Is Doc Rivers overrated as a coach? Big 3 or Doc River's magic

[SHAQATTACK]

Maybe the best babysitter coach in the NBA today.    Handling egos is his calling card.   Phil Jackson was the best handler of new era coaching millionaire cry babies.

So,there are two types , coaches who do their jobs and coaches who are player driven ..told how to coach.

Real coaches can develop young talent .

[Eja117]

quitter

[Moranis]

Yes.  He never properly developed the young players.  They didn't get better during their tenure and left the same player they were when they started.  That doesn't even mention he is perhaps the biggest fraud in all of sports.  Always saying one thing but doing something else, constantly calling out the role players while letting the veterans do what they want, etc.  I was happy he left and wanted him gone years earlier.  I can't stand that guy and never have.

[Greyman]

Think if he was a great coach, the Cs would have at least one more title. Even though one title cost me $800 Aussie dollars, it is not the money talking. The big three era was wonderful and would have been (though somewhat less) without a title.

We should have had two though and, all things considered, it comes down to Doc.

Team achieved heaps under Doc, feel they could have gone (another title) better.

[DarkAzcura]

I have a feeling people are going to be emotional about this one but...

Doc actually wasn't a very good coach at all. Similar to Mark Jackson (who the GS players almost universally LOVED) he was backed by the players but doesn't actually help the team win.

I blame the fact we only got 1 title 100% on injuries, but it's still a little suspicious to see that a team with as much talent as those Big 3 Celtics only manage to get top-9 in offensive efficiency once (which was the year they got there).

Let's keep in mind that Doc Rivers also managed to win one more game after going to Clippers... following on the heels of Vinny-motherfreaking-Del Negro. If you can't significantly out-coach Del Negro WITH internal improvement from Blake Griffin and another year for your key players to jell... I'm sorry, you're not a great coach.

The only two things Doc is great at are 1) managing player egos 2) drawing plays out of timeouts.

Better than some (like the abysmal Vinny Del Negro) but not a difference maker (like Pop or Rick Carlisle).

Doc the GM seems to be hamstringing Doc the coach a bit. And Rivers is more than just his tenure with the C's -- he's done a lot more with a marginal squad than, say, Brad Stevens has --  but you're right: he does seem to coach to the way he thinks is best to play basketball, regardless of the roster he's presented with.

No he hasn't, at least not in the way Stevens has had. Doc always had either McGrady or Pierce on his teams. The teams were pretty mediocre but having a wing that can get you 25 in their sleep makes any coach's job easier...at least relative to what Stevens has had in his first two years as coach. I'm not even going to get into how he completely mishandled Al Jefferson's touches, and part of the reason Jefferson exploded the way he did was because Pierce force-fed him going against the gameplan. The fact that he couldn't even pull one win out of that 18 game losing streak was really depressing. Sure the team sucked, but they weren't 18 game losing streak bad. Not with Jefferson playing the way he was.

I don't think the Celtics would have more than 18-20 wins with Doc as coach of this team. He wouldn't be able to handle all the roster turnover and lack of general offensive talent (until Thomas obviously).

Doc is great at managing egos, and he is great at drawing up plays every now and then, but the guy had no idea how to develop young talent. His teams completely fell off a cliff whenever Pierce and McGrady went out with injury. Those are major impact players, but those teams should have never fallen off a cliff the way they did without their stars.

I guess, in the end, it may be moot because coaches aren't judged by how well they coach young players and mediocre teams. They are judged by how well they coach championship talent, and in that respect, Doc did well.

[D.o.s.]

I have a feeling people are going to be emotional about this one but...

Doc actually wasn't a very good coach at all. Similar to Mark Jackson (who the GS players almost universally LOVED) he was backed by the players but doesn't actually help the team win.

I blame the fact we only got 1 title 100% on injuries, but it's still a little suspicious to see that a team with as much talent as those Big 3 Celtics only manage to get top-9 in offensive efficiency once (which was the year they got there).

Let's keep in mind that Doc Rivers also managed to win one more game after going to Clippers... following on the heels of Vinny-motherfreaking-Del Negro. If you can't significantly out-coach Del Negro WITH internal improvement from Blake Griffin and another year for your key players to jell... I'm sorry, you're not a great coach.

The only two things Doc is great at are 1) managing player egos 2) drawing plays out of timeouts.

Better than some (like the abysmal Vinny Del Negro) but not a difference maker (like Pop or Rick Carlisle).

Doc the GM seems to be hamstringing Doc the coach a bit. And Rivers is more than just his tenure with the C's -- he's done a lot more with a marginal squad than, say, Brad Stevens has --  but you're right: he does seem to coach to the way he thinks is best to play basketball, regardless of the roster he's presented with.

