Avery robbed

by gsdubz on Apr 24, 2007 9:40 AM PDT

Despite how much we hate the Mavs, and how bad they play against the W's, and how overrated they are, bleh bleh bleh, I still gotta say Avery got robbed. I mean he took his team of choke artists to almost 70 wins, and by far the best record in the league, but they give coach of the year to Sam Mitchell, whose team probably won't even win 1 game against New Jersey.

http://sports.yahoo.com/nba/news?slug=ap-nbacoachaward&prov=ap&type=lgns

I think Avery gets blamed too much for his teams choking. His lineup wasn't that bad, it was people like Dirk shooting 4/16 and his team missing 11 layups (thanks to 1 DUB defense!) that lost that game. I hate the Mavs, but lil Avery Johnson is sure getting a lot of heat for a bad game 1!

This FanPost is a submission from a member of the mighty Golden State of Mind community. While we're all here to throw up that W, these words do not necessarily reflect the views of the GSoM Crew. Still, chances are the preceding post is Unstoppable Baby!

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i'm actually

thinking that the guy that got robbed was NELLIE! First playoff appearace in 13 years...tons of injuries to deal with...turned over half the starting lineup midseason...fanstastic clutch finish to the reg season...etc.

Let's Go Oakland! Gas, Brake, Dip.

by OaktownFunk on Apr 24, 2007 9:44 AM PDT reply actions

hahah

thats what i was thinkin bro...

PLAYOFFS!!!

by SalinasWarrior on Apr 24, 2007 10:41 AM PDT up reply actions

Third that

by BiedrinsORBust on Apr 24, 2007 12:45 PM PDT up reply actions

next year

If Nellie could have made the team work from the beginning of the season he would have been in the running. IMO Mullin deserves the credit for giving Nellie the tools to work with. VP of the Year!

J.cob -greatest accomplishment: coming up with the Golden State of Mind name.

by jdotcob on Apr 24, 2007 2:37 PM PDT up reply actions

let's not go

overboard

sure, Mullin found a sucker to trade his mistakes for their headaches (as well as Jax has played, Indi was desperate to move him)

but Nelson saved Mullin's job IMHO by pulling a rabbit out of his glutemus maximus with this small ball gambit

& Nelson deserves CoY way more than Avery, who inherited a fine roster without changes or long injury stretches ...

by hardcore on Apr 24, 2007 9:25 PM PDT up reply actions

Well....

Nobody expected the Raptors to do anything this year. That fact that they won their division and are in the playoffs is a huge achievement.

I happen to think Sam deserved it.

by ritchie on Apr 24, 2007 9:47 AM PDT reply actions

I agree

but I can't really argue with the choice of Sam Mitchell either. The Raptors far exceeded expectations - of course nobody knew how good those foreign guys would be in the NBA so it's tough to say whether our expectations were just too low for them.

I also don't agree with all the criticism Avery's got for his lineup change. I think the Warriors would love for Avery to play Diop or Dampier, big, non-offensive centers. I then saw him get criticized in approximately 4,758 different articles. Today on espn.com I finally found aarticle guy that agrees with me! (Now it's 4,758 to 2) The guy also made a very good point that if Avery plays Diop/Dampier, then Dirk plays power forward, which means he would have to guard someone like J Rich or S Jax, which probably wouldn't be too good for Dallas.

Avery will probably play Diop/Dampier given how poorly his small lineup performed, so it'll be interesting to see how the big lineup works given more playing time.

More Hardware Coming!

by gsw4life on Apr 24, 2007 9:51 AM PDT reply actions

haha

more dampier = warriors by 20

by GameSix on Apr 24, 2007 1:41 PM PDT up reply actions

Agree 100% with GSW4Life

And with GSDubz' point about Avery getting too much blame for the loss.

One possible "downside" to a Warriors upset -- or even a tighter-than-expected series -- will be the fact the press, in constant search of a simplistic "angle," will almost certainly try to portray it as: Nellie, the Old Master, is outsmarting Avery, the young disciple.

