Bill Simmons getting his own show on ESPN

[LooseCannon]

Plus its comical when guys like Magic Johnson and Jalen Rose talk hoops and then we go to Simmons who really knows nothing about how the game is played.

Listening to Magic Johnson talk about basketball is a great reminder to me that having played the game at a high level in no way makes you a quality analyst.

You didn't learn that from watching Joe Morgan do baseball commentary?

[Celtics4ever]

Listening to Magic Johnson talk about basketball is a great reminder to me that having played the game at a high level in no way makes you a quality analyst.

He was poor at coaching as well.  5-11 record

[Beat LA]

Listening to Magic Johnson talk about basketball is a great reminder to me that having played the game at a high level in no way makes you a quality analyst.

He was poor at coaching as well.  5-11 record

Bird aside, and Isiah at times in Indiana, most great players are terrible coaches and/or executives because they're likely impatient and/or are unable to recreate what worked on their teams because they aren't on the court, in charge, so it's really all about control.  I think.  Some guys simply can't relate to their players, but it depends entirely on the individual. 

[mgent]

Listening to Magic Johnson talk about basketball is a great reminder to me that having played the game at a high level in no way makes you a quality analyst.

He was poor at coaching as well.  5-11 record

Bird aside, and Isiah at times in Indiana, most great players are terrible coaches and/or executives because they're likely impatient and/or are unable to recreate what worked on their teams because they aren't on the court, in charge, so it's really all about control.  I think.  Some guys simply can't relate to their players, but it depends entirely on the individual.

Not just Bird, all Celtics do fine:  Bird, McHale, Ainge, Tommy, KC Jones.  Just so happens Isiah and Dumars are idiots.

[D.o.s.]

Will this basically be a tired version of the Starters?

Come on now. I think that the Grantlanders will be better than The Starters. And if not, at least we'll have some Boston fandom instead of the Raptor show.

They fill up a lot of the same bandwidth on the spectrum of fandom. I don't actively watch either. That said, I am happy that Simmons has done what he's done, and he's definitely done a lot of good things -- like exposing people to Andrew Sharp, who was a solid writer for Bullets Forever (and definitely very Simmons-y) by hiring him for Grantland. Sports bloggers are taken more seriously because of Bill Simmons, and that's more or less a good thing. Plus, the guy pushed hard for the 30 for 30 series, which might be his most important contribution to sports culture at the end of the day: widespread appeal for Sports Docs.

I just think ESPN is clinging to him because they know he's their NBA cash cow, and the sport is becoming popular enough that they can't afford to lose him as one of their basketball faces. Unfortunately, that leads to more podcasts and more television appearances and less writing, which is detrimental, because now he doesn't seem motivated to write good columns more than, say, 40% of the time -- and he's still a better writer than a talking head even when he's phoning in yet another Mailbag.

Book of Basketball is great. 30 for 30 is fantastic. The B.S. report is on the other end of that spectrum. Everything else he does falls somewhere in between, IMO, YMMV, etc.

[Clench123]

The only guy I could stand on NBA countdown.  Good for him (even though he usually seem anti-celtics with his comments)

[Beat LA]

Listening to Magic Johnson talk about basketball is a great reminder to me that having played the game at a high level in no way makes you a quality analyst.

He was poor at coaching as well.  5-11 record

Bird aside, and Isiah at times in Indiana, most great players are terrible coaches and/or executives because they're likely impatient and/or are unable to recreate what worked on their teams because they aren't on the court, in charge, so it's really all about control.  I think.  Some guys simply can't relate to their players, but it depends entirely on the individual.

Not just Bird, all Celtics do fine:  Bird, McHale, Ainge, Tommy, KC Jones.  Just so happens Isiah and Dumars are idiots.

I don't think Dumars is an idiot.  You have to do something right to make your team the superpower that they were for 6-7 seasons.  Having said that, yeah, he made some really dumb moves, but overall he was pretty good.  I mean, he took Arron Afflalo in the late first round in 2007 and traded for Stuckey, but none of his coaches ever played their young guys, who would have helped tremendously, imo.  There's no excusing the 2003 draft, letting Larry Brown go, or opting to save money after their title and not bring back so many key contributors off their bench (Okur, James, Williamson, etc.), though.  McDyess was a great addition, but if you added him to their bench for 04-05, they win it all, imo.

Isiah, yeah, he's a moron, but he did draft really well, for the most part, and honestly, if you look at the type of team he was trying to make with a 4/5 duo of Randolph and Curry, that's pretty much the same formula Memphis used, the key difference being, of course, that Gasol can protect Randolph and the rim, while Curry couldn't do much of anything defensively, but the model was a good idea.

I'm not sure that I would put KC Jones in that group, however.  Plus, not all Celtics do well in the coaching realm - look at Russell.  He's the prime example of what I was talking about.  You forgot Dave Cowens, btw.  Now he was a great one, both as an assistant and a head a coach.  Don't forget Silas either, who excelled in the same way.  Don Nelson, too.  Am I forgetting anyone?  I wasn't watching when ML 'coached,' but then again, he wasn't a great player, so he only fits into the Celtics category, unfortunately lol.

[pearljammer10]

Finally.

[freshinthehouse]

Not just Bird, all Celtics do fine:  Bird, McHale, Ainge, Tommy, KC Jones.  Just so happens Isiah and Dumars are idiots.

