Gauging CelticStrong on HC Udoka

[Goldstar88]

Looked like he had the team playing some good defense for a while, but lately they have been bad and on the season they are middle of the pack in terms of points allowed. According to Brad, This team was constructed to be strong defensively, which made sense as this was supposed to be a strength of  Udoka.

Offensively, however, Ime seems completely clueless. I don’t think the players have any confidence in his play calling and it shows. They look so disjointed Thats it’s hard to watch at times.

Not impressed, thus far... but I’m not giving up on the coach, yet.

[cons]

It’s early for him as a coach. But I don’t see how anyone could think he’s done really well.

 I think he’d have been better off with a lower expectation team. Like Orlando for instance.

  But here we have talent and the expectation ( right or wrong) to win fairly big right now.
 
  So yeah I think a more veteran coach like Vogel or Carlisle would’ve gotten more out of this team. 

  I feel like we gambled on a rookie head coach and we’re losing that gamble.

  Brad had a way easier start. When he took over we were basically tanking.

[Somebody]

Looked like he had the team playing some good defense for a while, but lately they have been bad and on the season they are middle of the pack in terms of points allowed. According to Brad, This team was constructed to be strong defensively, which made sense as this was supposed to be a strength of  Udoka.

Offensively, however, Ime seems completely clueless. I don’t think the players have any confidence in his play calling and it shows. They look so disjointed Thats it’s hard to watch at times.

Not impressed, thus far... but I’m not giving up on the coach, yet.

He's been underperforming on defence as well - our team has one of the best defensive personnel in the league and yet we're only slightly above average in that regard with a -1.0 rDRTG (10th in the league).

[Somebody]

Fire him.

You know someone is doing a WOAT level job when Who has seen the light

Who will fire him? Somebody has to do it? Y’all can draw lots.

The past, present and future must succeed this time around on Christmas Eve, I refuse to believe that Scroogebeck can get away with this any longer.

Did the site autocorrect Grousbeck to Scroogebeck?…lol

It isn’t clear that the ownership is committed to winning.

No, that's what I call him nowadays.

[Somebody]

It’s early for him as a coach. But I don’t see how anyone could think he’s done really well.

 I think he’d have been better off with a lower expectation team. Like Orlando for instance.

  But here we have talent and the expectation ( right or wrong) to win fairly big right now.
 
  So yeah I think a more veteran coach like Vogel or Carlisle would’ve gotten more out of this team. 

  I feel like we gambled on a rookie head coach and we’re losing that gamble.

  Brad had a way easier start. When he took over we were basically tanking.

He would've been better off coaching a secondary school team or in the G-League.

[celticsclay]

I am curious how everyone feels about Udoka’s start as our head coach.

For me he’s been solid, but perhaps he shouldn’t have been given such a tough task for his first head coaching position. In saying all that, I have no doubt that Wyc will give Udoka at least two seasons before looking to replace him.

I bring this up now because Lakers management are attempting to make Frank Vogel the fall guy for their terrible roster construction and I was curious if anyone would prefer Vogel as the Celtics head coach. It also should be noted that if the Indiana Pacers decide to go into a full rebuild, Rick Carlisle would most likely become available too.

I wonder when a team will hold gm Lebron responsible for something. It was pretty clearly reported he wanted Westbrook over demar or hield. This is his roster. How is this vogels fault? Lebrons friends are old and not playing well.

I’ll add this is coinciding in a time Lebron may
No longer even be a top ten player in the league. He is definitely no longer top 5.

[PhoSita]

He's a downgrade from Brad Stevens.

But if the star players like him more and are overall more content having Ime as the coach, then hiring him is a success, i guess.

I haven't seen any evidence that he's gonna coach them up offensively, nor is there much evidence yet of his being adept at developing young players.  Those are big issues since this team has a long way to go to learn to play team offense, and the only way for the roster to really improve seems to be for young guys to break out.

But it's early yet. Ime deserves to have some time to figure things out. I do think it would've been better to hire somebody like Kenny Atkinson. Somebody with a track record of coaching up young teams. But the guys wanted Udoka, not another person like Brad Stevens.

So I guess the overall theme of this season is "let's see how this goes when the stars on the team get what they asked for."

Interesting result so far, from that angle.

[Ogaju]

I am curious how everyone feels about Udoka’s start as our head coach.

For me he’s been solid, but perhaps he shouldn’t have been given such a tough task for his first head coaching position. In saying all that, I have no doubt that Wyc will give Udoka at least two seasons before looking to replace him.

