Lawrence Frank Will Join Clippers' Coaching Staff

http://basketball.realgm.com/wiretap/234999/Lawrence-Frank-To-Join-Clippers-Coaching-Staff

Is this the same guy who they suspected of undermining then Head Coach Jason Kidd?

Rivers, Woodson, Frank, Cassell... best coaching lineup in the league.

I think Jason Kidd was more of the issue than anything. The league clamors about how good Frank was defensively, but I've been looking at his team stats and only once was he in the top 5 of Drtg and Points allowed. He seems like a mediocre head coach.

As long as he is not toxic to our team and follows the program.

I wonder what our offense will look like now that gentry is gone? Still a great coaching staff though

When did we make Sam cassel official, I missed that?

It was a while ago. I think Washington were fishing for a draft pick, but Doc said "f*ck that" and sent 'em Howard Eisley instead.

Seriously great staff. I was pissed at Lue and Gentry and a little bit at Doc for not negotiating harder with them. But we got 2 HC's and one of my all-time favorite Clip players to replace them.

Wouldn't be surprised if Woodson moved on after a year or two but Franks and Cassell probably hang around long term, which would be great.

After the whole Kidd fiasco went down, this twitter feed was good stuff...https://twitter.com/LFrankDaily

No, Kidd just used him as a scapegoat for the Nets' slow start.

Frank was an assistant under Doc in Boston, so I don't think he should be problem

I was listening to 980 on the way home from school, and they said that Frank is brilliant. they said he's one of the few coaches in the NBA hat can draw up a play in an instant. his fall from grace in Brooklyn stems more from Jason Kidd, whose unorthodox coaching was called into question by Frank. considering Jason Kidd had no previous coaching experience, and other things like soda gate it's not out of the question to conclude that Jason Kidd should not have been given a head coaching job so prematurely. Frank quickly questioned his coaching style, and this led Kid to keep him sitting on a bench and not contributing on the coaching

^ Yup. Seems like the Nets were something of a clusterfuck last year. Honestly, I'd be worried if Frank hadn't made waves.

The guys on 980 said that Frank asked Kidd something along like "What the f#ck are you doing, you can't do that." To which Kidd got offended by, but Frank being a more tenured coach was probably in the right. And seeing how much of a jackass Kidd was I put money on Kidd being in the wrong

Good guy as a defensive coach. Was head coach of some top 5 Nets defensive teams 03-04 (4th Drtg), 04-05 (7th Drtg), 05-06 (4th Drtg), but their defense went downhill from 06-07 on. Was great as the defensive coach for Boston with Doc (1st in Drtg). Couldn't replicate similar success as a head coach with Detroit on the defensive end.

I think this is a great pick up. I've been wanting Frank on the staff for awhile and the past experience between hm and Doc should really cement the defensive system down. I'm still hesitant to buy in on Woodson and wondering who can fill Gentry's shoes.

Adding Frank is a great move. I read on Clipsnation that he was actually Doc's first choice last summer over Gentry. It makes sense since Doc must have known the team's defense was going to need a lot more work then the offense. In my opinion, we really don't need another offensive specialist like Gentry right now. Offensively we're already the best in the league and nearly the best of all time for that matter. Losing Gentry doesn't mean our guys won't continue to run the same plays they already know. Mastering the sort of defense that the championship Celtics were known for is going to take a TON of time and attention by itself. There was an article in today's LA Times where Doc was talking about game five and all of our defensive lapses in the closing minutes- good read.

that's a great point. we finished with the league's best offensee, but the league's 7 best defense. it's safe to say that we probably won't have the league's best offense again, but finding ways to improve that defense, while staying in the top 3 in offense may get us an overall better result.

Actually his one year with Doc in Boston (2010-11) the Celtics were 2nd in Drtg. Still great though

http://www.basketball-reference.com/teams/BOS/2011.html

My bad, 2nd, clicked on the wrong year.

page, with good health, we have a chance to be an even better offense while still being able to improve on defense.

