Bill Simmons Was Right About Doc Rivers

I was searching for news about Doc, hoping that he would be fired. I ran across this old article by Bill Simmons. Some of the criticisms of Doc and reasons why he lingered in Boston as long as he did are in play here in L.A. as well. Overall, Doc seems to be a master of selling a "nice guy image" and endearing himself to the people that matter so that he can keep a job longer than he really should. Goodbye Doc, hello Greg? By Bill Simmons Note to reader: Due to scheduling conflicts, I was forced to write the inevitable "Doc....

Cliff notes?

Long story short, Doc was a disaster of a head coach until Danny Ainge saved his career with KG and Ray Allen. What's more embarrassing is the time it took for Doc to mismanage the Clippers, the Celtics completed an entire rebuild mode and now look like a front runner for the Championship. **** you Doc.

If anything this article proves how much I hate sports talking heads as much as political talking heads.

Talk, talk, talk, project, project, project, speculate, blah, blah, blah.

Reading the article proved how wrong he was on so many fronts...

true, but the front he got right was on Doc. Doc has endeared himself to people in the organization, which has allowed his bad coaching to go uncriticized

Don't really care for Simmons that much, but I did think he was on to something about Doc when he first came here, and I agree with most, not all, but most with what he said in this article. Facts are, he's never been a great head coach. Even when he had Garnett and Ray Allen, I felt he underachieved with that group. That 2008 team was an unbelievable team. They had James Posey, Eddie House, and Big Baby coming off the bench. Heck, I think even VDN could've won a ring with that group. Once those players left, Doc had to coach more and the results were not pretty. Don't forget, up 3-2 on the Lakers in the Finals, up 3-2 on Miami in the ECF in 2013.

Here, the only thing he's done that I give him a ton of credit was getting through the Donald Sterling controversy. He kept the team and organization from falling apart and probably saved the franchise from spiraling out of control. But after that, it's been pretty much a disaster. The meltdown in OKC, the disastrous Houston series, and then failing to get out of the first round the last two years. He's moves as GM were awful and left us with no picks left. Add his son to the mix, who seems to have really divided the locker room and caused CP3 to want out. Here we are now, and what a mess we've turned into since he got here. Unless he does a miracle with this season, he's out. Whether it's tomorrow or in April, he's worn out his welcome. A change is needed.

Why did you go and ruin the other points you were making with this? Eddie House was there for another two seasons and Big Baby for another three.Those players leaving was pretty irrelevant. KG's injury in 08-09 wasted a season, then later it was the big three getting old that was the issue. Doc couldn't just rely on being more talented than other teams.

The fact that the 07-08 Celtics played a 7 game, 7 game and 6 game series before the finals makes the coaching very questionable. They should have beat Atlanta in 4-5, even Cleveland in 5-6, though I can understand a Lebron led team pushing them that far. The players do have a responsibility here, Ray Allen was awful vs Cleveland and meh overall vs Atlanta. KG his whole career could never truly consistently dominate as a scorer, or carry a team with scoring, and he was always very mediocre in his scoring efficiency when the playoffs rolled around.

Still, no KG injury in 08-09 and Doc would have led a team to 3 straight finals, and if Lebron also didn't wisen up and build his big three, then the Celtics would likely have made even 4-5 finals in a row with Doc as coach, or at least 4/5 finals. That makes you look good no matter what.

If Doc is fired i'd prefer it during the season. The sooner it's done the sooner any potential coaching candidates can start planning how they will make a bid for the job.

If you want Doc Rivers fired. Email Steve Ballmer: [email protected]

Does Memphis have Fizdale's rights for the rest of the season or is he free to sign? In all honesty if we want to tank we should just keep doc! I would like to see how Cassel would do as an interim coach.

Just sent him an e-mail realbull17. I started a thread a few years back and tried encouraging others to write to Ballmer as well...I was even scoffed at by some members who liked the status quo. Still, I think everyone should continue to do this to bring attention to the severity of the problem. Please submit those e-mails everyone

^Just sent an e mail too. Is that address genuine?

I join the parade, I just send a Fire Doc Rivers email.

Yes! That's his clippers email. Probably not personal email. You can send them Gillian Zucker (email: [email protected]) & she'll forward them to him or verbally tell him your disatisfactory with Rivers.

I have voiced my concerns to both email addresses.

You guys are so lame. Sending an email to Steve Ballmer to fire Doc Rivers is just SO LAME.

Then what? What will you accomplish if Doc gets fired now? He is guaranteed a lot of money and it's a garbage team that he built. Let him suffer out the year in complete embarrassment and fire him at the end of season. If he goes out now, what will change? Austin is still a starter on this team, they will still be a sad-losing team, it'll indicate that we've completely given up on the season, and Doc will be sitting pretty with his cash. If we fire him now, he'll just be chilling with Paul Pierce on ESPN with a giant smile, knowing very well that at the end of his career, he was just milking the Clippers Franchise.

I don't like Doc, but let him get what he deserves. I don't want to see him be our long-term franchise coach, but I don't mind him sweating out the year trying to explain the mess he made.

Ballmer wouldn't even break a sweat paying off Doc. It may be like pocket change to him. It's not like it would count against the team's salary cap. And no Doc won't be suffering much afterwards. He won't go hungry with that pay off. He can go golfing all he wants and no more worries about practicing.

excellent rebuttal. Also, props to Joe and all you others that have and will send emails. Indifference and inaction only prolong Doc's time here.