I bring this up now because Lakers management are attempting to make Frank Vogel the fall guy for their terrible roster construction and I was curious if anyone would prefer Vogel as the Celtics head coach. It also should be noted that if the Indiana Pacers decide to go into a full rebuild, Rick Carlisle would most likely become available too.

I wonder when a team will hold gm Lebron responsible for something. It was pretty clearly reported he wanted Westbrook over demar or hield. This is his roster. How is this vogels fault? Lebrons friends are old and not playing well.

I’ll add this is coinciding in a time Lebron may
No longer even be a top ten player in the league. He is definitely no longer top 5.

He looked like the best player in the league against the Cs.

[Csfan1984]

BS wanted a vet team and win now approach to the rotation, Ime has delivered that. The roster isn't good enough and the energy from the team isn't there. Feel that's a team make up and on BS. Things would have been a lot easier if like when BS was hired the team was doing a bridge or transition year. This team isn't built around the Jays and the Jays themselves haven't been their best. I give Ime a C+ and BS a D.

[Jvalin]

I've stopped watching the games. Can't stand the constant iso. Two of our players (Tatum and Schroder) are in the top 12 league-wide in isolation frequency for crying out loud!

My ideal hiring would be Quin Snyder. Imo, he's the best coach in the NBA. Obviously, he ain't available. Not till the offseason at the very least.

Or maybe we can actually exploit market inefficiencies like we used to (so much for going back to our DNA ) and hire a European coach who's one of the best coaches in the world like Messina.

If we go after a european head coach (which I don't think we will), gimme Šarūnas Jasikevičius. He's a disciple of Željko Obradović (the european Gregg Popovich) having played under him for 4 seasons. He played college basketball at the university of Maryland from 1994 to 1998. He also had a 2-year stint as a player in the NBA. All in all, he has lived 6 years in the USA so I guess it would be a relatively easy transition for him. He started his career as a head coach in 2016 with his native Zalgiris Kaunas. Amazingly enough, he led Zalgiris to the Euroleague Final Four in 2018. To put this into perspective, it would be as if a small market NBA team reached the Conference Finals with no stars on its roster! He won numerous trophies at national level with Zalgiris. He then left the club in 2020 to coach Euroleague's powerhouse Barcelona. That's the team Nikola Mirotic plays for. Jasikevičius led Barcelona to the Euroleague Final last season, but lost to Anadolu Efes which was led by former Celtic Shane Larkin. They won the ACB league which is hands down the most competitive national league in Europe. They also won the spanish cup. This season, Barcelona is sitting comfortably at the top of the table in the Euroleague with a 12-2 record. Jasikevičius' former team, Zalgiris, is dead last with a 3-11 record.

Fwiw, Quin Snyder has worked under Messina in 2012/13. Messina was the head coach of CSKA Moscow at the time. He's now coaching Olimpia Milano. They also participate in the Euroleague.

P.S. I don't expect us to fire Udoka anytime soon.

[footey]

I like Ime. He’s brutally frank. He is trying to instill team concepts but the players have yet to break their bad habits. The stars are entitled and the role guys are too scared to rock the boat. It’s messed up. Brad faced the same problem and basically gave up.

[Somebody]

I've stopped watching the games. Can't stand the constant iso. Two of our players (Tatum and Schroder) are in the top 12 league-wide in isolation frequency for crying out loud!

My ideal hiring would be Quin Snyder. Imo, he's the best coach in the NBA. Obviously, he ain't available. Not till the offseason at the very least.

Or maybe we can actually exploit market inefficiencies like we used to (so much for going back to our DNA ) and hire a European coach who's one of the best coaches in the world like Messina.

If we go after a european head coach (which I don't think we will), gimme Šarūnas Jasikevičius. He's a disciple of Željko Obradović (the european Gregg Popovich) having played under him for 4 seasons. He played college basketball at the university of Maryland from 1994 to 1998. He also had a 2-year stint as a player in the NBA. All in all, he has lived 6 years in the USA so I guess it would be a relatively easy transition for him. He started his career as a head coach in 2016 with his native Zalgiris Kaunas. Amazingly enough, he led Zalgiris to the Euroleague Final Four in 2018. To put this into perspective, it would be as if a small market NBA team reached the Conference Finals with no stars on its roster! He won numerous trophies at national level with Zalgiris. He then left the club in 2020 to coach Euroleague's powerhouse Barcelona. That's the team Nikola Mirotic plays for. Jasikevičius led Barcelona to the Euroleague Final last season, but lost to Anadolu Efes which was led by former Celtic Shane Larkin. They won the ACB league which is hands down the most competitive national league in Europe. They also won the spanish cup. This season, Barcelona is sitting comfortably at the top of the table in the Euroleague with a 12-2 record. Jasikevičius' former team, Zalgiris, is dead last with a 3-11 record.

