Fast Breaks

At the end of last year's horrendous season, Joe Dumars, the Detroit Pistons president of basketball operations, defended first-year coach Michael Curry. He said he had to be patient, and he recognized that it was an "up-and-down season" for coach Curry. Joe D. went from standing up for Curry a couple of months ago to signing rookies last week, then firing Curry on Tuesday.

What changed???? Curry had to smile and stand tall at the rookie press conference; I wonder if he knew then that his firing would be made public a few days later.

In my eyes, it didn't look like he was given a fair chance. It was his first head coaching job, with this in mind I'm like expect the first go-round to be shaky, but at least give him a second season to learn from those initial mistakes. Flip Saunders had 3 seasons, and he led the team to the finals each year, Rick Carlisle had two seasons, as did Larry Brown - who actually took the team to a championship and came very close to a repeat! (Brown's firing still has me shaking my head.)

But poor Curry....one and done. The season started with him losing his father, with whom he was very close. He got his dream job then his father died right after. At the beginning, the news said Curry got along well with the players and had built a good rapport from being an assistant under Saunders the year before....Now they're saying Curry had to go because of tension with players, most notably Rip Hamilton. WELL with the dumb-a** Allen Iverson-Chauncey Billups trade, Rip would have been unhappy regardless of who was coaching the Pistons last season. It coulda been the dang Dalai Lama, and Rip woulda been like f*** all yall.

The team went 39-43 last season and were completely swept in the first round of the playoffs by Lebron and them...when have u ever seen a Pistons team so uncompetitive? You know those boys play with heart and grind hard, so yes, such a failure does call for drastic measures. But look at the situation Curry was given and ask yourself if he really deserved the blame?

From where I sit, being an "executive" is the easiest job around. You make all the bone-headed decisions you want because in the end, the blame falls on the coach. (Look at the Lions if you need another example.) The players call the shots, the managers give in to the players' whims and make other like wise bad decisions, and a coach has to make magic out of madness. (I.E., if a player doesn't show up for training camp because he wants more money, chances are the front office will find a way to give that man more money eventually. And a coach can do nothing about it. He'd like to have all players in attendance on time so he can install his system, but he can't make a player do anything.)

I say all this to say, coaches have less power than we think, and it's unfortunate to me that Curry had virtually no chance of proving himself. He got to taste his "dream" job, but a lot of things beyond his control were thrown in the potion. Joe D. said his team is undergoing a transition, and they need someone with more experience to guide them at this time. I say, decisions are not made a season at a time. Executives absolutely think long term and set things in motion for seasons to follow. So Dumars didn't wake up this morning with the idea that his team is going through a transition. He knew last season, and he coulda just hired someone else then instead of wasting Curry's time and making him a lame duck coach.

BUT I WILL SAY IT IS VERRRYY INTERESTING THAT BILL LAMBIER STEPPED DOWN FROM HIS POSITION AS HEAD COACH OF THE DETROIT SHOCK A FEW WEEKS AGO, EVEN THOUGH THOSE GIRLS ARE PROBABLY THE MOST SUCCESSFUL WNBA FRANCHISE THANKS TO HIM....NOW ALL OF A SUDDEN THERE'S ANOTHER SPOT OPEN IN DETROIT, IN THE BIG BOYS CLUB, WITH HIS HOMEBOY JOE D.....WHERE YALL THINK HE'S GOING TO END UP?

:-/