AI Benched! Rip To Start the Rest of the Season

Curry is clueless. RIP cries to the media and the next day he goes back to the starting lineup. Who exactly is running the show the coach or the player? This is one of the reasons why we are losing. Players are doing what they want. Their is no accountabilty we have no set identity. The lineups are all over the place no one is being held accountable to rebound or defend the paint. Stuckey is stinking up the place and nothing is said. Sheed does what he wants and the comment is oh that's just Sheed. Whatever!!!

Fire Curry.

Good. Finally. This is what will work. Until Rodney gets in foul trouble. Maybe the rest of the Pistons will actually play their part in the "it's A.I." angle and step up with some actual inspired play.



26 games to go. Hopefully it will be an 18-8 run to end the season.

I think he is trying to please everyone by making sure everyone else touches the ball. But of course he is an infinitely more effective player driving to the basket aggressively and dishing off when the defense converges.

Any move that helps the Pistons get off their slump I'm all for it but to me its more about Curry not knowing how to use his rotations instead of who actually starts...

Even if Det plays well the rest of the season and AI does well off the bench the rest of the season unless they make it to the finals AI is more than likely gone...because the Elite teams like Spurs,Boston, etc.. (whoever doesnt win title) will try to sign AI for their 6th man spot..

Either that or he feels like he's in over his head and has lost confidence in himself/game or defenses have adjusted and he isn't as good as Joe thought.

I hope it's what you said, but think it might be combination of the your view and the 2nd (or possibly all 3)

edited to add;
And even though it is OT to the thread, i feel like it needs be said START AMIR! LOL

^^^NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!

He definitely isn't confident either... He has that old cliche that he is "never scared" but he has been playing scared the last several weeks. When they do run pick and rolls, he isn't coming off as quickly like he was earlier. When the other team traps the pick & roll and forces the ball out of his hands, they rarely generate anything.

He also can't knock down those wide open mid range jumpers any more to keep the defense honest... he was making the open (and contested) jumpers in December and January. It's certainly not mechanics... he just isn't shooting it with any confidence right now.

And this is where coaching really comes into play, handling and mentoring of young players.. and that is why I am on the Avery Johnson for coach bandwagon.

I'm kind of shocked right now. I feel this was handled all wrong by MC, the media etc. In a way it was handled to give the maximum escapegoating to Allen Iverson. I think the whole organization is in disarray, not just the team. It's not very professional the way it came about. I'm very disillusioned about the Pistons right now, but mostly about Joe and MC. Maybe they thought this was the better way to go earlier in the season but they didn't have the cujones to disappoint AI. I just don't understand why Joe traded for him. I think the way this roster move was handled makes us, the Pistons, the organization and the players, look like amateur hour.

So many of us on this board thought that AI should come off the bench. I didn't but I never was objective because he's my favorite player in the NBA so I recused myself from that argument. I don't know enough about that difference to say. I know I am heartily tired of Rip's limitations and all I hear about are AI's.

Anyway it's a sad day for me, but I'll watch the game with great interest to see how much better everything under the sun is with Rip Hamilton at the 2 guard position. Now I like Rip. I happen to fall into that category of fans that is just so sick of the "core" such as it is, and I wouldn't mind seeing them all leave and do a complete rebuild. Except for Sheed I guess. I love Sheed. And when AI leaves us, I'll continue to watch all Pistons games and all AI games like I did last year when he was with Denver. So it won't be that different, just the suffering of this season to get though.

Maybe AI will grow to like coming off the bench. He says he want to play until he's 40, so sooner or later he'll be a sixth man, right? He can try it out with us, where it seriously doesn't matter because well....you know. We Bad.

Didn't Avery develop Devin Harris? Wasn't he a rookie with Dallas?

One day you will wake up and it'll hit you and you'll realize . . . Damn, that Amir Johnson is a good basketball player. LOL

I think he's responsible for Devin Harris' defensive development, but he did stifle his offensive game.

Hopefully it's more indecisiveness than anything else. If Curry basically lets him call all the plays, i could understand with the current personnel why he looks so disjointed.

I'm pretty sure that Cuban is the guy that had the woody for Kidd, not Avery.

Avery's not a certain thing, but he has had success that you can't deny or devalue just because he had talent. Any good coach needs talent. So many people here are clamoring for Laimbeer (who would be one of my alt. choices btw), but what experience does he have coaching professional men? None. I know he's had success in the WNBA, but that is hardly the same thing.

I'm not an Avery Johnson fan either (I'm not against him, but not exactly for him). I've seen a pretty brutal video where he's "yelling" at Harris in practice and it's borderline cruel and not constructive in any form. Towards the last year that was supposedly the way he dealt with all the players. After he left, various people said he was a dictator, and a little nuts. He's like a Scott Skiles type with better marketability.

Originally, it was said that Avery was behind the trade (along w/ management) and practically one of the initiators of the DH trade. What mainly irritated him about Harris' game is that he wasn't a traditional PG; and basically Tony Parker which didn't work in DAL b/c they have no post up threat. After he was fired, Avery himself came out and praised Harris and stated how he never wanted him traded, he was so great, etc. Dallas fans say that's BS. Who knows.

It's iffy what he would do coaching Stuckey.

The problem with the NBA is that there aren't enough good head coaches. There qare maybe about 12 of them, with 5 of them currently not on a team.

NFL coaches just need to be ego managers with ENOUGH assistant experience to succeed...then, the rest of the job is just basically putting the right assistants around you (offensive coordinator, defensive coordinator, etc.)

Anyone is miles better than MC though.

Some people may not think that is so bad.