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Will Hardy Extension

I am not sure about this extension. On a fundamental level, rewarding a coach for coaching the worst team in the league seems a bit off. The defense wasn't just bad but historically bad. I have real concerns on that end. He definitely gives a good press conference. Sounds intelligent and nuanced but he might just be a guy who can talk well but not coach well. He speaks well in general but there is this atmosphere that everything going on is ok when it shouldn't be ok. Almost no accountability for the young guys being horrific defenders. Not just regularly bad but worst in the entire league bad. Keyonte might have been benched but he still got 30 minutes a game to do what he does. Brice wasn't much better defensively.

To be fair to them, they weren't drafted for their defensive prowess, but there is a minimum amount of defense that is needed. If they aren't hacking it on that end, Hardy needs to play someone else that will perform defensively. The Jazz shouldn't sink the whole team to develop young guys, even if its in their best interest to lose and develop. There has to be some level of merit and accountability or none of this is going to work in the future. It's about laying the proper foundation and mindset for the future.

But Hardy's previous 2 years weren't as bad as this year. The approach that he has gone for is to give the young guys a bunch of slack and playtime in the hopes that it leads to outsized growth. That approach also aligns with the Front Office wanting to lose for lottery balls. Which is why he got the extension. We will see how it all plays out. It's probably too much to hope for good basketball next year but I hope all this development leads to something in the future. Young draftees are not the only way to build a team.
 
Ferguson_Mellochill said:
Suns are pulling together a list of coaching candidates— Borrego and Joerger among them.
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Borrego got a raw deal in Charlotte. Needs a second chance. Joerger likely not a personality fit based on how it went with Bud.
 
William Culvahouse Hardy is a coach with certain projectable potentialities. At age 37, he is relatively early in the life cycle of the species, his telomeres do not yet face the “end-replication” problem that befuddles older specimens. With robust chromosomes, WC Hardy can grow. Empiricism values the observable, and WC Hardy observes and grows. Forward!
 
Thee Idiotic Minivan K said:
Maybe the most impressive thing last year was the fact that the Jazz shamelessly tanked, and yet that locker room always seem to be good, and they always played hard for the most part.
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He also had this with his first team… I mean it was clear that many of those guys were going to be shipped out, yet they played hard and the culture was great.
 
This extension is not about Hardy - it is about Ainge. Danny wants to demonstrate that everything goes according to his plan and there is no need for correction. So far the owner trusts Ainge and lets him do whatever he wants. If the owner loses confidence in Danny then Hardy will be fired right after him.

If the Jazz get unlucky in the 2025 and 2026 draft lotteries then Ainge and Hardy will be gone because so far the Jazz have close to nothing to show for their 3 years of tanking. The fate of Ainge and Hardy will be decided by the lottery balls.
 
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Nothing screams intentional tanking quite like extending your coach right after finishing dead last.

What makes this ironic is that it happens in the same year when Jenkins and Malone got fired minutes before the playoffs started.

Im happy we invested in Hardy though.
 
Hardy hate in this thread is wild.

The man has overperformed when the team is trying to win, and he has overperformed when the team is trying to lose. Looking at either of his first 2 seasons as a whole is piss poor analysis since both seasons were so clearly split in "let them play" and "tank" phases. Analyze each phase separately, and Hardy's performance looks pretty spotless.
 
infection said:
Unsure how good of a coach he is. I think those really supporting him may interpret that as being a hater or not acknowledging reality. I genuinely don't know. Quin is a good example that he was seen as an absolute savant until we got exposed to his patterns in deeper into the competition. It's hard to prognosticate success at the highest levels with what we see in regular competition. I'm hoping he is the real thing because us winning a title would in no small part be tied to that.
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I think this is 100% fair and if anyone sees this as hate they are dumb. Hardy is unproven in the playoffs and scheming (and adjusting) in a playoff series is different from sceheming for regular season success. I think those two are very factual statements.
 
HermanG said:
I think this is 100% fair and if anyone sees this as hate they are dumb. Hardy is unproven in the playoffs and scheming (and adjusting) in a playoff series is different from sceheming for regular season success. I think those two are very factual statements.
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The posters on this board have won as many playoff games as Hardy as head coach has.
 
HermanG said:
Hardy hate in this thread is wild.

The man has overperformed when the team is trying to win, and he has overperformed when the team is trying to lose. Looking at either of his first 2 seasons as a whole is piss poor analysis since both seasons were so clearly split in "let them play" and "tank" phases. Analyze each phase separately, and Hardy's performance looks pretty spotless.
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I just enjoy balancing out the positivity with a little hate. Its more cathartic to be a hater. Plus, I get the sense that Hardy is quite the smooth talker, almost too smooth.

For the most part, he is a fine young head coach.
 
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