidekick scoring threat in Mike Miller. The replacement comes next summer, Juwan Howard, a guy who plays the exact same position as the guy they traded Miller for (Gooden). Co-incidently Howard was the only Free Agent they spent serious money on outside of Grant/Tracy for Doc's four years there. Then they fire Doc 11 games into the season without giving him a fair shot of trying to make that work. Then of course they trade Gooden for next to nothing shortly after Doc leaves because the Mike Miller trade didn't work. Add in the assortment of 35+ players like Horace Grant, Shawn Kemp, Patrick Ewing, Rod Strickland who were supposed to be able to contribute. That didn't work either.

Through each year of Doc's final 3 and 1/8 seasons his team's talent levels consistently got worse. Keeping the ship steady was good work.

I hate teams that fire their coaches 10 games into a season. It's never a wise move unless it's completely neccessary and it wasn't in this case. It's even dumber when there's no clear replacement.

Firing Doc Rivers for Johnny Davis at that time was along the lines of firing Dwayne Casey for Randy Wittman. Except Doc got only 11 games and had done more in previous seasons with his team (3 playoff appearances, one just miss, CoY) just to make it a bit worse. I hate it when teams fire their coaches like that, especially when they have no quality replacement available to them.