Aside from any possible racial overtones tones in this line of thinking, I just think it's totally bogus. Avery is every bit as good a coach as Nellie, and probably a lot smarter. I totally felt his irritation when the press started in on questioning his decisions. His answers were 100% correct and to the point:

Just because the Mavs lost doesn't mean it was stupid to bench Dampier. Big Damp is too slow to play against the Ws, period. It'll be stupider if he caves to pressure from the mob and tries to play him 25-30 minutes.
You can't gameplan Baron Davis draining like 9 of 10 tough fallaway jumpers from downtown in crunchtime. He's not likely to do that again, and if he does, you just have to say "too good." If Dirk nails a bunch of threes at that juncture instead of Baron, the Mavs win by 10-12, and everyone's calling Avery the genius.

Nellie actually said it best in a recent interview: in the playoffs, much more than regular season, it's about the players, not the coaches. The main reason we won Game 1 is that Baron and Jax took over the game and dominated on both ends of the floor, while Nowitzki wilted like a delicate flower. If we somehow win the series, it'll be for similar reasons -- not because Nellie's a genius and Avery's a fool.

by Sleepy Freud on Apr 24, 2007 3:19 PM PDT up reply actions

Well I really think that the coach that got robbed

was Jerry Sloan! I don't like the Jazz by any means, but you have to respect the job that he's done with this talented young group of players. Nellie should be right up there to get his third Coach of the Year award. Sam Mitchell did deserve it, but Sloan had a better record with about the same amount of talent... in a tougher conference!!! Oh well...

MISSION ACCOMPLISHED!

by mightymadskillz on Apr 24, 2007 10:42 AM PDT reply actions

lol

I think that Van Gundy was the one who got robbed.

Playoffs in '07, baby! *It Happened.*

by coma @ Golden State Of Mind on Apr 24, 2007 12:00 PM PDT reply actions

yeah

I completely agree. Yeah, he has two allstars to play with, but to revamp your team when a stud C goes down and play as well as they did, then reintegrate him into the lineup without any hiccups, is a greater sign of coaching excellence I think. And being able to motivate the notoriously moody T-Mac, particularly given Jeff's rep as a taskmaster...

That's not to say that the Toronto turnaround wasn't amazing. However, I think Colangelo deserves more credit for that turnaround than Sam does - an influx of talent like he provided is why Toronto looks so good now.

by richmindseed on Apr 24, 2007 8:57 PM PDT up reply actions

yea

Sam Mitchell did a great job, I would have liked to see Nellie get it though. From nine games down to finishing the season 2 over .500, that is impressive. One dub!

Playoff Rally 2006-2007

by tadams1080 on Apr 24, 2007 1:27 PM PDT reply actions

Think about this...

I don't think one playoff game, even though it was a big upset, has any weight on AJ not getting the COY award.

What I think counts against him the most is that he took basically the same team to the finals last year. It makes sense that they had a good year. I think the coach of the year rewards coaches that make a team work better than the sum of their parts. Which you could say for Dallas but they've already proven that.

Seriously, who doesn't give a double take when they see that the Raptors had such a great season?

J.cob -greatest accomplishment: coming up with the Golden State of Mind name.

by jdotcob on Apr 24, 2007 2:33 PM PDT reply actions

especially cuz they voted before the playoffs...

More Hardware Coming!

by gsw4life on Apr 24, 2007 7:22 PM PDT up reply actions

Coach of the Year

I believed that Sam Mitchell deserved Coach of the Year. I bet no one other than the crazed Toronto Raptors fanatics expected them to win their division. He got that team going this year by taking advantage of how bad that division is. Even though they aren't likely to beat the Nets this playoff series, they still put up a good fight.

by Phil T28 on Apr 24, 2007 5:05 PM PDT reply actions

Avery should have won COY

I think Avery should get major credit for keeping the Mavs focused throughout the season, after the disappointment of the NBA finals and a 0-4 start. Dirk gets a lot of credit for the 67 wins but IMO it was Avery who kept the team motivated and focused.

by Vash01 @ Golden State Of Mind on Apr 25, 2007 8:35 AM PDT reply actions