thatrapsfan
Superstar
Q: Do you think you have a future there?
A: It’s not something that I necessarily want to do the rest of my life. I would probably rather stay in the gym.
Q: Have any coaching opportunities come up yet?
A: No. I’m hoping they don’t come this quickly.
Taking a team in the middle of the year is not the most advantageous situation. We had a helluva ride here [32-8 following Jeff Bzdelik (13-15) and Michael Cooper (4-10) in 2005]. It’s the only time I’ve really ever done it. I’m sorry — when I went back to Seattle in ’92, I guess [27-15 following K.C. Jones (18-18) and Bob Kloppenburg (2-2)]. Seattle was desperate to get back in.
Q: Have your views changed at all about what happened to you here?
A: I still don’t have a tremendous understanding of it. It’s funny, when I walk around Denver, people still think I’m the coach. They’re like, ‘Hey, good luck tomorrow!’
Q: Do you watch the games?
A: When I have a relaxed moment, I do. I don’t ever say, ‘I can’t do that because I have to watch the Nuggets game.’ It’s really strange but in my discussions with ESPN and amongst other situations in TV and radio, Denver doesn’t come up. It just seems like the rest of the nation doesn’t think they’re relevant. So I think they’ve got to re-prove themselves.
Q: They’re playing better lately.
A: (Nods). JaVale [McGee] getting hurt, one, opened up the lane, and two, I think it makes it easier to coach the team. You can find minutes for four guys and you have one big guy, which you probably need. Against 30 or 40 percent of the teams, you need a big guy. But about 60 percent of the teams, the spirit of the team is to play fast.
Even in the first 10 games, I think it’s shown that they play better when they play fast. They’re actually playing at a faster pace than we did last year. I mean, it’s close.
Q: The original plan seemed to be to feed JaVale in the post. Can that work?
A: The thing we went to three or four or five years ago, of attacking, attacking, attacking, the first couple years we had Melo and we tried to balance it. We tried to attack and get Melo his isos and then he had some post-ups. What we found after the Melo trade was it’s better to say, ‘This is the way we play.’
What the whole thing comes down to is you can’t lose the strength of the team, and I think the last three or four games the game’s been tilting back to playing very aggressive. So it’ll be interesting where it ends up.
I love Ty (Lawson) having a great year. I’m happy for him. I’m happy for Timo (Mozgov) because in a lot of ways, I thought, what happened the last three or four years, the two guys that got screwed by me, by my decisions, were Birdman [Chris Anderson] and Timo. Both of them now seem to have found a place and that makes me happy.
Q: What’s your take on JaVale?
A: He came here as a player that played 30 minutes [in Washington] without earning that responsibility, was given that responsibility because they were a bad team. My year with him last year, I was trying to figure out what he was. I thought at the end of last year he earned the right to get more minutes this year but I don’t think he earned the right to be given 30 minutes.
Q: Did you ever have a sit-down within the organization about JaVale’s role?
A: I don’t remember that conversation directly, one-on-one, either with [owner] Josh [Kroenke] or even [former general manager] Masai [Ujiri]. I think they tried to lobby through my assistants quite frequently, especially Masai. But we were having such a fun year last year that the opportunity probably didn’t come up until we lost to Golden State.
Q: Have you relived that series much, or replayed it in your head?
A: Gallo’s injury took our defense. Say we were above average defensively, and I think that probably would be a good way of phrasing it. And we went from above average to ordinary. We had no versatility in our defensive schemes. Wilson [Chandler] was the only guy that we could maneuver around. And we run into an offensive team that was the best at what we did the worst — cover the three ball.
And then you take your versatility out and you’re playing two small guards that their guards can shoot over even with good defensive position. They took the momentum from us in Game 2, shooting the hell out of it, and Games 3 and 4, that building was, it had a karma to it. We took it to Game 6. It wasn’t my favorite series I’ve coached. I wish I would have done a better job trying to figure out how to give confidence to our offense and/or our defense. Even in our two wins, I thought they were on guts and grit more than they were on good basketball cohesiveness. I think we were trying to find answers quite often in that series and didn’t find answers. And that falls on the coach.
Q: Do you think Andre Iguodala was Mark Jackson’s “mole”?
A: No question.
