arthurracoon
The Cardinal Smiles
D'Antoni takes time out from his hectic off-season to talk about Suns' future
http://www.azcentral.com/sports/columns/articles/0913bickley0913.html
Dan Bickley
The Arizona Republic
Mike D'Antoni hobbles into Amaré Stoudemire's restaurant. The Suns coach is clutching a pair of crutches, and grimacing with every step.
The lunchtime crowd begins whispering. The imagery is both ominous and powerful.
Can't anyone on this team stay healthy long enough to win a championship?
"It's nothing," said D'Antoni, who recently underwent arthroscopic knee surgery. "Just getting it cleaned up. Just the price of getting old."
Oh, yes. And these days, the shot clock is ticking louder than ever.
Without so much as a nap, a weary D'Antoni is about to conduct the biggest basketball season around here since 1993-94, when the Suns should've capitalized on Michael Jordan's retirement and captured that elusive NBA championship. Instead, the trophy slipped out of Charles Barkley's fingers and into Clyde Drexler's lap.
Thirteen years later, the Suns will add better depth and a recovering Stoudemire to a team that reached the Western Conference finals last season. They are among the favorites to win the championship.
This is serious stuff.
Q: Do you feel overwhelmed? Worn out? Will your energy and focus be an issue?
A: "The only thing I can say is, I don't think so. I think we'll all see together. But when you love something and you have a great staff and great players, you get more excited than tired. I think I'll get tired when the steam comes out of the team, and that's not going to happen in the near future."
Q: But there will be unprecedented expectations this season.
A: "It's funny. We would all like to have low expectations. It makes our job easier. But I'm not going to sit here and lie. The fans should have high expectation. The players have to understand what's expected of them. We're excited because . . . " - long pause followed by a nervous smile - " . . . this should be the year that we win a championship."
Still, there will be clashing egos and unforeseen problems, not to mention a head coach who should be teetering on burnout. Postseason included, the Suns have played 199 games in the past two years. Along the way, D'Antoni took a pay raise and became the team's general manager. Then he joined the Olympic efforts of Team USA, and whoosh, there went the summer vacation.
There were draft preparations and summer league stuff. There were strategy sessions and tryout camps for USA Basketball. Once, he met with a free agent (Marcus Banks) at 10:30 p.m. at the Wynn Las Vegas hotel to consummate a deal.
D'Antoni returned from Team USA's exploits in Japan on Sept. 3. He will leave for training camp in Italy on Sept. 29, where he is considered a hero and will likely be expected to do much promotional work.
Yet instead of decompressing, D'Antoni is already back at the office, "working on the offense." And aside from the continuous hum of work, there is the inevitable drain of failure.
By failing to secure an automatic Olympic berth for 2008, Team USA must try to qualify again next summer in Venezuela. The critics are back out in force, including the Wizards' Gilbert Arenas, who didn't make the team, felt snubbed in the process and recently lashed out at D'Antoni.
Q: Gilbert Arenas is mad at you. He said he's going to score 100 points in two games against the Suns this year.
A: "I saw that. I can see why he's a little upset that he didn't make the team. He shouldn't be. It's an honor to be among the top 25. But also, I'm an assistant coach. He has to understand that. But the only guy he can take it out on is me and (Portland coach) Nate McMillan. And you know what? With our defense, he has a chance to get 100. God love him. I hope he can do it. But all I can say is 100 might not be enough."
In the past two years, D'Antoni has become one of the hottest coaches in the NBA. Fans love his personality while players love his system. He is a genius at liberating basketball players, and Phoenix is fast becoming a destination for curious free agents, particularly those seeing a one-year springboard to riches.
Yet D'Antoni will really need to be on his game in the coming months. All denials aside, there is tension between Stoudemire and Shawn Marion. There are new faces to blend, a creaky point guard who needs monitoring and 10 players who need chunky minutes. The math leads down one path, to an inevitable clashing of agendas.
Q: Given all the potential problems, how are you going to make this work?
A: "The biggest thing for a coach is to find roles for his players. As a coach, that means you have to find ways of talking to the players, and find ways of getting them to accept those roles. We're so close to winning a championship that this really has to be greater than everybody's individual needs. This has to be what's good for Phoenix . . . the Suns and the city. Everybody has to be on board, or we're going without you."
Q: This year, you have a lot of depth. But you don't like depth. And in the past, you've been criticized for being too impatient with players, for keeping too short of a bench.
A: "I can understand where that comes from. But my patience . . . a lot of fans look at it from game to game. I'm going from practice to shoot-around to the game to babysitting. More goes into it than just what they see on the court. As for Steve Nash, I know this: I'm competitive enough to say he's going to play as long as it takes for us to win."
Q: What's you're biggest fear with Amaré?
A: "The other day in practice, we saw him go and really felt like he was going to get it all back. Now, it may take awhile. The biggest thing is, we can win 55-60 games without him. We can win 55-60 games if he can't go at all. The hard thing is, what if he comes back somewhere in between? If he's struggling, we can have some hard patches. That can wreck a team."
As D'Antoni limps out of the restaurant, he makes it clear that we all need to stop worrying so much. And he's right. The journey is always the best part. The bumps in the road are what give the trophy high definition and context. This stuff - the hand wringing and the sweaty palms - is what makes it all worthwhile.
Besides, the coach has got a few nice surprises in store.
"We're going to be a better team this year," D'Antoni said. "Because I think we can run even more. Last year, we didn't run quite enough."
