Messina vs. Blatt. This Friday.
- Thread starter karpasov
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fishonjazz
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karpasov
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The thing that was most impressing was the abilty of Blatt to get within reach to the last seconds with a much inferior team. Baring the fact he lost Sofo with foul trouble early on - it is remarkable.
Congrats to Maccabi&Blatt. Couldn't see the game so can't say much except that I'm not surprised at all. We were saying constantly that this CSKA team is not good as it seems on the paper. Not to mention to Teodosic who is constantly getting injured and ruining the teams rhythm. Plus, It's Euroleague F4, no series and win or die game like always, so anything can happen.
Though I'd be glad if the Blatt homers just were praising Blatt and quit bashing Messina. It may sound interesting to the people who don't know much about Euroball but it sounds just childish to the people who know about Messina and Blatt. Both are great coaches.
Btw, you can say that the Maccabi is the inferior team but don't undersell them, no star player doesn't mean they are not a good team. They are very decent and everyone knows that Euroball is not about star players but team play.
Though I'd be glad if the Blatt homers just were praising Blatt and quit bashing Messina. It may sound interesting to the people who don't know much about Euroball but it sounds just childish to the people who know about Messina and Blatt. Both are great coaches.
Btw, you can say that the Maccabi is the inferior team but don't undersell them, no star player doesn't mean they are not a good team. They are very decent and everyone knows that Euroball is not about star players but team play.
Apparently the odds were low, in hindsight obviously. Madrid won the game 100-62, that's a shame for the Barcas. But stats say Tomic was good, the best actually in his team. 16 pts, 8 rbs in 28 mins, still pretty meaningless though, considering the score.
Guitaro
Well-Known Member
This discussion actually brings up a good point: If you bring in a guy like Messina, who is pretty intense, then you can't have players who can't take that pressure or rebels against authoritative coaches.
Ostertag, for example, as a player was always butting heads with Sloan. They're friends, granted, but that doesn't always make for a good working relationship. There were many players like that over the years.
Do we really want another coach that can't coach certain personalities? Would you say Phil Jackson or Coach Pop can't coach certain personalities?
Ostertag, for example, as a player was always butting heads with Sloan. They're friends, granted, but that doesn't always make for a good working relationship. There were many players like that over the years.
Do we really want another coach that can't coach certain personalities? Would you say Phil Jackson or Coach Pop can't coach certain personalities?
karpasov
Well-Known Member
( Here are links to the game (I found just Spanish broadcast links
VK ONLINE
1/4 - https://adf.ly/nJq4a
2/4 - https://adf.ly/nJqCF
3/4 - https://adf.ly/nJqGJ
4/4 - https://adf.ly/nJqIv
VK ONLINE
1/4 - https://adf.ly/nJq4a
2/4 - https://adf.ly/nJqCF
3/4 - https://adf.ly/nJqGJ
4/4 - https://adf.ly/nJqIv
Should we be concerned about Messina?
At the end of the season, when his team should be rounding into best form, they lose two straight in the domestic playoffs to a heavy underdog at home. Then they fall apart in the final quarter against another underdog in the Euroleague semis to lose by one. Then they mail it in to lose by 15 to Tomic's Barca team that was humiliated the previous game. (And as for Tomic in the Euroleague playoffs: good game when his team was destroyed; poor game when the rest of his team decides to play well against Moscow. Also unsettling.)
I'm perfectly willing to concede that this may in fact be meaningless (small sample size and all), but someone please tell me why I shouldn't be worried that Messina quit on his team or his team quit on him here at the end of the season. And as long as I'm going here, wasn't most of Messina's reputation built in his earlier years? Haven't his teams had something of an underachieving reputation over the past few years?
Euro experts, please help me out.
At the end of the season, when his team should be rounding into best form, they lose two straight in the domestic playoffs to a heavy underdog at home. Then they fall apart in the final quarter against another underdog in the Euroleague semis to lose by one. Then they mail it in to lose by 15 to Tomic's Barca team that was humiliated the previous game. (And as for Tomic in the Euroleague playoffs: good game when his team was destroyed; poor game when the rest of his team decides to play well against Moscow. Also unsettling.)
I'm perfectly willing to concede that this may in fact be meaningless (small sample size and all), but someone please tell me why I shouldn't be worried that Messina quit on his team or his team quit on him here at the end of the season. And as long as I'm going here, wasn't most of Messina's reputation built in his earlier years? Haven't his teams had something of an underachieving reputation over the past few years?
Euro experts, please help me out.
It was known that CSKA had serious team chemistry issues. However, I can't say if Messina had a big part in it or not, since I don't follow CSKA that closely. But I just know that Messina has been admitting it for some time and were criticizing himself for not being able to fix it, that gives me the impression that the problems were severe and over him this time. This happens a lot in Europe, teams with star players just can't establish the team chemistry and collapse. Same thing happens and did happen to every good coaches.
Though, I'd add technical and basketball related aspects as well. CSKA is a good example for an unbalanced roster, they had been playing with serious back court issues. Teodosic is probably one of the most overrated PGs in Europe with horrible defense and he frequently gets injured and messes up the team rhythm. Plus he's a diva, I wouldn't be surprised if the chemistry problems relate to him. Also, Pargo and the other guards are far from replacing him. It's hard to compete in Euroleage without a consistent back court.
This is Messina's comments after that second loss against Lokomotiv-Kuban.
And after the F4.
Like I said, same thing happens to every good coaches like it happens in the NBA too. And It happened to Blatt as well in Istanbul with Efes, before someone says he's immune to that. It also happened to Pianigiani last year. It happened to Pesic and Spahija. It happened to Ivkovic too, another legendary coach in Europe.
Heck, this year it happened to even Obradovic! The best of the bests! The winningiest coach of the Europe and arguably the best of its history. Ironically, Fenerbahçe with Obradovic absolutely humiliated Messina and CSKA in the earlier stages of the Euroleague. But at the end Fener couldn't advance to Final 8 but CSKA did make it to the Final 4. But obviously, that doesn't make Messina better than Obra although even Fener's roster wasn't worse than CSKA's either. But it was the same story kind of, it was an unbalanced roster with a weak front court and had the similar team chemistry issues.
That's not entirely true. Your question reminded me another poster saying that Messina's past five years were all failure. Here is that post and the answer I gave.
The gist of it here:
So, it's all relative. For a coach like Messina, the bar is very high. But the Euroleague F4 is like the NBA conference finals in Europe so even this final F4 could pass as a success for Messina, since it's a dream for the most of the remaining coaches.
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