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just registered this one:
http://first-round-exit.blogspot.com/
how about dunleavy?
just registered this one:
http://first-round-exit.blogspot.com/
Regardless of what happened and AJ's coaching potential, he had to be let go for the simple fact that he definitely seemed to have lost connection and respect of his players. Anytime that happens, a coach needs to exit; See Skils, Scott from Chicago and Scott, Byron from New Jersey.
that's a fair assessment i think. just unfortunate...i thought he really had somethin. i just hope some roster changes are made too, because that's gotta be part of the problem...
3-12 playoff record since 2-0 lead in '06 Finals.....thats what really matters. Avery's regular season record doesnt mean a thing
http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/200...ery/index.html
Winning Is Everything: Absence of playoff success doomed Johnson
by Chris Mannix
Story Highlights
Mavs have been one and done two straight years
Johnson won't be the Mavs' last dismissal this offseason
Could Cuban chase Krzyzewski or Izzo as coach?
Avery Johnson was not fired as head coach of the Dallas Mavericks because his relationship with owner Mark Cuban had soured. If Johnson were winning championships, he could have talked to Cuban the way Billy Walsh of "Entourage" talked to E and the Mavericks owner wouldn't have blinked.
Nor was Johnson shown the door because he clashed philosophically with point guard Jason Kidd. Not specifically, anyway. Johnson and Kidd could have engaged in WWE-style wrestling matches over strategy during timeouts -- just so long as the team was winning.
No, Johnson was fired for the reason most coaches are (or at least should be): He couldn't get the job done in the postseason.
For the second time in as many seasons, Cuban watched his $105.3 million investment exit the playoffs with barely a whimper. Last season it was the fast-breaking Golden State Warriors who sent Dallas packing, dismissing the top-seeded Mavs in six games. It only took five games this season for a young New Orleans Hornets team to bounce Dallas, leaving Cuban seething on the sidelines and in search of a fall guy.
Johnson was it.
Johnson certainly deserves credit for changing the culture in Big D. Under Don Nelson the Mavericks showed only a passing interest in playing defense. With Johnson on the sidelines, Dallas morphed into a stingy unit, ranking sixth in scoring defense this season (95.9 points per game).
That regular season success, however, did not transfer to the postseason. Much like the 2007 playoffs, Johnson couldn't devise schemes to stop the simplest of styles. Golden State ousted the Mavericks by pushing the tempo and playing a smaller defender on Dirk Nowitzki. The Hornets, who utilize the pick-and-roll as a staple, hammered Dallas over the head with it. And everything Johnson threw at Chris Paul, from traps to double-teams to different defenders, failed.
For that he was fired.
But he may not be the only one leaving Dallas.
His dismissal is likely the first in a wave of changes for the Mavericks, which Nowitzki hinted at in his postgame press conference Tuesday night. "I'm sure there are going to be some changes," said Nowitzki. "Once you don't win the championship, you always have to look at what you're going to do to make the franchise better."
Those changes could include Dirk. As disappointing as the loss to New Orleans is, Dallas won't panic and make a knee-jerk deal involving Nowitzki. But after years of steadfastly standing by his star, Cuban (who once refused to include Dirk in any deal with the Lakers for Shaquille O'Neal) may be willing to seriously entertain offers.
And Nowitzki could still fetch a nice price. At 29, he is a year removed from an MVP season and is still one of the league's elite scorers (23.6 points per game in the regular season). What if Miami lands one of the top-two picks? Could a package of Nowitzki and a future first-round pick for Shawn Marion and the Heat's choice entice Pat Riley? Could the Mavs throw in, say, Brandon Bass (the only player on Dallas who showed up for the first-round series) and get the deal done? What about Memphis? Would it package a Derrick Rose/Michael Beasley pick with Mike Miller and salary filler for Nowitzki?
Dallas will also have to explore its options at the center position. If the NBA gave out its version of the Razzie Awards for playoff series, Erick Dampier would sweep several categories. Cuban's $73 million investment contributed no points and no rebounds in 25 minutes in Game 5 and was consistently outplayed by Tyson Chandler throughout the series. There is no telling how successful Dallas would have been had it suited up a young, energetic center like Chandler. Defensive rotations would have been quicker. More shots would have been blocked, or at least altered.
Finding that type of player should be one of the Mavericks' top priorities in the offseason. The free agent pickings are slim: Emeka Okafor and Nenad Krstic are out of Dallas's price range and Primoz Brezec and Rasho Nesterovic aren't options. The Mavericks also don't have a first-round pick, having surrendered it to New Jersey in the Kidd trade. If Dallas is looking to replace Dampier, it will have to get creative.
The Mavs may also get creative in replacing Johnson. This will ostensibly be Cuban's first independent hire: He inherited Don Nelson when he bought the team in 2000 and allowed Nelson to groom Johnson as his hand-picked successor. While names of the usual candidates (Rick Carlisle, Paul Silas, Jeff Van Gundy) will be bandied about, it wouldn't surprise me to see Cuban make a big-money bid for Duke's Mike Krzyzewski or Michigan State's Tom Izzo. Krzyzewski flirted with the Lakers in 2004 while Izzo said recently that he would be open to talking to NBA teams.
The Mavericks are in line for an overhaul. Just how big is the only question.
Phase 1 of Operation: Rebuild complete.
Yup, time for a major overhaul to the mavs. Start from scratch. Only one safe is Dirk. We're stuck with Kidd another year I guess...
we should keep bass, too.