Fwiw, Quin Snyder has worked under Messina in 2012/13. Messina was the head coach of CSKA Moscow at the time. He's now coaching Olimpia Milano. They also participate in the Euroleague.

P.S. I don't expect us to fire Udoka anytime soon.

Didn't Messina win the Champions League with CSKA Moscow? I've always thought that was the equivalent of winning the championship with the '01 76ers against teams like the early-2000s Lakers, the mid-2000s Spurs, etc.

Hopefully we'll hire any one of the guys we've suggested though

[nickagneta]

I've stopped watching the games. Can't stand the constant iso. Two of our players (Tatum and Schroder) are in the top 12 league-wide in isolation frequency for crying out loud!

My ideal hiring would be Quin Snyder. Imo, he's the best coach in the NBA. Obviously, he ain't available. Not till the offseason at the very least.

Or maybe we can actually exploit market inefficiencies like we used to (so much for going back to our DNA ) and hire a European coach who's one of the best coaches in the world like Messina.

If we go after a european head coach (which I don't think we will), gimme Šarūnas Jasikevičius. He's a disciple of Željko Obradović (the european Gregg Popovich) having played under him for 4 seasons. He played college basketball at the university of Maryland from 1994 to 1998. He also had a 2-year stint as a player in the NBA. All in all, he has lived 6 years in the USA so I guess it would be a relatively easy transition for him. He started his career as a head coach in 2016 with his native Zalgiris Kaunas. Amazingly enough, he led Zalgiris to the Euroleague Final Four in 2018. To put this into perspective, it would be as if a small market NBA team reached the Conference Finals with no stars on its roster! He won numerous trophies at national level with Zalgiris. He then left the club in 2020 to coach Euroleague's powerhouse Barcelona. That's the team Nikola Mirotic plays for. Jasikevičius led Barcelona to the Euroleague Final last season, but lost to Anadolu Efes which was led by former Celtic Shane Larkin. They won the ACB league which is hands down the most competitive national league in Europe. They also won the spanish cup. This season, Barcelona is sitting comfortably at the top of the table in the Euroleague with a 12-2 record. Jasikevičius' former team, Zalgiris, is dead last with a 3-11 record.

Fwiw, Quin Snyder has worked under Messina in 2012/13. Messina was the head coach of CSKA Moscow at the time. He's now coaching Olimpia Milano. They also participate in the Euroleague.

P.S. I don't expect us to fire Udoka anytime soon.

Didn't Messina win the Champions League with CSKA Moscow? I've always thought that was the equivalent of winning the championship with the '01 76ers against teams like the early-2000s Lakers, the mid-2000s Spurs, etc.

Hopefully we'll hire any one of the guys we've suggested though

As non-Americans, you have to realize, foreign coaches, no matter how good, just aren't going to happen in the NBA. Especially if they aren't 100% fluent in English. Head coaching in the NBA, where NBA stars have all the power in the locker room, is a completely different dynamic than you see in any league outside of the NBA, moreso with foreign leagues.

So, sorry to say, you guys might pine for those great Euro, Australian and/or Chinese coaches over some of the guys getting chances in the NBA as head coaches, but it's just not going to happen.

[18isGREATERthan72]

Ime is coaching a .500 level roster to a .500 record.

I had hoped Tatum and Brown would take their play to another level this season with a coach they "stamped off" on but that hasn't really happened.

I think Brad has gotten more from less than Udoka has to this point with the rosters he had, but additionally Brad also got less from rosters that he probably should've gotten more from.

[PhoSita]

I like Ime. He’s brutally frank. He is trying to instill team concepts but the players have yet to break their bad habits. The stars are entitled and the role guys are too scared to rock the boat. It’s messed up. Brad faced the same problem and basically gave up.

the problem is your best players are still quite young, yet they've experienced a lot more success already than most players that age. they went on deep playoff runs when the team had more talent. this gives the impression that whatever their bad habits may have been, they were not so important that they prevented the team from going far.  so the young stars might think, well, do i really need to change or does the team just need to put that kind of talent around me again?