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ripleydc
Joined: 17 Nov 2004
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bigsportzbabe
Joined: 21 Apr 2005
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el_barrio_96_125
Joined: 19 Nov 2004
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 Posted: 07/03/05 2:17 pm ::: |
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It was a good decision even in hindsight. It doesn't matter how good a coach you are if your team isn't willing to listen to you. Richie lost his team. They can claim that they loved him and prove their affection by going out to dinner with him until the cows come home, but their play on the court certainly didn't suggest an infatuation with him nor did their loud whispers of discontent. They were uninspired and bitchy up until he was relieved of his duties. Sometimes their behavior was warranted by his micromanaging and unwillingness to treat his players as adults. Other times his behavior was no more than that of a coach who wanted to win with players who seemed to be looking out for self.
Even Richie admits he has changed based on the experience and that maybe he handled some things wrong and now you can bet Washington is reaping the benefits of his epiphany. It was time for him, Spoon and Tari to go whether Lib fans want to tolerate it or not. All 3 had a hand in their own and each other's undoing and all 3 are much happier in better situations because they left unlike us Lib fans who are still stuck with the subject of our ire. The only mistake Blaze made in firing Richie, was not firing herself, Patty, and Lisa. |
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bigsportzbabe
Joined: 21 Apr 2005
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Location: Libertyville
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| Posted: 07/03/05 3:22 pm ::: |
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| Fire her today for a better tomorrow. |
Firing Blaze is never gonna happen....she is part of the MSG family...it`s unfortunate but it`s the reality....
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| They can claim that they loved him and prove their affection by going out to dinner with him until the cows come home, but their play on the court certainly didn't suggest an infatuation with him nor did their loud whispers of discontent. |
What`s interesting is that the players seem to say different things to different people...I work at Rubyfruit Bar & Grill, the girls have dinner there quite often, and said many times that they missed Richie`s coaching. Since it appears that they talk out of both sides of their mouths, I would love to know what the real 411 is. Also, if they were so happy he was gone, why did they go to dinner with him?
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Admiral_Needa
Joined: 23 Sep 2004
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Location: Tiburon, CA
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bigsportzbabe
Joined: 21 Apr 2005
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Location: Libertyville
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| Posted: 07/03/05 7:16 pm ::: |
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| Well players generally listen more when they're winning and the opposite when they're not, so I wonder if they're listening to Patty right now... |
2004 w/Richie.........7-9
2005 w/Patty.........5-7
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el_barrio_96_125
Joined: 19 Nov 2004
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| Posted: 07/03/05 7:19 pm ::: |
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| bigsportzbabe wrote: |
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| Fire her today for a better tomorrow. |
Firing Blaze is never gonna happen....she is part of the MSG family...it`s unfortunate but it`s the reality... |
I thought in a previous discussion on the same topic, you said Blaze fired Richie because it was either his ass or her's.
I already know how ingrained in the MSG fabric Blaze SEEMS to be. However, money talks and the Libs are struggling in the attendance department by their standards. If the Libs continue to fail to break 10k and Dolan or Mills feels there is someone out there who could bring a higher level of excitement and throw in some wins as an added bonus, Blaze is gone without the excuse of making the playoffs and sucking it up re: RCMH to fall back on. She can play the company line all she wants. NOBODY at 34th Street has job security, not Becky, not Blaze, not Maddie, not even the janitor. If she keeps Patty and they struggle, she's screwed because attendance will fall. If she fires Patty, she's screwed because of her faux coaching search when she knew all along she was using the buddy system. How many different people are you going to blame the team's shortcomings on and how many scapegoats are you going to run out of town before your boss starts to realize YOU'RE the problem? It's not as if Dolan is one of those WNBA owners that couldn't give a damn about his team.
| bigsportzbabe wrote: |
| What`s interesting is that the players seem to say different things to different people...I work at Rubyfruit Bar & Grill, the girls have dinner there quite often, and said many times that they missed Richie`s coaching. Since it appears that they talk out of both sides of their mouths, I would love to know what the real 411 is. Also, if they were so happy he was gone, why did they go to dinner with him? |
Let me take a deep breath and put the rib down because this one will be the extended version. I already called out our three "captains" about their bs last season when they sold Richie up the river. If you had to put up with a coach who tells the media what she should have, could have and might have done AFTER the game, you'd miss Richie too. If they loved him that much, they'd have played harder for him the last 2 seasons. The fact is, to a person, they ALL loved Richie, even Spoon. He loved them ALL in return. The problem was, they couldn't stand his need to have a textbook instead of a playbook, his habit of benching players who deviated from the plan even if the improv was successful and his cover my own ass tactics when it came to him being run by Blaze. They didn't want him gone as much as they wanted him to change, lighten up and utilize the abilities of his players as athletes instead of making every practice a trigonometry exam.