That's definitely a stretch.  Out of that list, only KC Jones won a title for anyone other than the Celtics.  Tommy and KC did great jobs when they had premium talent.  I don't think anyone would consider them world-class coaches.  Bird has done a very good job, as has Ainge.  Don Nelson was very good for a long time.  McHale started out very good in Minnesota, but by the end of it he was won considered by most as one of the worst GMs in the game.  Cowans, Silas, Chris Ford, and Don Cheney were mediocre at best.  ML Carr was unmitigated disaster.  Dennis Johnson never managed to impress a team enough to handle him the reins. 

So while the C's have had a very good track record as coaches/GMs they are far from perfect.

[j804]

Good to hear.  Grantland has some of the best writers in the world when it comes to discussing the NBA, or basketball in general.

music too their Wu Tang piece was dope. I'll be setting my DVR for sure

[Beat LA]

Not just Bird, all Celtics do fine:  Bird, McHale, Ainge, Tommy, KC Jones.  Just so happens Isiah and Dumars are idiots.

That's definitely a stretch.  Out of that list, only KC Jones won a title for anyone other than the Celtics.  Tommy and KC did great jobs when they had premium talent.  I don't think anyone would consider them world-class coaches.  Bird has done a very good job, as has Ainge.  Don Nelson was very good for a long time.  McHale started out very good in Minnesota, but by the end of it he was won considered by most as one of the worst GMs in the game.  Cowans, Silas, Chris Ford, and Don Cheney were mediocre at best.  ML Carr was unmitigated disaster.  Dennis Johnson never managed to impress a team enough to handle him the reins. 

So while the C's have had a very good track record as coaches/GMs they are far from perfect.

He was an assistant when he won with another team, though, I just checked - 1972 (Lakers).  Wasn't he also an assistant in Washington when the Bullets lost to the Sonics, or am I confusing him with someone else?

Edit - the Bullets lost to Golden State that year (1975), not Phoenix.  Well, not yet, anyway

[freshinthehouse]

Not just Bird, all Celtics do fine:  Bird, McHale, Ainge, Tommy, KC Jones.  Just so happens Isiah and Dumars are idiots.

That's definitely a stretch.  Out of that list, only KC Jones won a title for anyone other than the Celtics.  Tommy and KC did great jobs when they had premium talent.  I don't think anyone would consider them world-class coaches.  Bird has done a very good job, as has Ainge.  Don Nelson was very good for a long time.  McHale started out very good in Minnesota, but by the end of it he was won considered by most as one of the worst GMs in the game.  Cowans, Silas, Chris Ford, and Don Cheney were mediocre at best.  ML Carr was unmitigated disaster.  Dennis Johnson never managed to impress a team enough to handle him the reins. 

So while the C's have had a very good track record as coaches/GMs they are far from perfect.

He was an assistant when he won with another team, though, I just checked - 1972 (Lakers).  Wasn't he also an assistant in Washington when the Bullets lost to the Sonics, or am I confusing him with someone else?

Edit - the Bullets lost to Golden State that year (1975), not Phoenix.  Well, not yet, anyway

Good call.  I was thinking KC was still in Washington in 78.

[Endless Paradise]

Listening to Magic Johnson talk about basketball is a great reminder to me that having played the game at a high level in no way makes you a quality analyst.

He was poor at coaching as well.  5-11 record

Bird aside, and Isiah at times in Indiana, most great players are terrible coaches and/or executives because they're likely impatient and/or are unable to recreate what worked on their teams because they aren't on the court, in charge, so it's really all about control.  I think.  Some guys simply can't relate to their players, but it depends entirely on the individual.

Not just Bird, all Celtics do fine:  Bird, McHale, Ainge, Tommy, KC Jones.  Just so happens Isiah and Dumars are idiots.

If you count McHale as having done fine, it makes no sense to then consider Dumars an idiot.

[sofutomygaha]

Plus its comical when guys like Magic Johnson and Jalen Rose talk hoops and then we go to Simmons who really knows nothing about how the game is played.

Listening to Magic Johnson talk about basketball is a great reminder to me that having played the game at a high level in no way makes you a quality analyst.

You didn't learn that from watching Joe Morgan do baseball commentary?

OH my god!!! Thank you for making me remember what a hilarious, vapid, slow-motion trainwreck Joe Morgan was with a microphone.

Bill Simmons is like, the anti-Joe Morgan. It's a great contrast. Morgan is one of the best to ever play the game, and he has poise, gravitas, a beautiful voice, and a brick between his ears. Bill Simmons is the dorky, articulate, graphomaniacal fan boy whose dream is to get the letterman's jacket and the slow clap from the jocks like in the final scene of Lucas. I enjoy it a lot. I think he does a decent job dancing on the edge of "punditry" without selling the "I'm the guy who REALLY knows what's up" character that most sports TV personalities do.

I love the whole Grantland thing, but I actually also loved the Basketball Jones back when they were a bunch of Canadian dweebs making inside jokes instead of trying to deliver sports-TV-grade commentary.  Grantland has been doing segments already on Youtube; I don't get why they are turning it into a TV show and I don't particularly like the idea- when you blow something out to a regular 30 minute slot that has to be filled, it inevitably starts looking like everything else.

[sofutomygaha]

It makes me happy somehow, by the way, to see that some of you guys who I disagree with most of the time are listening to the same stuff on their ipods that I am. Arguing with you all on this board and listening to Grantland are the two things that keep these Celtics rebuild years enjoyable for me