Quote Originally Posted by Harison
Great coaches get the most out of players, have good offensive and defensive schemes (or at least get assistants who do), can manage their egos, team delivers better out of time-outs, etc.

Flip does none of those things well. I was watching him for over a decade, he is bellow average coach. Even Mike Brown is better, who can only do one thing well - defense, nothing else.

What concerns Pistons, Larry won championship in one of the greatest overachievements in NBA history in '04, in '05 he was in the Finals again. Flip took over after that, and outside of winning more games in the regular season, can you say anything good about those Pistons teams? No championships, no Finals. Mike Brown was also winning a lot of Regular season games (more like Lebron was), it didnt mean squat in the Playoffs.

Let's begin by clarifying that nobody said Saunders was a "great" coach. That's a term that's thrown around and overused in sports in general.

Saunders throughout his career has been recognized as a very good defensive coach. That Detroit team ran into Miami and a career-defining post season from Wade in the ECF. That he didn't match the level of success Larry Brown had with those players? Well, add him to a long list. Brown legitimately is a "great" coach.

Saunders is a solid NBA coach who took over a dysfunctional team and franchise in Washington, wasn't able to get a professional level of effort out of a horrible group of players, and probably deserved to be fired. But to call someone who has had 10 winning seasons out of 15 in the NBA a "below average coach" is ridiculous imo.