Crutches today, Ferrari tomorrow. Can't wait to see that.
http://www.azcentral.com/sports/columns/articles/0913bickley0913.html
Dan Bickley
The Arizona Republic
Mike D'Antoni hobbles into Amaré Stoudemire's restaurant. The Suns coach is clutching a pair of crutches, and grimacing with every step.
The lunchtime crowd begins whispering. The imagery is both ominous and powerful.
Can't anyone on this team stay healthy long enough to win a championship?
"It's nothing," said D'Antoni, who recently underwent arthroscopic knee surgery. "Just getting it cleaned up. Just the price of getting old."
Oh, yes. And these days, the shot clock is ticking louder than ever.
Without so much as a nap, a weary D'Antoni is about to conduct the biggest basketball season around here since 1993-94, when the Suns should've capitalized on Michael Jordan's retirement and captured that elusive NBA championship. Instead, the trophy slipped out of Charles Barkley's fingers and into Clyde Drexler's lap.
Thirteen years later, the Suns will add better depth and a recovering Stoudemire to a team that reached the Western Conference finals last season. They are among the favorites to win the championship.
This is serious stuff.
Q: Do you feel overwhelmed? Worn out? Will your energy and focus be an issue?
A: "The only thing I can say is, I don't think so. I think we'll all see together. But when you love something and you have a great staff and great players, you get more excited than tired. I think I'll get tired when the steam comes out of the team, and that's not going to happen in the near future."
Q: But there will be unprecedented expectations this season.
A: "It's funny. We would all like to have low expectations. It makes our job easier. But I'm not going to sit here and lie. The fans should have high expectation. The players have to understand what's expected of them. We're excited because . . . " - long pause followed by a nervous smile - " . . . this should be the year that we win a championship."
Still, there will be clashing egos and unforeseen problems, not to mention a head coach who should be teetering on burnout. Postseason included, the Suns have played 199 games in the past two years. Along the way, D'Antoni took a pay raise and became the team's general manager. Then he joined the Olympic efforts of Team USA, and whoosh, there went the summer vacation.
There were draft preparations and summer league stuff. There were strategy sessions and tryout camps for USA Basketball. Once, he met with a free agent (Marcus Banks) at 10:30 p.m. at the Wynn Las Vegas hotel to consummate a deal.
D'Antoni returned from Team USA's exploits in Japan on Sept. 3. He will leave for training camp in Italy on Sept. 29, where he is considered a hero and will likely be expected to do much promotional work.
Yet instead of decompressing, D'Antoni is already back at the office, "working on the offense." And aside from the continuous hum of work, there is the inevitable drain of failure.
By failing to secure an automatic Olympic berth for 2008, Team USA must try to qualify again next summer in Venezuela. The critics are back out in force, including the Wizards' Gilbert Arenas, who didn't make the team, felt snubbed in the process and recently lashed out at D'Antoni.
Q: Gilbert Arenas is mad at you. He said he's going to score 100 points in two games against the Suns this year.
A: "I saw that. I can see why he's a little upset that he didn't make the team. He shouldn't be. It's an honor to be among the top 25. But also, I'm an assistant coach. He has to understand that. But the only guy he can take it out on is me and (Portland coach) Nate McMillan. And you know what? With our defense, he has a chance to get 100. God love him. I hope he can do it. But all I can say is 100 might not be enough."
In the past two years, D'Antoni has become one of the hottest coaches in the NBA. Fans love his personality while players love his system. He is a genius at liberating basketball players, and Phoenix is fast becoming a destination for curious free agents, particularly those seeing a one-year springboard to riches.
Yet D'Antoni will really need to be on his game in the coming months. All denials aside, there is tension between Stoudemire and Shawn Marion. There are new faces to blend, a creaky point guard who needs monitoring and 10 players who need chunky minutes. The math leads down one path, to an inevitable clashing of agendas.
Q: Given all the potential problems, how are you going to make this work?
A: "The biggest thing for a coach is to find roles for his players. As a coach, that means you have to find ways of talking to the players, and find ways of getting them to accept those roles. We're so close to winning a championship that this really has to be greater than everybody's individual needs. This has to be what's good for Phoenix . . . the Suns and the city. Everybody has to be on board, or we're going without you."
Q: This year, you have a lot of depth. But you don't like depth. And in the past, you've been criticized for being too impatient with players, for keeping too short of a bench.
A: "I can understand where that comes from. But my patience . . . a lot of fans look at it from game to game. I'm going from practice to shoot-around to the game to babysitting. More goes into it than just what they see on the court. As for Steve Nash, I know this: I'm competitive enough to say he's going to play as long as it takes for us to win."
Q: What's you're biggest fear with Amaré?
A: "The other day in practice, we saw him go and really felt like he was going to get it all back. Now, it may take awhile. The biggest thing is, we can win 55-60 games without him. We can win 55-60 games if he can't go at all. The hard thing is, what if he comes back somewhere in between? If he's struggling, we can have some hard patches. That can wreck a team."
As D'Antoni limps out of the restaurant, he makes it clear that we all need to stop worrying so much. And he's right. The journey is always the best part. The bumps in the road are what give the trophy high definition and context. This stuff - the hand wringing and the sweaty palms - is what makes it all worthwhile.
Besides, the coach has got a few nice surprises in store.
"We're going to be a better team this year," D'Antoni said. "Because I think we can run even more. Last year, we didn't run quite enough."
Crutches today, Ferrari tomorrow. Can't wait to see that.
