I had never considered this as an extension of the Carlisle firing. That seems so friggin long ago, except that all the players we are complaining about now are the players that lived through that. Carlisle was a very successful coach who was fired under questionable circumstances. All the players (at least the ones that mattered) were kept. The players learned that no matter how many games a coach wins, he is always expendable. Same thing more or less happened under Larry Brown and and Flip and Curry. Whenever anything bad happens, just replace the coach and pretend like nothing else has changed. Nothing is ever the players fault. Why should Rip or Tay ever take reponsibility for their actions? As long as they’ve been here nothing has ever been the players fault. I’m scared that Kuester will be fired and we will still be stuck with Rip which will only reinforce this flawed and dangerous idea to our young and potentially impressionable players.

I agree with a lot of this argument, although I think it’s more intuition than logically being convinced. I think there’s certainly a culture of expend-ability as it relates to coaching in Detroit, which is feeding a sense of entitlement among players.

I know Kuester’s not the answer long-term, but the more I think about it, the more I think Dumars needs to stick with him through his contract.

I don’t know, I’ve always felt that the coaching musical chairs would come back to haunt this team at some point. On one hand, you have players (Rip, Tayshaun and Ben) who have been around since the Carlise Era and pretty much got what they want in a sideline leader until MCIAFI. On the other, you have coaches not excited to come and sit on the sidelines with a bunch of spoiled underachieving brats (ok I’m bitter about the mutiny). Most of those coaches want a long-term position so Detroit is not an option because two years is not long-term.

Would this have happened under Avery Johnson? Nope! Was he worth the money he asked? Yup and then some. Getting rid of Curry was probably the best move they could have made but everything that lead up to that moment was purely this organization’s fault. I’m not sure if there is a bit of arrogance or ignorance but it will cost this organization, as it has, a ton of trips to the lottery, bad draft picks and no room for trading and signing much needed players. Don’t you think the hierarchy of this organization has gone to crap? It starts at the top and I’ve been a Joe Dumars fan for years but a lot of these coach selections are horrible missteps that the management seems to feel it’s ok to make and the players will adapt.

It’s time to clean house…

There are two theories. One, it was basically his fault. He had a great team, but he didn’t have what it took to win at the ECF level, and/or he never developed the bench players the way he should have.

Two, it was basically not his fault. He had a great starting five, but one of the least productive benchs in the NBA, and that lack of productivity was mostly because the bench players were largely mediocre at best. Or maybe some of our starters weren’t quite as great as we, or maybe they, thought.

I tend to think it was the lack of bench productivity, and despite the occasional good game from Carlos Delfino in his post-Pistons career and despite Walter H.’s hair, I think it was especially the lack of a decent backup for Tayshaun.

Michael Curry was probably a poor coach, and Kuester may or may not be a competent coach, but by those years, the roster wasn’t going to win much even with a brilliant coach.