King Canned!

On Dec 4, 3:57 pm, willy... RemoveThis @webtv.net (rich williams) wrote:
> I just read about on MSNBC....King fired, Stefanski hired...it was a
> good move.
>
>

Why let King run last year's draft? Why fire him one-quarter of the
way into the season? Why let him begin a _three year_ rebuilding
plan?

As a consultant friend of mine used to say, "a fish rots from the head
down."


wes
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> Why let King run last year's draft? Why fire him one-quarter of the
> way into the season? Why let him begin a _three year_ rebuilding
> plan?

If it was up to me, King would have been canned long before
that.

But as far as why the Sixers let him run the draft and let
him start a 3 year rebuilding plan and then fire him... I don't have
any problem with this. Perhaps Ed Snider reacted to King's
draft the way a lot of us did: "Huh? You did *what*?" Perhaps
Snider et al. listened to King's hype about having 3 picks "in
the deepest draft in years" and then watched King obviously
putting a lot of spin on the result of his draft. As for the
three year plan, come on -- Billy King saying "it's going
to take 3 years" doesn't therefore mean that he's
earned a 3-year extension on his job. Snider may
well have looked at how the team played this year and
realized, again, that King had hoowinked him. Willie Green
isn't really a good young player. Sam Dalembert hasn't
improved much -- if at all -- since King signed him to
that contract extension. Etc. etc. (Snider did say
something to the effect of "we were delusional about
our team based on how they played after The Trade.")

I don't have any problem with the timing. Seems
to me King's bullshit finally caught up with him. And now
the new GM can get an inside look at things leading up
to the trade deadline.
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Here's a certain rationale for the timing that occurred to me: that
with all indications pointing to Louis Williams usurping Andre Miller
as starting PG sometime during the year, that it became apparent that
King traded Allen Iverson for...Jason Smith. Somehow King and Cheeks
managed to convince people that Miller--who despite some fine skills
is a limited (never could shoot and not particularly noted for
athleticism) and aging PG--could be an integral part of a rebuilding
process. That was probably the biggest delusion over the past year or
so. In any case, as for the trade, Joe Smith left quickly; the second
Denver pick was horrendously bungled--they could have at least kept
the rights to an international player like the one they actually
drafted (Petteri Koponen) and held onto it for a few year--leading
them to actually trade it down to get Derrick Byars who was waived.
And now it seems that the Sixers best move is to trade Miller for an
expiring contract. So yeah, that leaves Allen Iverson for Jason
Smith. Besides the ridiculousness of that notion on a basketball
level, I'm sure it didn't do much to ingratiate King with ownership.

In any case, the Sixers are in an enviable position. A Miller dump
could leave them $26M or so under the cap. Assuming they all stick
around, adding 1 more top pick and 1 worthwhile free agent (it remains
to be seen if Philadelphia can become a desired FA destination) to
Dalembert, Korver, Iguodala, Williams, and Young, sounds pretty good.

--IK
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Ian writes:

> So yeah, that leaves Allen Iverson for Jason
> Smith. Besides the ridiculousness of that notion on a basketball
> level, I'm sure it didn't do much to ingratiate King with ownership.

This could well be true. It appears, in the end, that the
decision was
not Ed Snider's after all, but Peter Lukko's (sp?). (If so, Snider has
really lost it. This coming a year after he quite plainly stated that
Bobby
Clarke was doing a great job and had Clarke not resigned, Snider
wouldn't
have canned him. And reports have it that he was satisified with
King's
job, too. Wow.)

> In any case, the Sixers are in an enviable position. A Miller dump
> could leave them $26M or so under the cap. Assuming they all stick
> around, adding 1 more top pick and 1 worthwhile free agent (it remains
> to be seen if Philadelphia can become a desired FA destination) to
> Dalembert, Korver, Iguodala, Williams, and Young, sounds pretty good.

You've got think that Lukko analyzed the Iverson situation as you
pointed
out. And I think we've all seen that ghastly list of $300 million
worth of contracts
that King handed out to non-entities or over-the-hill vets like Greg
Buckner,
Aaron Mckie, etc. etc. (It's an amazing list -- I don't think we had a
single
performance that was even worthy of all-star consideration for all
that money
and salary cap space). You have to believe that Lukko would not
possibly
allow King to work that kind of magic with so much salary cap space
next year.

Honestly, I cannot fathom how King kept his job as long as he
did
and I was absolutely flummoxed to have read all those "don't worry,
Billy King
has a plan"-type stories in the philly press over the last year.
Can't help
but to think he spent some time in Haiti and picked up some strange
voodoo
powder that he slipped into drinks all around town.
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"Ian Kognitow" <covanus.DeleteThis@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:2b7b46df-38b9-45dd-96ec-054f9ff12415@i12g2000prf.googlegroups.com...
> Here's a certain rationale for the timing that occurred to me: that
> with all indications pointing to Louis Williams usurping Andre Miller
> as starting PG sometime during the year,

If the team is going to try Lou in the starting lineup, I'd suggest it be at
SG, in place of Willie Green, and keep Miller in the lineup at PG. Yes,
that does make for some, ahem, defensive difficulties and imponderable
matchups, but Miller is having a fine year offensively, which is more than
you can say for WG.

---- Kurt Straub
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