Healthier Paul

Healthier Redick

CDR playing like last season > injured Dudley

Healthier Barnes > slow start Barnes

Blake should improve a little too

Davis and Hedo offensively over the early usage of Jamison and Mullens

Hawes much better on offense than any backup big from last season

Better health and the additions / replacements would actually mean a better offensive team than last season. Could be an even better 1st ranked offense and get into the top 5 on defense, but hey, 2nd or 3rd and being a top 3 defense is just as good.

I wouldn't mind a step down on offense if it meant moving up in defense. I think you're right in terms of position comparisons from last year, but with Gentry gone, Collison gone, and a similar year by Griffin and Crawford being less likely we may stay about the same offensively or just move down a slight bit. At the very worst we become the leagues 2nd best offense, but you're correct in that its more likely we can see an even better offense than last year. I am most excited

About the possible defensive improvements to be honest with you. Not just additions like Udoh, CDR, and Hawes but also what Lawrence Frank will bring, and as Severns said at a fan event "last year three players did not buy in defensively"

Can you imagine how great this ball club could be if those three Severns alluded to decided to contribute on the defensive end? That's what will be the difference this year, and I think it's very possible.

I just don't want us to regress to an Iso offense, and if Frank is running the defense what is Woodson doing? I think Doc can do a good job on offense himself, but I don't know about the other coaches. I love Cassell being back with the team and liked Frank last year as well as now; Woodson is the only one I'm not high on.

Regardless I think we will be good. I'm not fretting and think the sky is falling or anything like that. I think we will be good. I think Defensively we will be much better and am thinking CDR will be a steal. I also think CJ is going to pass expectations (which are very low after last year with Reggie). Our front court depth is crazy now. I think Collison and Farmar are very similar players (as long as Farmar puts in defensive effort); neither is a defensive star and while Collison can drive better than Farmar the opposite can be said in regards to shooting. I would like another PG, but if we don't I'm ok with an Ingles or Hedo running point duties with a mixed line up.

im glad you brought up that last point. Sometimes a player than can average about 4 assists per game regardless of position is highly valuable. Last year between Griffin and Collison they both combined to avergae close to the assist number that Paul does on his own. Hence why Lebrons teams do so well despite having shitty point guards. Ingles does have a pretty good passing ability, and I think that will come into play

Woodson is clearly there for moral support, and marketing, duh!

I'm pretty sure the team is going to run mostly the same sets as last season. If Frank runs the defense and Woodson the offense, Doc will have nothing to do . Woodson is similar to Mike Brown in some aspects. They are guys that seem to do a lot better as assistant coaches just giving ideas and helping tweak things than as head coaches where they are making all the decisions.

Keep in mind that Doc is also our President of Basketball Duties - there are a lot of behind the scenes demands that he has, which means it's great that we have such a strong supporting staff that can 'lighten the load' so to speak. In regards to our projected performance in offense/defense this year, I'd just like to say that there is literally no way we regress offensively. We have our guys healthy, and even last year, with an injured starting line-up and with us being CP3-less for a long stretch, we were juggernauts (with one of the worst three point shooting % in the league). This year we are going to tear up the league with our offense for several reasons: Our guys are healthy, J-duds is gone. Our bench wasn't great by any stretch of the imagination; we had great individual performances, but no cohesion or flow. Now we have a full unit with offensive capabilities and a month of training camp and preseason to gel. Blake gets another offseason without distraction or limitation. Don't be surprised to find him posting a 25/9/3.5 stat-line. Cp3 is coming into the season with a new understanding of his role. Expect his 3pt shooting in the playoffs to carry over into this season. The concern for us should be defense. Our starters were absolutely amazing in stretches (during games) last season, but our bench ALWAYS let us down. We all saw our starters make heaps of defensive mistakes last year; slow rotations, over rotations, and no WING REBOUNDING. These downfalls of our defense are not permanent by any means, and with another year to really learn the system, we're are going to be so much better. A few defensive things to note this season: Blake wasn't a net-positive by any means for 90% of last season. The last....