No he hasn't, at least not in the way Stevens has had. Doc always had either McGrady or Pierce on his teams. The teams were pretty mediocre but having a wing that can get you 25 in their sleep makes any coach's job easier...at least relative to what Stevens has had in his first two years as coach. I'm not even going to get into how he completely mishandled Al Jefferson's touches, and part of the reason Jefferson exploded the way he did was because Pierce force-fed him going against the gameplan. The fact that he couldn't even pull one way out of that 18 game losing stread was really depressing. Sure the team sucked, but they weren't 18 game losing streak bad. Not with Jefferson playing the way he was.

I don't think the Celtics would have more than 18-20 wins with Doc as coach of this team. He wouldn't be able to handle all the roster turnover and lack of general offensive talent (until Thomas obviously).

This would be a very nice post, if it were true.
http://www.basketball-reference.com/teams/ORL/2000.html
You'll notice this team reached .500. You'll notice that it features neither Tracy McGrady nor Paul Pierce. You'll notice that, actually, it's probably a worse team than the collection of talent that Stevens has had to work with.

[DarkAzcura]

I have a feeling people are going to be emotional about this one but...

Doc actually wasn't a very good coach at all. Similar to Mark Jackson (who the GS players almost universally LOVED) he was backed by the players but doesn't actually help the team win.

I blame the fact we only got 1 title 100% on injuries, but it's still a little suspicious to see that a team with as much talent as those Big 3 Celtics only manage to get top-9 in offensive efficiency once (which was the year they got there).

Let's keep in mind that Doc Rivers also managed to win one more game after going to Clippers... following on the heels of Vinny-motherfreaking-Del Negro. If you can't significantly out-coach Del Negro WITH internal improvement from Blake Griffin and another year for your key players to jell... I'm sorry, you're not a great coach.

The only two things Doc is great at are 1) managing player egos 2) drawing plays out of timeouts.

Better than some (like the abysmal Vinny Del Negro) but not a difference maker (like Pop or Rick Carlisle).

Doc the GM seems to be hamstringing Doc the coach a bit. And Rivers is more than just his tenure with the C's -- he's done a lot more with a marginal squad than, say, Brad Stevens has --  but you're right: he does seem to coach to the way he thinks is best to play basketball, regardless of the roster he's presented with.

No he hasn't, at least not in the way Stevens has had. Doc always had either McGrady or Pierce on his teams. The teams were pretty mediocre but having a wing that can get you 25 in their sleep makes any coach's job easier...at least relative to what Stevens has had in his first two years as coach. I'm not even going to get into how he completely mishandled Al Jefferson's touches, and part of the reason Jefferson exploded the way he did was because Pierce force-fed him going against the gameplan. The fact that he couldn't even pull one way out of that 18 game losing stread was really depressing. Sure the team sucked, but they weren't 18 game losing streak bad. Not with Jefferson playing the way he was.

I don't think the Celtics would have more than 18-20 wins with Doc as coach of this team. He wouldn't be able to handle all the roster turnover and lack of general offensive talent (until Thomas obviously).

This would be a very nice post, if it were true.
http://www.basketball-reference.com/teams/ORL/2000.html
You'll notice this team reached .500. You'll notice that it features neither Tracy McGrady nor Paul Pierce. You'll notice that, actually, it's probably a worse team than the collection of talent that Stevens has had to work with.

Wow, you are right. I completely forgot about that team! One year before McGrady arrived, I believe. I don't really agree that the collection of talent is worse on that team, but you definitely proved me wrong about him always having a 25 PPG talent. To cover me a bit, though, that season was Ben Wallace's coming out party. The Magic had a real tough defense because of him anchoring it. It's easier to grind out wins in the regular season with a tough defense so I'd say Doc had a much more balanced roster to work with that season than what Stevens has had in two seasons (until very recently). I just forgot Doc coached that roster.  Armstrong played out of his mind that season so I'll give Doc some credit for that one.

[D.o.s.]

To be fair  to your point, Doc almost always had McGrady or Pierce. 

[littleteapot]

So Doc is either bad because he never developed talent on veteran teams, or he's bad because he won due to players having breakout years and became superstars while he was coaching them?

[DarkAzcura]

So Doc is either bad because he never developed talent on veteran teams, or he's bad because he won due to players having breakout years and became superstars while he was coaching them?

Pierce was a superstar before Doc. McGrady was going to be a superstar no matter what. Only "superstar" that can be credited to Doc may be Wallace, but the argument could be made that he broke out in Washington a season before he went to Orlando. Some people might not even want to say he fully broke out until he went to Detroit under Carlisle. So I guess there is Rondo too, which I'll give Doc. Doc managed his personality well enough even if I don't think his shot was properly developed. That's more on Rondo than Doc probably, though, we've seen Stevens force a couple of his players to shoot 3s to develop their game regardless of past experience with the shot (Sully and Olynyk).

