Should Brad Stevens be fired?

[CoachBS#1]

Been defending Brad pretty ardently because of his many redeeming factors. Today, despite those redeeming factors, his glaring faults cost us the chance to go to the Finals and beat LeBron.

Fire him

This

[SparzWizard]

Don't mind me for bumping this thread but GET RID OF HIM NOWWWWW

His fault the Heat shot 56% tonight, and 48% on threes.

His fault his team didn't play good enough defense, and doing terrible substitutions with Theis and not Timelord or GWill. And when they went on that 22-6 run, the Celtics just flat out quit by bricking many 3's.

And they still brick 3's when they should have attacked the paint more.

[ausbacker]

Been defending Brad pretty ardently because of his many redeeming factors. Today, despite those redeeming factors, his glaring faults cost us the chance to go to the Finals and beat LeBron.

Fire him

Nobody here wants to see the Celtics fail, we're all passionate advocates but if ownership can't see this falls on both Ainge (being so completely understocked at the 5) and Stevens (who cannot coach on game momentum) then we're on a slow boat to nowhere.

[Roy H.]

Don't mind me for bumping this thread but GET RID OF HIM NOWWWWW

His fault the Heat shot 56% tonight, and 48% on threes.

His fault his team didn't play good enough defense, and doing terrible substitutions with Theis and not Timelord or GWill. And when they went on that 22-6 run, the Celtics just flat out quit by bricking many 3's.

And they still brick 3's when they should have attacked the paint more.

Right, because the players get no blame for lack of execution.

And, Theis isn’t the reason we lost.

[Scottiej23]

This thread should be locked for 24 hours until some people regain their composure a little and aren't so prone to lashing out because they have no impulse control.

That's not actually how forums work though now is it?

No, but that is ultimately to the detriment of the quality of discourse.

[Uncle_Stingfinger]

You do have to wonder if they've tuned him out a bit.  This team and last years didn't play as hard as the teams he had earlier in his run.   Ainge could use some pressure, too.

[Tr1boy]

Don't mind me for bumping this thread but GET RID OF HIM NOWWWWW

His fault the Heat shot 56% tonight, and 48% on threes.

His fault his team didn't play good enough defense, and doing terrible substitutions with Theis and not Timelord or GWill. And when they went on that 22-6 run, the Celtics just flat out quit by bricking many 3's.

And they still brick 3's when they should have attacked the paint more.

Right, because the players get no blame for lack of execution.

And, Theis isn’t the reason we lost.

Yes he is. A big reason why Bam went off and Heat played with more force

When Celts stole the ball early in the 4th... they played with momentun

You lost that in a snap of a finger with that Bam dunk on Theis and one

[gouki88]

Don't mind me for bumping this thread but GET RID OF HIM NOWWWWW

His fault the Heat shot 56% tonight, and 48% on threes.

His fault his team didn't play good enough defense, and doing terrible substitutions with Theis and not Timelord or GWill. And when they went on that 22-6 run, the Celtics just flat out quit by bricking many 3's.

And they still brick 3's when they should have attacked the paint more.

Right, because the players get no blame for lack of execution.

And, Theis isn’t the reason we lost.

The players definitely deserve some blame. But Stevens does more so than anyone. We finished the game with two timeouts - timeouts he could have used to instil a different offensive mindset. Instead, he didn't, so whether proactively or not he gave his permission for that terrible offence of 3 after 3. His fault.

He also substituted our best defender of Adebayo for no apparent reason other than to return to what he knows. Then, Theis resumes what he'd been doing all game - being as effective as a folding chair. That's on Brad.

[ozgod]

Don't mind me for bumping this thread but GET RID OF HIM NOWWWWW

His fault the Heat shot 56% tonight, and 48% on threes.

His fault his team didn't play good enough defense, and doing terrible substitutions with Theis and not Timelord or GWill. And when they went on that 22-6 run, the Celtics just flat out quit by bricking many 3's.

And they still brick 3's when they should have attacked the paint more.

