Is Dumars losing the confidence of the fans?

Wow. Just wow.

Aside from the fact that he was the offensive assistant coach for the Cavs last year, is there any proof that he's solely an offensive minded coach a la Flip? Good coaches can do both, and this guy's been a protege of Larry Brown who is arguably one of the best defensive-minded coaches out there. Take the glass half full approach, and Kuester may be a defensive minded coach who is also creative on offense. (Before you ask Lee, yes I did have my pink koolaid glasses on when I wrote that)

The point is, we don't know. I'm going to wait on passing judgement on the guy after about a 1/3 of the way into the season.

Even when LB came on board we struggled for at least 1/3 of a season. Kuester has a whole new roster so we should give him 30 games.

So far, I give him a B+.

I've stated i'm not thrilled w/ the hire, but also that i'm ok with it. Basically, he could be terrible or he could be great. I'm hoping for the latter obviously. I'm willing to wait and see even though my posts indicate extreme impatience LOL.

At this point, it's all speculation anyway.

I'm not really doing that. I state people in the general sense b/c i don't need to expressly single those people out by name, and sometimes i doon't even remember who said that to me at whatever point. Sentiment in the thread to a varying degree was that people shouldn't be bashing at all and thakful that we don't have Memphis' GM.

I know some people are at different points of the issue and have no problem debating w/ anyone who reads my post even if they think it's crap, but i would like to actually debate my post rather than defend my "fandom".

We've been moving farther and farther away from a defensive philosphy into almost all offense territory and we don't have Kobe Bryant. Of course, the new coach could understand defense, but it would be probably be more successful if we had players that could play defense.

More than anything i want someone to get on Stuck and force him to become a good defender b/c he physically has everything it takes to be.

I wonder how Cloudwalker has him graded so far?

Let's hope Dumars can get us a solid 5.

You should start higher man, he at least has 14 more years of assistant head coaching experience.

Look at Doc Rivers, a few seasons ago Boston were a lottery team under his watch, now they've won a championship, and are a 60+ win team.

This is something that I've been thinking since mid last year. They say that defense is a mindset. Stuckey has no physical excuses. He's tall, strong, and quick. Avery might have been the perfect one to turn him into a defender.

But you're right, somebody needs to emphasize that part of the game to him and stay on his case.


With Ben Gordon and Charlie V, I'm not sure what to think. I want to say that they've been on teams where defense wasn't emphasized, so we shouldn't jump to conclusions, but Ben Gordon played on the Bulls under Skiles and with Ben Wallace when they tried to go all D. If that didn't inspire him to D up, then I think there is probably no hope in changing him. We just have to create schemes to minimize the damage.

Charlie V- Why isn't he a good defender? He's big and coordinated and has a very long reach. He has a soft rep. Can Laimbeer knock some grit into him?

Give this new coach a chance . So called offensive coaches have to know defense and vice-versa. Mike Brown in considered a defensive coach , LB was a defensive coach. We have to wait and see....just like we had to do for Curry.

I'm not sure if he needs our support considering that he has the most job security of anyone in the NBA.

But I'm warming up to him. Just had to let the frustration pass from my main man BL not getting the gig.

No problem with this.

My 2 cents:

Joe's made good moves and bad. But on balance, he's a good GM, and he's won a championship. And he's a real Pistons guy. Who else do you want running the show? As far as I'm concerned, he can have the job until he no longer wants it.

At first impression, yes.

My feeling is that rebounding and defense are not going to be things that are given priority due to coaching philosphy and partly due to the personnel Joe assembled.

If the new coach stresses it and can make the team as a whole the best defensive unit they could possibly be then i have no problem admitting i was wrong about him.

But as of now i'm expecting alot of press conferences about "not making shots".

Joe's been moving to a more PHX suns style of play so i wouldn't be surprised if he hired someone who shares that idea.