In one of the more surprising moves last season, the New York Knicks fired head coach Derek Fisher. The team and Fisher had seemingly made improvements since his first year as a head coach. Nevertheless, team president Phil Jackson decided to fire Fisher halfway through the year.
There have been several explanations given for the decision. Chief among them has been Fisher’s decision to move slightly away from the Triangle and run more modern systems.
Jackson, however, has a different explanation, centered around millenials because of course it is.
Following via Charley Rosen of Today’s Fastbreak:
“And because Derek was still in a player’s mindset, he’d talk to the guys about diet, how to approach shootarounds, the importance of gameday naps, of game preparation, and of being ready for the practices that are called the day after games. He was training individuals, which was really in tune with the so-called millennials, young people and young players who are primarily interested in themselves. In the NBA, these young guys are concerned with what playing for whatever team they’re on can do for them. Can playing in New York or Boston or LA or wherever add 10K followers to my Twitter account? Will the local media get me lucrative endorsements? What do I have to concentrate on to get a better contract?
“One difference I had with Derek is that I’m much more interested than he was in training groups. The Knights of the Round Table kind of thing.”
There’s a lot to digest here, so let’s go.
I don’t doubt that Derek Fisher tried to train individuals, but that seems like an iffy criticism. The Knicks had a young team that needed development more than wins. Young players like Jerian Grant and Langston Galloway were improving under Fisher’s watch partially because of the emphasis placed on their individual skills.
Training within a team concept is obviously important. But the whole is only greater than the sum of the parts when the parts have enough to contribute.
The millenial aspect of Phil Jackson’s quote just sounds like scapegoating. It also doesn’t sound like something a young free agent would want to hear from a prospective new home.
Finally, I’m no expert but I’m pretty sure the Knights of the Round Table had some killer individual talent, too. They were definitely a playoff team, though.
