I don't know how much of the credit for Lauri's improvement and Kessler's revelatory run as a rookie is attributable to the rookie coach. I imagine both of them, given similar situations with a fairly competent coach, would have made a similar leap anyway. It is in their makeup to be competitive and they have the gifts. We already saw Lauri's improvement over the summer when it was not known he was coming here, so it isn't that surprising, other than what we see in the summer doesn't always translate into success in the NBA. That in mind, there were a thousand ways a new coach could have screwed up this team, and Hardy avoided those for the most part. I think he is obviously still learning, I do not necessarily agree with his approach in everything, but we can see that he is a good hands-on player's coach, kind of the polar opposite from Quin, which is what we needed. That breath of fresh air. So I would give him a B at this point, I think he is doing well with what he has been given, and is showing a lot of promise. I look at this from a 9-box perspective, where we rank leaders in our organization from 1-9 based on performance and potential, and he is a solid medium performer and medium- to high-potential, putting him somewhere in the 5-7 range. Could be argued he is an 8 on that scale, but we have a measure that says "too soon to tell" for people in a new role. I think he fits that, so that knocks him down one notch, so a solid 7, which would equate to a B grade-ish.