Q: Does that bug you?
A: I just think that’s media hype. I mean, that series was not a physical series. Everybody wants to be more aggressive with the guy kicking your ass, so . . . .
Q: The media didn’t say it. Jackson said it.
A: I thought Mark had a lot of tricks in that series that were bush- . . . I don’t know. I don’t know what they were. Almost high-schoolish. They were beneath the NBA level. And they might have worked. They might have motivated his young team in a good way. You know, he’d announce a starting lineup and start another guy. C’mon, man. You think we’re not ready for that?
Q: Is your goal still to coach in the NBA again?
A: One more time.
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Q: Are you still frustrated about the ending?
A: I’m not frustrated with eight and a half great years, fun years. The window of frustration is small compared to, I found a home and an unbelievable eight and a half years. To take not winning in the first round of the playoffs as your scapegoat, I don’t think you evaluated it fairly. That’s just my opinion. Obviously, there was a bigger opinion somewhere else.
Q: Do you address it the same way you address it in an NBA locker room?
A: I’ve never had the chance, but I would. I really think if we all would kind of work as a team, that we’ll all come out of it better off.
Q: How do you overcome ego and money?
A: (laughs). I’m better at ego than money, probably. I mean, millions of dollars have messed up a lot of parts of the game of basketball. If you’re playing for the money, I don’t know if you can be really good.
Q: Percentage-wise in the NBA, how many players in your experience are basically in it for the money?
A: More. It’s growing. Every year it’s gotten more.
Q: Less than half?
A: That would be interesting, to ask that question. I think almost all players now, in the summertime, are businessmen and are worrying about whatever, their brand and these words I keep hearing. But the great players still, when it comes October first or November first, they understand what 82 games is.
That’s why I admire LeBron a lot. I think he’s the best guy in basketball and he is possessed to win championships. I’m sure he understands that’s going to make him more money, but that’s not why he’s that way. He has a goal to catch Michael. He thinks he can. And he is driven.
If Julyan Stone would have that same passion, of just, ‘I want to get on the court, I want to play 15 minutes a game and I can do that,’ if that’s what his drive is, he’ll get there better than, you know, ‘If I get on the court I might make a couple million dollars a year.’ The drive’s got to be the passion for the game and I think the game has gotten so business-oriented, so agent-player relationship centered, that it’s hard to not say that money’s always going to be a part of the decision of where [a player] goes.
But I still think the great player is driven by the passion for the game and not by the check that he gets every two weeks.
Q: So what’s the plan? Wait for the phone to ring?
A: There are days I wish it would ring and there are days I don’t want it to ring. I mean, I watch the Knicks play and I wouldn’t want to be in that hell for a million dollars. It’s just New York City and the Garden and the immensity of the pressure. I think Mike Woodson is standing up to it with tremendous integrity.
Q: Best team in the West?
A: San Antonio, probably. I’m a Golden State fan. I’ve never seen a team with that many offensive weapons. David Lee and Bogut, you could run an offense through them and they could win games. If the Denver Nuggets had Bogut and David Lee, they’d be good. And they’re not among the top offensive options. Curry, Thompson, Barnes, Iguodala. They have so many weapons offensively that can blow up, and they’re doing a pretty good job with the defense. I think Houston and the Clippers are still in that stage of development that I think they could be very good by the end of the year, but they have their moments now when they struggle.
The team I like a lot and it bothers me is New Orleans. That Davis kid is coming and their three guys out front, Holiday and Gordon and Evans, can get to the rim, and they can score. Gordon can be a great shooter. And then they’ve got the Ryan Anderson kid who’s the best shooting four in basketball.
Q: So why does it bother you to like them?
A: I think they should be playing better. But I’m still on record that I like ‘em a lot. I like them because Anthony Davis is a basketball player. He’s not a big man. He’s a basketball player that’s seven feet tall. And I just think the game is about basketball players, not necessarily position players
Dude talks like he's Phil Jackson
Could never stand this dude. No wonder that he's ended up having terrible relationships with every star player he's ever dealt with.full interview here: http://blitzkrieg13.com/2013/11/28/breakfast-with-george-karl/
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he sees it
Iggy told Mark Jackson to let Stephen Curry drop 30pts on them consistently 
