Sacramento Kings Fire Fomer Suns Coach Paul Westphal

If there was a battle between Westphal and DeMarcus Cousins, I guess we know who won.

5 months ago East Bay Ray 17 comments 0 recs |

Comments

We should hire him!

One of only two people to have taken the Suns to the Finals as head coach and the only one who did it as both a player and coach.

I’d suggest we can Gentry and hire Westy to coach, but frankly, we could probably use him more at shooting guard.

I'm Michael Beasley's imaginary friend.

by suns68 on Jan 5, 2012 4:07 PM MST reply actions

I bet he goes back to being a college coach

Or gets some minor NBA front office job. He lost that Kings team and they quit playing for him, but it remains to be seen if it was his fault, or the players’ fault.

Blogging Suns basketball for Bright Side of the Sun from California wine country.
Twitter: @EastBayRaymundo

by East Bay Ray on Jan 5, 2012 9:57 PM MST up reply actions

Chuck quit on him, too

Mmmmm ... Guinness

by JSun on Jan 6, 2012 9:00 AM MST up reply actions

Westphal is human garbage

The guy leaves every team he works for a lifeless husk of its former self.

by rzyn on Jan 6, 2012 11:44 AM MST reply actions

Human garbage? Really?

I reserve terms like that for child molesters, serial killers, etc. Using it for a guy you think is a bad basketball coach?

Blogging Suns basketball for Bright Side of the Sun from California wine country.
Twitter: @EastBayRaymundo

by East Bay Ray on Jan 6, 2012 11:52 AM MST up reply actions

He's friends with Rush Limbaugh

Again, human garbage

by rzyn on Jan 6, 2012 5:39 PM MST up reply actions

Hell of a player and a coach that took this team to the finals, BOTH freaking times. I will never forget down 0-2 to the Lakers and him saying “Everyone will talk about a great series this has been when we win the next 3”, and they did.
Keep the politics out of it. Cousins fired Westphal. SAC Town sucks. Everyone in the world new Cousins was a punk, but they take him anyways.
Because he is a friend of someone he is human garbage? Geez relax.

by Grockcubs on Jan 7, 2012 4:52 PM MST up reply actions

Anyone who can do basic math could lead a team with Charles Barkley and Kevin Johnson in their primes to the Finals

He was a great player, yes, but he sucks as a coach plain and simple. Outside of the 3 and a half years of riding Chuck’s back to never before seen heights which ended with the team giving up on him him halfway into the season. Even back then he had no system outside of give it to Chuck. Hell, here’s an article from 1996 that talks about just that in the first friggin’ paragraph:
http://articles.nydailynews.com/1996-01-17/sports/17992227_1_suns-bench-paul-westphal-cotton-fitzsimmons

“Here’s how Westphal coaches,” said one Western Conference rival last season. “He says, ‘Charles, go ahead, you take over.’ Five minutes go by and it’s, ‘OK, K.J., it’s your turn.’ Another five minutes go by and it’s, ‘Hey, Danny, you try something.’ What the hell does the guy do?”

After that he had 3 seasons of failure and constant feuds with Gary Payton in Seattle ending with, SURPRISE, the team giving up on him.

And then there’s 2 and a half seasons in Sacramento where he managed to make a bad team even worse and not being able to handle a rookie with all that ending with, golly gosh what could have happened this time? You guessed it, pretty much the whole team giving up on him.

GO COACH WESTFAIL

by rzyn on Jan 8, 2012 9:51 AM MST up reply actions

Make good points.

However players quitting on a coach falls on the players also. Sure you can say it is easy coaching good, star players. However how about the Lakers and Riley? I guess becasue he had Magic, Kareem and Worthy he can’t coach. Hell Paul Westhead went 50-18 after replacing Mckinney and the the championship in 79-80 with the same group. Then Magic gets him fired and Riley wins with the same bunch. Players tank games it is on them.
And in your quote that is ONE rival.

by Grockcubs on Jan 9, 2012 6:50 AM MST up reply actions