Pulling Gwill for Theis was definitely something that didn't work out, just as putting in Gwill was something that did. That's something that Brad will want a mulligan on. I'm guessing he was hoping to get Friday night Theis instead of Sunday night Theis. The problem was Theis was in foul trouble and not playing well and couldn't challenge Bam and Bam ignited that run with that massive dunk and erased our 6 point lead and they went on a 26-6 run getting the easiest baskets they'd gotten all game.

As for bricking the 3s I think that was a sign of panic and immaturity from the team, they saw their season slipping away and tried to get the whole lead back immediately. They went away from what had been working for them. And when those 3s started missing their defense unraveled, like it tends to do when they start missing. They went away from what had given them the 6 point lead in the first place.

Realistically though, and this will be an unpopular opinion particularly at this time just after the season ends, but I'm pretty sure Brad's not going to get fired. I just don't think there are decent candidates to replace him, the best one was probably Donovan and he's with the Bulls now. Wyc and Danny tend not to overreact to bad losses.

[SCeltic34]

If someone can convince me that Brad did a good job this series (or against Toronto) I'll give them a bunch of TPs.  If you can convince me that his substitution patterns in game 6 were good ones, I'll give you TPs until my mouse breaks.

Personally I can't recall a time where Brad made dumber personnel decisions than this game.  After the failed experiment with Kanter in the 1st quarter, not only did he stick with Kanter too long thereby allowing Miami a ton of wide-open 3's (including his matchup Iguodala), he went back to Kanter again later in the half only to end up with the same poor results.  We were getting obliterated with him on the floor.  He really should have went to GWill with the way that Iggy was playing pick and pop.  That's elementary level stuff right there that even a half-knowledgeable fan can recognize.  The decision to sub GWill in the 2nd half was far, far too late.  When Iggy was subbed in in the 3rd quarter, Brad stuck with Theis for an inexplicable reason.  Iggy went on quickly to make a 3 pointer.  Also Why he went back to Theis in the 4th - which was the turning point in the game - is beyond me.  I thought Timelord gave us solid minutes in the 1st half despite some mistakes.  We played solid ball with him on the court.  If anything I'll say that Brad's rotational mismanagement was the primary reason we lost this game.

Brad did a poor job last year too.  He even said so himself.  That's two years in a row of doing a poor job in the playoffs with an immensely talented squad.  His teams always seem to have a weakness that he cannot seem to fix.  This series it was executing in the 4th quarter (and bad 3rd quarters, too).  Game 5 aside these two problems killed us.  I don't count game 2 because we played like crap in the 4th even if we won it by 2 points.

Find an adequate replacement and I'll be glad to see Stevens go.  I'm tired of watching his poor coaching decisions.  Unfortunately the current selection is really unappealing, so if he's here next year I won't complain too much.

[Roy H.]

I'm pretty sure Brad's not going to get fired

Very true.  Teams generally don’t fire coaches a month and a half after giving them a contract extension. 

[PhoSita]

I'm pretty sure Brad's not going to get fired

Very true.  Teams generally don’t fire coaches a month and a half after giving them a contract extension.

Not to mention making the ECF three times in four years.

[ozgod]

I'm pretty sure Brad's not going to get fired

Very true.  Teams generally don’t fire coaches a month and a half after giving them a contract extension.

Not to mention making the ECF three times in four years.

It's also more the fact that I don't think there's a compelling alternative out there. D'Antoni? Jim Boylen? Stan Van Gundy? Ty Lue? Alvin Gentry?

[KrazyLegs]

Biggest mismatch of series: Bam >>> Theis

Second biggest mismatch: Spo >> Stevens

[hpantazo]

He could have done better, but can't blame this on Stevens. Ultimately the difference was Bam killing our bigs. Stevens was left with Theis who's a decent backup big but shouldn't be our starter, Kanter who's too slow to defend many of today's big men, Rob Williams who's still lost on most plays, and Grant Williams, and undersized rookie.

The other factor was the Heat's shooters. That Herro pick right before Langford cost us a trip to the Finals and maybe a title. Ainge slammed the table for a reason. We have to add a shooter and a better big man, and that's on Ainge.