Archived Thread

NFT: Phil Jackson revealing Quotes

DanMetroMan : 7/27/2015 3:12 pm

What about those trades? (In addition to dealing J.R. Smith and Iman Shumpert to Cleveland, the Knicks also traded Pablo Prigioni to Houston for Alexey Shved and two second-round picks and waived Amar'e Stoudemire.)

Jackson: "We sat down with our scouts and made a list of players we'd be interested in, a list of who we could part with to get some of these players and what would be the ramifications of our own salary situation if we could get this guy or that guy or whomever. Then we contacted more than a dozen teams to see what might be done.

Which players did you focus on?

Jackson: "Goran Dragic, for one. I heard through the grapevine that he was open to coming here. We worked hard on that possibility, but the asking price was too dear. Maybe we worked on that possibility so much so that it distracted us. I mean, Dragic is every team's current choice for a nuclear option -- a guard who can penetrate and either score or kick. Guys like Chris Paul and James Harden. But, anyway, that's not really the way I want us to play."

Who else?

Jackson: "We were also interested in guys like Enes Kanter, Arron Afflalo. ... Guys we thought could be good fits in our game plan. We weighed all of our options, but, obviously, none of those things came to be. Actually, no really serious discussions took place until about two, three hours before the trading deadline. It was all kind of chaotic and totally fascinating."
Link - ( New Window )

Interesting read. This series has been good.

BeerFridge : 7/27/2015 3:24 pm : link

It's interesting to see that Phil believes in system basketball but is pretty flexible too.

More coherent that you usually get

Deej : 7/27/2015 3:29 pm : link

Nothing in there upsets me. My takeaway from the series is that Phil's view (probably correct) is that the league is full of knuckleheads. Basketball in particular is a team sport. Losing teams have loser players making loser plays. JR Smith is the definition of that. Phil wants to get us to a team system where players buy into the notion that if you make the right cut and the right pass, you'll win. You may not get your stats, but you'll be on a successful team.

The Calderon comment was evocative. He may be a guy that really recovers in play when teammates do the right things around him.

Funny and true

Torrag : 7/27/2015 3:41 pm : link

Quote:

...Phil's view (probably correct) is that the league is full of knuckleheads.

from the article below that one ... thought this was funny

Del Shofner : 7/27/2015 3:42 pm : link

in a those-were-the-days kind of way:

"Back in the mid-1980s, when I was an assistant coach for Phil Jackson's Albany Patroons in the CBA, our usual game-day routine consisted of the following:

� A 65-minute drive from Woodstock, New York, to Albany to conduct a 10 a.m. shootaround.

� A workout on the Nautilus circuit at a nearby health club.

� A 30-minute game of one-on-one going up and down the club's small court (my record against him was approximately 1-125).

� A session in the steam room.

� Lunch at our favorite Chinese restaurant.

� Dessert at a bar on Swan Street, to savor a large cup of coffee laced with Bailey's Irish Cream.

� Head over to the Washington Avenue Armory for the game at hand."