I sent my email the other day, Ballmer doesn't even get it. Some cornie filters all his emails if that. They're probably sent to the spam folder.

Children there are things called pen and paper. Where?

Clipper Darrell wants Doc Rivers fired. Hey take his horrible son as well.

There's a video on BR with Clipper Darrell saying, "Fire Doc Rivers." Wish I knew how to download it!

I wish Ballmer would read our post. Just blows my mind that he hasn’t been fired. I guess Steve doesn’t mind giving away 10 million a year to a mediocre coach.

Even if he fires him, he still has to pay for that dumba$$ for the remainder of the contract. I’d prefer to have suffer more losses by tarnishing his coaching legacy.

Or you could also punish him by sending Austin to somewhere else like, Atlanta.

Hey Mr. Big Talk. I'm not claiming to be cool. I'm saying your efforts are futile. Doc Rivers is guaranteed money and he made this bad roster, why does Mike Woodson deserve to suffer coaching a G-League caliber team led by Austin Rivers? We don't automatically get better when Doc is gone. It's still a pile of garbage on the court. Doc Rivers should suffer out the year. This can give time to Jerry West to see exactly what the franchise is working with and diagnose the team. Meanwhile, Doc can burst into flames and end his coaching career as the enormous embarrassment he is. You're lame because you're not the owner of the team and your actions won't help the team if you fire Doc Rivers now. P.S. Doc isn't the only problem and is very close with Ballmer. Until Clippers fans understand and come to terms with the fact that Blake Griffin is not a champion and all he does is project passiveness and a fake attitude to boast himself... you're going to suffer for 5 more years under Blake's super contract. I think you'd be better off asking for a Blake Griffin Trade, but it's too late for that. The coach isn't the only problem and firing your coach 20 games into the season isn't getting these Clippers closer to the playoffs, let alone a championship. Austin is still there, everyone will still be injured, when they come back, everyone will still play with no passion. At least with Doc, you have a punching bag to blame for your problems for the rest of the season. What are you going to say when he is gone and we still stink? You think....

Austin fined $25k by the nba.

Finally, some justice.

There s no point in firing Doc this year. Even I couldn't screw things up this year they're so bad. The Clipper Curse strikes again!. Since Doc is not GM and he can't screw up player acquisitions there may be no point in firing him next year. The money could be better spent elsewhere. If we totally tank and need to rebuild ,how could one more year of coaching scrubs hurt? GSW will may be on the wane unless their FO is like the Spurs. CP will be in decline.but not this year, not next. As well the players now probably won't play hard. They're waiting to leave but young hungry players will play with energy. We can get some Euro players. Austin will be gone I think but he has a player option( ?) In reality, there is no way that we can have a decent team next year. We need to dump a lot for cap space and get lucky.. Even if we trade well now, how much cap space will we have next year? Won't we have to take on some bad contracts which suck now but in two years will have expired or in their final year making them trade bait? By that time maybe Jawan will have developed into a decent player. I think that he has potential to be an all star except he's 6'1" and 186#. Piss and moan but Doc did develop DJ. and to a certain extent he developed Austin. Thornwell may be serviceable..

No, standing on the sidelines and expecting results is futile. You call people lame for taking time to let the owner know that as a consumer, they're not satisfied with the product. You think companies don't listen to their consumers? You don't think companies haven't been pressured into making changes through direct correspondence? Then that makes you naive.

Where do we send the letter? Letters have more impact that e-mails.This has been proven somewhere. You can't have a pile of e-mails but you can have a pile of letters on your desk..

Considering that in the time it takes to boot up a computer etc. you can write a letter. Anyway I hate electronics. My Roledex is five times faster that a computer and more accurate.Don't get me started on e-bank statements they have you fooled but a conversation for another day

So, if the Clippers don't fire Doc before All-Star Weekend are you going to start rooting for another team? Did you let Mr. Ballmer and Mrs. Zucker that you'll be a Laker fan if you don't fire Doc? Doc isn't is the entire reason the product is bad. What do you expect to happen to this team in Post-Doc mid-season firing? I'm asking you. If you fire Doc now VS at the end of the season, what advantage have you gained? He is literally being forced to coach young talents and play team basketball with all these injuries. He isn't a GM. If you fire him with a team that is going to do poorly, NO MATTER what happens this season, then you'd think the Clipper's understand that they should keep him for at least the remainder of this season, maybe even ride out his contract.

I think this team is already in the pre-rebuilding stage. We are going to suffer with this coach and these players until the Clipper's Franchise decide how to approach a modern NBA. I don't think firing Doc Rivers will be productive for this franchise at this point in time. Expressing dissent is fine, but I'm positive that the franchise is well-informed about the resentment towards Doc Rivers. The entire internet shits on him and publicly asks for him to be fired. Firing Doc will not get you results or the fixes the Clippers need.

When player's fail to work in a team they get traded or cut. If a coach fails in coaching they get fired. Doc wanted GM power and he traded and cut players he deemed failures. If he had never received GM power we wouldn't be calling for his head right now. We would be calling for the head of the GM. So Doc is to blame for bringing us to this point. Even without GM power(now in the hands of his appointed cronies) he still claims he has input into moves.

Doc wasted some prime CP3 years. Two years in he should have traded JJ and DJ to help Blake and CP3. Sure you can argue that Blake and CP3 would still be injury prone but a changed starting 5 dynamic could have changed things. You fire Doc early to signal the potential future coach that the position is open. Also you can find out what players are not ok with the firing and you can trade them early if needed. Putting Sam in as interim coach won't cost Ballmer anything more.