Richie handled the Spoon situation worse than Blaze because he wanted to keep his job and thought hitching his wagon to Becky would help him do so. You don't think the rest of the team realized this and took issue with it? Tari damn near rolled her eyes out of her head at him for the 45 games since 2002. Then when Miko and Spoon (whom Blaze figured were the ones who had the real problem with Richie) were gone and the team was still bitching about his ways, Blaze figured there needed to be change and that her thoughts of canning him after 2003 may have been warranted and hey, maybe Miko wasn't so crazy after all. Richie's problem was playing both sides against the middle, trying to get everyone except Miko to like him.
Prime example: NY vs Sac in 2003. He has a 15 minute conversation after the game with Spoon in regards to benching her in favor of Becky in a close game. He apologized profusely. Spoon's nobody's fool, so she's like, play whoever's going to get us wins, we won the game, it's all good. Richie goes to Blaze and tells her he wants to start Becky and Blaze sends him out of her office with his tail stuck between his legs. You can't bench Spoon. They're about to name her an All-Star started averaging .00011 points per game and she still sells jerseys and tickets, wtf is wrong with you. Spoon continues to start, but now Richie's being bitchy because he knows, Spoon knows and we all know she should be coming off the bench but there's nothing he can do about it because he won't man up to Blaze. So he takes it out on Spoon implying that she's the one being difficult. Why? Because if he tells people the real reason his 38 year old point guard is still starting, surprising even her, he'll lose his job. I'm sure you can see all the problems this would cause in regards to a coach's authority and credibility among his players especially players like Miko and Tari who make a living getting away with murder at his expense. Then Spoon makes Blaze and Richie look foolish by going to LA and taking an 8 minute per role off the bench for the minimum when they swore up and down that she would NEVER come off the bench and NEVER take a paycut. Nevermind that neither ever asked or even said, look Spoon, your best days are over, we think Becky should start, end of story. Spoon by going to LA said, I'll tell you what I'll NEVER do, I'll never take a bs front office job with the 2 of you still calling the shots here. However, never one to burn bridges, she just allowed Richie to take shots at her (all a ploy to show how much she was the problem, we're so much better now, hence he should keep his job) until he became the victim of Blaze's July 4th BBQ. I give Richie credit though since privately he swears his only real beef with Spoon is that he wanted her to retire a Lib.
If Blaze hadn't hired such an incompetent like Patty, the Libs wouldn't be complaining about missing Richie. They realize, the grass isn't always greener on the other side. They realize they're not nearly as prepared for games. They realize Jeff was a casualty of loyalty to Richie and Spoon. They realize the real problem is Blaze. They realize more often than not Patty has no plan and when she does she has no clue how to implement it. They realize that Patty's full of one liners and posturing and short on substance. However, your characterization of Richie as some savior who was unjustly wronged in his firing is off base.
It's obvious that in Washington, he's gone back to being the coach that helped a team get to 3 finals appearances and was loved by all except Miko, and left his manipulative alter ego that coached the 2003 and half of 2004 Libs back home in Florida. However, in firing the new Richie and hiring Patty, the Libs simply went from bad to worse. If you want bad, go right ahead and keep 2003-2004 Richie on that pedastal. As far as I'm concerned the only mistakes Blaze made in firing Richie other than not firing Patty, Lisa and herself right along with him, were firing Jeff as well and not hiring a real head coach. |
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bigsportzbabe
Joined: 21 Apr 2005
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Location: Libertyville
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| Posted: 07/03/05 7:32 pm ::: |
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Firing Blaze is never gonna happen....she is part of the MSG family...it`s unfortunate but it`s the reality...
I thought in a previous discussion on the same topic, you said Blaze fired Richie because it was either his ass or her's.
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Yeah, but before the SA game MSG did this whole Blaze retrospective, basically crowning her MSG`s goddess of basketball...it was very discouraging
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Senility Prayer: God grant me the senility to forget the people I never liked anyway, the good fortune to run into the ones I do, and the eyesight to tell the difference. Amen.
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el_barrio_96_125
Joined: 19 Nov 2004
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| Posted: 07/03/05 7:34 pm ::: |
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| bigsportzbabe wrote: |
| Yeah, but before the SA game MSG did this whole Blaze retrospective, basically crowning her MSG`s goddess of basketball...it was very discouraging |
Don't worry about that. Layden, Chaney and Wilkens were all given millions and abundances of praises before the door smacked them on their ass. We even joke that a sure sign that you will be fired or "resign" at MSG is when they sign you to a new contract or praise you in the media. |
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bigsportzbabe
Joined: 21 Apr 2005
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| Posted: 07/03/05 7:47 pm ::: |
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| his habit of benching players who deviated from the plan even if the improv was successful |
when I coached (softball) I did the same thing.....the reason you have a coach is to set up the gameplan....players who deviate from the plan should be benched...IMHO
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Senility Prayer: God grant me the senility to forget the people I never liked anyway, the good fortune to run into the ones I do, and the eyesight to tell the difference. Amen.