Top two offense for sure. Top five defense hopefully. That will affect our season more.

IF we do get better defensively, which we should, THAT means less offensive rebounds by our opponents, more turnovers by our opponents, AND lower scores by our opponents! In other words, words, as long as....

I'm excited to see what Woodson can bring to the table for Blake.

He's already coached Josh Smith, Melo and Amare. Transitioning to Blake should be seamless.

injuries are tricky issue. Actually they're quite common. Always prepare for them and acquire depth. Chris Paul will miss some games, Farmer will miss some as well. We just have to pray that the injuries are staggered and not all at once. If they are staggered we can achieve a great record.

65 games is hard to achieve in the current Western Conference because there are so many good teams. 60 wins would be nice, and statistically our production was more of a 59 win team last season, which suggests luck didn't go our way as much last season, but that happens. I think healthy we can win 62 games.

Injuries are something that happen here and there, what we hope for is no extended injuries.

Blake / DJ are guys who have generally been 82 game players, hopefully that continues

Hawes also doesn't get injured often 500/558 career games played

CP played 62 games last season. The three previous seasons had ha played 91% of his games. So anywhere from 70-75 games or more would be fine.

Redick played 35 games last season, he had played 88% of his games the previous 3 seasons, so similarly, about 70-73 or more games would be solid.

Jamal Crawford and Matt Barnes are harder to gauge because they also have age as a factor, but for his career, Jamal doesn't usually miss more than about 6 games a season, he missed 13 last season

Barnes has been sort of up and down with injuries, but he had still played 85% of his games the previous three seasons and gave us 80 games in 12-13

So I think in terms of injuries, we ideally should have a better situation than last year. I'm not expecting 80+ games from everyone except for Blake/DJ, but I think a lot of our main guys should be able to give 70+ games, though more importantly we don't want them to have any more than minor injury going into the playoffs...and Dudley playing 74 games was not even a real thing last season because if we had another healthy SF he would probably have played closer to 60 games last season 14 less than he did.

Clippers Defense

Regular Season
9th Drtg - 104.8
(League Average Ortg - 106.7)
5th in opponent eFG% - 48.4%
(League average eFG% - 50.1)
13th in opponent TOV% -13.8%
(League average TOV% - 13.6)
26th in Defensive Rebound % - 72.5%
(League average DRB% - 74.5%)
17th in opponent FT/FGA - .222
(League average FT/FGA - .215)
Playoffs
10th in Drtg - 111.3
(Regular season: OKC - 110.5 / GSW 107.5, Avg = 109)
12th in opponent eFG% - .521
(Regular season: OKC - .520 / GSW .517)
1st in opponent TOV% - 14.9%
(Regular season: OKC - 14%, GSW - 13,8%)
15th in Defensive Rebound % = 70.4%
(Regulars season: OKC - 26.5 ORB% / GSW 25.1 ORB%) (Playoffs: GSW - 30.8%)
13th in FT/FGA = .272
(Regular season: OKC - .244 / GSW - .186) 12th in FG% at rim = 68.5% (Regular season: OKC - 66.8% / GSW - 65.4%) 14th in percentage of opponent FG at rim = 29.1% (Regular season: OKC - 28.2% / GSW - 26.4%)

The overall rankings don't mean as much in the playoffs because everyone is playing different opponents as opposed to regular season where for the most part everyone plays everyone else somewhat equally. Regular season we weren't bad, not great, but not bad. Some numbers for OKC just against us aren't available because basketball reference has whole playoff numbers, and they played MEM and SAS too, but GS is easy since they only played us. Post-season we have to look at it in comparison to competition and what they were doing in the regular season. Also have to take into account that Westbrook played 46 games, and the Thunder's Ortg with Westbrook on was 113.5 Ortg, while it was only 108.7 with him off, so their regular season Ortg was an underestimate of their actual offensive production if they have Westbrook which would probably....