AbeVigodaLive wrote:So, Okafor has been in two nightclub incidents and was caught speeding at 108 mph ON A BRIDGE within his first month in the NBA.
Oh oh.
[Note: I joke about the "mentorship" angle... ESPECIALLY last season when the Thad Young trade was spun to be about that but was really about tanking. But you need SOMEBODY with professional experience on a basketball team to show the young guys what to do and even more importantly what NOT to do. Good lord. I see an ESPN "30 for 30" in the future about this. And the Wolves might even be included as an example of a team who went out of its way to instill professionalism at some level to offset all the youth. What's happening in Philly is what happens when math nerds without basketball knowledge are given the keys.]
Abe, there are only 3 capitalized words there, cmon man, you're slipping. But I agree, and I can't believe that we just brought this up now, he PUNCHED a guy (allegedly), i didn't know about the speeding incident. Having Cris Carter around Randy Moss is a good example. Randy wasn't an outstanding citizen, but I believe Cris helped him a lot. And I can't remember any KG "incidents" while he was here before, can you?
Sam Mitchell was that guy to keep the young Garnett out of trouble. Remember, he had a run-in in high school, so there were concerns (justified or not).
Either Sam did a great job. Garnett was a hoops junkie who did all the right things. Or, any news was squashed before it was a leaked. Or, some combo of all of that?
Well it wasn't just Sam, Terry Porter was around for a while and so was Googs and it sounds like Flip was a pretty good influence too. Of course none of that saved Marbury did it?
That's a lot of bad news about Okafor. Hopefully he gets himself straightened out. Just when the Sixers fans maybe had something else to get hopeful for...
As far as Marbury, his family was his "support" system. They were awful.
There's a book about Coney Island hoops. I think it's called "The Last Shot" by Darcy Frey. It's about prospective college players right about the time Marbury was tearing up the courts. His family wouldn't let him be a bigger part of the book because they were holding out for a big money payday... Marbury was only 14 at the time and was still showing up on Coney Island courts in a Big Wheel. (Yes... a Big Wheel.)
I've never read anything about Marbury's family that didn't make them out to be money-grubbing fiends. Money, money, money. That mentality led to one of the more tragic and dumb choices in recent NBA history. It might have been good that Garnett was more on his own and needed babysitters like Sam Mitchell and Terry Porter and others...
Found at RealGM regarding 108 on the bridge:
"Hinkie gets prospects he can stash. One in physical therapy, one in Europe, and one in jail."
"Maybe someone yelled "Sixers suck!" from the other side of the bridge."
"Showing his quickness for a big man on and off the court."
"Probably late for a meeting with the 76ers maturity/life coach."
And the mentoring haters will hate these:
"Dude rarely had problems under Coach K. seems this is a reflection of the real lack of leadership on that roster and Brett brown isn't doing his job."
"Yep, the biggest issue with the way the 76ers have constructed their roster is they don't even have any vets to mentor the younger guys. We're seeing how KG being in Minnesota is making a difference while the 76ers have no discipline."
TheSP wrote:Found at RealGM regarding 108 on the bridge:
"Hinkie gets prospects he can stash. One in physical therapy, one in Europe, and one in jail."
"Maybe someone yelled "Sixers suck!" from the other side of the bridge."
"Showing his quickness for a big man on and off the court."
"Probably late for a meeting with the 76ers maturity/life coach."
And the mentoring haters will hate these:
"Dude rarely had problems under Coach K. seems this is a reflection of the real lack of leadership on that roster and Brett brown isn't doing his job."
"Yep, the biggest issue with the way the 76ers have constructed their roster is they don't even have any vets to mentor the younger guys. We're seeing how KG being in Minnesota is making a difference while the 76ers have no discipline."
Love it!
Good stuff. Also for the Jabari Parker fans out there, he's off to an, um, slow start. Only 9 games played, still having injury problems 9 points and 3 boards.
San Antonio team that was resting Kawhi, Duncan and Manu beat Philly 119 - 68. At least Wolves are competitive when they lose.
San Antonio players with most minutes in that game were Kyle Anderson (30 min), Rasual Butler (27), Ray McCallum (25), Matt Bonner (24) and Jonathan Simmons (24) and they still beat Philly by 51 points. Their gigantic rookie center Marjanovic had 18 points in 17 minutes and Aldridge had 26 in 22 minutes. Philadelphia is that bad that they are going to break this year their own record in games lost.
Adam Silver pushed for the Sizers to hire Colangelo so that's an interesting development. I don't know if they will make any moves to bring in vets this year but you wonder if next year they at least sign some legit solid vets so they can compete. It's getting ridiculous I do feel bad for the players.
I've read recently that Hinkle and the owner rarely meet with the media... maybe 3 or 4 times all season.
What?
So these are the two architects behind the tanking and they're the ones demanding fans to "just trust us, we know what we're doing" but they seem to be shirking the duties of actually dealing with the ramifications of it. I dislike that organization (Hinkle) more and more the more I learn about it.
[Note: Imagine if Sam Mitchell was the guy instead of Brett Brown. Brown is the guy taking all the questions and all the heat. It would be funny to put a guy like Mitchell in that spot. He'd snap quickly, right?]