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el_barrio_96_125
Joined: 19 Nov 2004
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| Posted: 07/03/05 7:50 pm ::: |
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| bigsportzbabe wrote: |
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| his habit of benching players who deviated from the plan even if the improv was successful |
when I coached (softball) I did the same thing.....the reason you have a coach is to set up the gameplan....players who deviate from the plan should be benched...IMHO |
Basketball is not nearly as mechanical as softball. It's a game of instinct, ability and impulse. Plays don't make players on a basketball court. Players make plays. All that damn overthinking is what messed them up out there on the court and if you consider having Tari setting picks at the 3 point line all game and running the same tap head play over and over a recipe for success, then have a good time. |
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bigsportzbabe
Joined: 21 Apr 2005
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| Posted: 07/03/05 8:03 pm ::: |
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Basketball is not nearly as mechanical as softball. It's a game of instinct, ability and impulse. Plays don't make players on a basketball court. Players make plays. All that damn overthinking is what messed them up out there on the court and if you consider having Tari setting picks at the 3 point line all game and running the same tap head play over and over a recipe for success, then have a good time.
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my guess is that we`ll have to respectfully agree to disagree......this team was like a bunch of children of a bad marriage....in their hearts they knew that Mommy was the villian but they couldn`t get to her, so they took it out on Daddy....then when Daddy got kicked out of the house they realized how much he meant to them
sure they didn`t like his playbook, but when they followed it they won division championships.....I`m afraid it will get much worse before it gets better
I truly hope not
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Senility Prayer: God grant me the senility to forget the people I never liked anyway, the good fortune to run into the ones I do, and the eyesight to tell the difference. Amen.
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BCBG25
Joined: 23 Sep 2004
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| Posted: 07/04/05 8:24 am ::: |
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I don't blame FFO for firing Richie. That was about 2 years too late IMO.
I only blame her for not hiring a better coach. Heck, had I known Patty would be his replacement, I would have never had any ideas towards getting rid of him.
I was counting on a more proven coach, one who had coached at least one professional game in their career. And after all these games, she remains as clueless as the first one I saw her coaching, which was a pretty good game, BTW, a massacre of the Monarchs she had nothing to do with. It was just that hapiness the players couldn't even hide.
Kinda like kids when they think they're in control.
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el_barrio_96_125
Joined: 19 Nov 2004
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| Posted: 07/04/05 9:59 am ::: |
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| bigsportzbabe wrote: |
my guess is that we`ll have to respectfully agree to disagree......this team was like a bunch of children of a bad marriage....in their hearts they knew that Mommy was the villian but they couldn`t get to her, so they took it out on Daddy....then when Daddy got kicked out of the house they realized how much he meant to them
sure they didn`t like his playbook, but when they followed it they won division championships.....I`m afraid it will get much worse before it gets better
I truly hope not |
They wanted Daddy gone with good reason. Mommy just screwed everything up by getting a new Daddy who was worse than the first one. It doesn't mean they want the old one back. What is so difficult about the fact that after a while players just don't respond like they used to? Either you change and find a new approach or you leave. What is it with Lib fans trying to cling to mediocrity just because it's attatched to what was once a great past? Even Blaze is still breaking her neck to pat herself on the back for shit that happened no less than 3 years ago. |
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Alepp03
Joined: 25 Nov 2004
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| Posted: 07/04/05 11:10 am ::: |
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This is kind of a strange comparison, but my high school was a power house in every sport - besides basketball. It is one of the best academic institutions in the country. It has a reputation with colleges that has helped kids into college for years. It is essentially an MSG-sort of place in terms of high schools and the athletic department is ran as a business in many ways because wins are the bottom line (except it is a Jesuit school, so the real bottom line is growing as men, being a good role model as a coach, and things along those lines) Regardless, so a very well-loved but seemingly underachieving coach is fired because of a a small group of influential people. So at first, everyone is thinking, well great, ya know, I loved Don, but we're SLUH, we're gonna get all kinds of applicants and we're gonna get a coach that turns our program around. Instead, a coach from another school who had three years of experience as a head coach, and hadn't had a +500 season as a coach yet is hired. Then you see the best player on the team transfer. Then everyone sees the new coach for what he is, just someone who knew the right people with little to no coaching prowess, but all the right cliches and lingo. Then he cuts a possible strong role player because he plays another sport because he wants to make a statement. Then... well, this is all going to get way out of hand. Anyway, it goes without saying from then on, everyone was wondering why the original coach was fired in the first place, and he was glorified by his memories. He went on to win a state championship the next year, and has always been gracious to his former place of employment, where his wife still works and his name will forever be revered.
I feel the pain, and I hate feeling Liberty pain...
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In hindsight, I bet Richie was glad he was fired 
I think the relationship with Blaze got to be like Don Zimmer and George Steinbrenner 