Never said Doc was bad anyway. Only that I agree that he is somewhat overrated.

[droopdog7]

You've heard the expression, the NBA is a players league.

Well, it's true.

[DarkAzcura]

You've heard the expression, the NBA is a players league.

Well, it's true.

It is a player's league, but if you mean it in a way to say coaches don't matter (like most people seem to do), that's wrong. SAS, Atlanta, and Indiana wouldn't be half as good as they are without their coaching.

[mahonedog88]

He might be slightly overrated, but only slightly.  He's been coach of the year twice, the first time being with the Orlando Magic and he got the coach of the year that year because he took an absolute crap team to a solid record.  Go back and look at that roster he was dealing with the year he won it and you can see why.

His success with the Celtics, especially in the first year of the big 3 era, I think was a combination of a lot of factors...first, that team, especially looking at it in hindsight I think was PERFECTLY constructed, so Ainge gets all the credit there.  But at the same time, we see all the time that just because the roster looks good on paper, you still need the right coach and system to make it all work so in that aspect, Doc gets a lot of the credit.

In terms of since being in LA, I think he's a good coach...but the problem is that he went to LA with the reputation of being almost a defensive genius, and the Clippers haven't exactly been worldbeaters when it comes defense, which I think shows that really the majority, if not all of the credit needs to go to Kevin Garnett for that.  Can't underestimate the importance of Tom Thibodeau when he was an assistant under Doc as well.

[D.o.s.]

You've heard the expression, the NBA is a players league.

Well, it's true.

It is a player's league, but if you mean it in a way to say coaches don't matter (like most people seem to do), that's wrong. SAS, Atlanta, and Indiana wouldn't be half as good as they are without their coaching.

Correct, but a good coach with not so good players won't produce particularly good results. SVG in Detroit is a good example of that.

[Moranis]

I have a feeling people are going to be emotional about this one but...

Doc actually wasn't a very good coach at all. Similar to Mark Jackson (who the GS players almost universally LOVED) he was backed by the players but doesn't actually help the team win.

I blame the fact we only got 1 title 100% on injuries, but it's still a little suspicious to see that a team with as much talent as those Big 3 Celtics only manage to get top-9 in offensive efficiency once (which was the year they got there).

Let's keep in mind that Doc Rivers also managed to win one more game after going to Clippers... following on the heels of Vinny-motherfreaking-Del Negro. If you can't significantly out-coach Del Negro WITH internal improvement from Blake Griffin and another year for your key players to jell... I'm sorry, you're not a great coach.

The only two things Doc is great at are 1) managing player egos 2) drawing plays out of timeouts.

Better than some (like the abysmal Vinny Del Negro) but not a difference maker (like Pop or Rick Carlisle).

Doc the GM seems to be hamstringing Doc the coach a bit. And Rivers is more than just his tenure with the C's -- he's done a lot more with a marginal squad than, say, Brad Stevens has --  but you're right: he does seem to coach to the way he thinks is best to play basketball, regardless of the roster he's presented with.

No he hasn't, at least not in the way Stevens has had. Doc always had either McGrady or Pierce on his teams. The teams were pretty mediocre but having a wing that can get you 25 in their sleep makes any coach's job easier...at least relative to what Stevens has had in his first two years as coach. I'm not even going to get into how he completely mishandled Al Jefferson's touches, and part of the reason Jefferson exploded the way he did was because Pierce force-fed him going against the gameplan. The fact that he couldn't even pull one way out of that 18 game losing stread was really depressing. Sure the team sucked, but they weren't 18 game losing streak bad. Not with Jefferson playing the way he was.

I don't think the Celtics would have more than 18-20 wins with Doc as coach of this team. He wouldn't be able to handle all the roster turnover and lack of general offensive talent (until Thomas obviously).

This would be a very nice post, if it were true.
http://www.basketball-reference.com/teams/ORL/2000.html
You'll notice this team reached .500. You'll notice that it features neither Tracy McGrady nor Paul Pierce. You'll notice that, actually, it's probably a worse team than the collection of talent that Stevens has had to work with.

Wow, you are right. I completely forgot about that team! One year before McGrady arrived, I believe. I don't really agree that the collection of talent is worse on that team, but you definitely proved me wrong about him always having a 25 PPG talent. To cover me a bit, though, that season was Ben Wallace's coming out party. The Magic had a real tough defense because of him anchoring it. It's easier to grind out wins in the regular season with a tough defense so I'd say Doc had a much more balanced roster to work with that season than what Stevens has had in two seasons (until very recently). I just forgot Doc coached that roster.  Armstrong played out of his mind that season so I'll give Doc some credit for that one.

I know Maggette was a rookie that year, but he had multiple seasons at over 20 a game included two above 22 a game.  Mercer was also on that team until he was traded midway through the year.  Mercer was a pretty good scorer in his own right.