Pete Babcock v. Billy Knight

[Yeti]

It occurs to me that comparing Billy Knight to Pete Babcock is unfair. Since when is Babcock the standard of excellence. Should we be happy that we are better than the worst in the history of the NBA. It's kind of like comparing new players to John Edwards or Evan Eschmeyer - everybody looks good compared to them.

[Weez]

in the days of the salary cap and 6-7 year player deals (now less, 5-6, but there remain active holdovers of these)...then no, not definitively can one say that four years is too long

think about this: in college sports, most poeple 'argue' that a coach is not given a chance when he's not able to hav a roster full of people that he recruited...

in professional sports, the player turnover (ie graduation) isn't nearly as large, thus one must find ways to move players, sometimes 'taking what you can get' simply to make a move...

this, combined with draft picks (which, in general, have been more inexperienced/younger) that typically take 3 years to develop (rule of thumb for 1-3 year college players, perhaps even longer for those drafted from HS)...

to look at it in a different light...

What if West had left the position in LA (and not had Shaq) shortly after Kobe was drafted/acquired? would subsequent success not be inherently linked to that pick?

*sorry, not the best argument (or fully fleshed out), but it's 5am and I gotta diagnose some cancers before sign out this morning..

[Final_quest]

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It occurs to me that comparing Billy Knight to Pete Babcock is unfair. Since when is Babcock the standard of excellence. Should we be happy that we are better than the worst in the history of the NBA. It's kind of like comparing new players to John Edwards or Evan Eschmeyer - everybody looks good compared to them.

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Not necessarily. Babcock did field multiple 50 win teams. Some were entirely his creation. No way could the worst GM in NBA history do that.

He made dozens of bad moves, but with Mookie, Steve Smith, and Mutumbo he could still get his teams in the playoffs. He doesn't compare to Isaiah Thomas or other GMs who could never accomplish multiple trips to the playoffs.

[Guest]

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we are 2.5 years into the rebuilding

the 4 year number is bogus...2.5 years ago (feb 04) is when he sold all the players to the highest bidder and started his building

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He took over in the second half of the 02-03 season. So are you telling me that he took over and decided to not rebuild until a year later? That is ridiculous, when you take over a job you start rebuilding. He also traded Glen Robinson in that summer he took over, if you want to base "rebuilding" off of when he started to trade away players, then THAT is when you start.

And if you want to talk about how long it should take a team to get 50 wins then look at the Phoenix Suns, Denver Nuggets, and the Miami Heat as recent examples of how to do that.

The only way BK gets a 50 win team is if you go by the infinite monkey theorm.

[exodus]

I am not really a fan of BK either but I am curious about one thing. How much success do the Hawks have to have for BK to lose his horns?