Have no problem with that. Have to take the licks now. Oh well, hopefully the Stars continue on their magical ride and the Cowboys begin a magic ride.
I think some of you underestimate the effect Avery had on the roster. He was given full control by the FO to implement his "system".
He WANTED Kidd here. And not only did he want him because he was Jason Kidd, he wanted him because he failed at developing Devin at anything more than a one trick pony.
He also refused to develop some other younger players like Daniels, Diop, Powell (starting this year for the Clippers).
He filled the roster continually with older players, players he played against. When asked what they were actually bringing to the team his answer was always "inantgibles, veteran leadership..." How much leadership does a team that went to the Finals need????
Some of this weird lovefest was shown at times by overlplaying Stack as well.
It was not only his strategies, but his roster decisions as well, that made this decision a no brainer.
Most likely Avery will continue to grow into a good coach sometime down the line. But the Mavs can't wait on him, and most importantly he has lost his ties with everyone in the organization.
There are hints, which I think are very well kept at bay, that Dirk and Avery can barely stand each other. Avery tried to trade him, threw him under the bus last year. Dirk responded with a mediocre season until Kidd came along, and than his personal coach had an interview back in Germany where he pretty much said that Avery is an idiot. It can't get worse than this I think.
I guess they can't fire Mark Cuban? Being a Suns fan, if they do fire Dantoni, I'd love it if they picked up Avery even if he's an ex Spur.
How dumb must Michael Jordan feel. He could have hired Avery Johnson right now instead of Larry Brown.
If they wanted Avery, they would have held off--you could see this coming for weeks. The reason they gobbled up Larry was because they WANTED him.
I listened to the press conference where larry brown spoke and he didn't even sound excited about the job. Pretty boring. BTW where is the smiley with the Go Suns flag?
Dirk would never say it publicly, but he definitely hinted at it with some comments from time to time, most notably after the loss to the Spurs when Kidd was on the bench.
Also every timeout that I saw on TV, if you looked at Dirk, he basically was never looking at Avery or even seeming to pay attention. He was always off staring at the scoreboard or elsewhere. Probably because Avery was so predictable that he knew what Avery would say before he said it.
Other than Stackhouse (his buddy), and Terry (always positive), nobody on the team really has had a whole lot positive to say about Avery this entire season.
Dirk is 100% pure class. You can read between the lines here and see that he thinks Avery is a ing moron, but he hedges his words carefully and doesn't throw him under the bus:
http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/news/story?id=3375306
"We probably could have opened it up a little more, have a little more free flow, let Jason create and not just make him a weakside spot-up shooter," Nowitzki said. "But, you know, Avery had us believing in the system, and that's the way he thought we could be the most efficient."
Avery sounds just like Van Gundy. That would be awesome if Cuban hired him lol.
Jason Kidd gets another one fired. How come this bag wife beater is always getting cuddle by the media?
AJ took that team further than Nellie could have...
The team panicked after their first-round beat-down with GS and completely jumped the gun on the trade for Kidd. I mean, they were so set on making changes, they only took about 24 hours to fix it after the first shot didn't go through (due to George).
It's not like Devin Harris was their saviour there or anything, but he at least helped them to the finals...on a team that was able to knock off the defending champ Spurs.
Sure, he was "outcoached" against GS, but Nellie knew their game plan from the inside and AJ is still learning.
I'm one Spurs fan who hated to see AJ sign with the enemy, but am damn sure not happy that Dallas is letting him go. If Dallas has an ace-coach up their sleeve, then maybe I'm wrong...but AJ taught that team defense like it never had.
There's only one team in the western "elite" that needs a new coach -- The Suns.
Come on home Avery
Guys,
Avery wanted Kidd here!!! After the first trade failed, he insisted that the Mavs make the deal and convinced Cuban to pay 12 more million dollars to have him in Dallas.
He screwed himself with that deal.
Freemeat, it's true that the defense improved under Avery however don't forget that the team went through a huge roster turnover which brought in players that could play defense instead of the Nash-Finley-Dirk Mavs teams. And that defense regressed a lot this year because Avery was putting more and more offensive minded teams on the floor, smallball teams which took away the Mavs' huge edge in rebounding. Our improvement in rebounding is probably the main factor that pushed us through to the 06 Finals.
*sigh* i'm just glad i missed more than half the season this year, i can only handle so much stupidity and i'm already a knicks fan as well...anyway good luck to all the teams who are moving on, i will still be watching and enjoying the games at least for the sake of watching some basketball. i should also change that dumbass pic of jho since i'm not happy with him but i'm too tired so whatever.
I'm curious to see what Mavs will do this summer.
Five years ago, Mavs were a crazy team. They made a lot of flashy trades, played offensive minded basketball without a lot of fundamentals. The end of that era was in 03-04 when Mavs failed with Nash, Finley, Jamison, Dirk and Walker. This team was insanely talented but they failed because you can't win with crazy basketball.
Cuban made after that the right choice and decided to turn Mavs into a more reasonable team : less trades, a more balanced roster, developing young players, more sounded basketball with some defense...
It works well until the loss against Warriors. Warriors were quite similar to what Mavs were five years ago. They were also a crazy team that played crazy basketball and did some big trades. On top of that, they were coached by Mavs former coach. The craziness beat the reason.
This year, Mavs put some craziness in their sounded basketball. They played more small and did a big trade in February. And they failled again.
Cuban should be quite lost right now and don't know what direction to give to his team.
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