For example the whole lay up thing.  Sure a lay up missed is on the player but if you have a player that misses multiple lay ups or a team that misses multiple lay ups that is on the coach to make that right.  If you have players that miss lay ups late in games habitually that is also on the coach.  Particularly it means you have a conditioning issue which often times leads to a lack of focus issue.  Those things can be corrected by the coach.  If it can’t what is the point of having one.

I was going to prepare this long, long response but I decided against it.  Instead I will address some of what you are saying in short posts because they are things I have wanted to write about anyway.

And Dave, don’t worry about coming after me.  I didn’t read that at all.  You were just attacking my comments which is all good.  We just don’t like personal attacks here.

Dannie, didn’t mean to come after you like that haha, I had a long drive today off not a lot of sleep, hope I didn’t take a crappy tone there.  But I just really disagree with a lot of what you said in your response to my earlier post.   

Also, I’ve always felt things like “missed layups” are something much more on the individual player, and not on the coach.  A coach can repeat a mantra of how many layups are missed repeatedly, but often this will have no concrete effect on whether this improves or not.  It is up to the player to practice specific individual drills with hand-footwork around the basket so that any layup type shot…reverse layups, going off the correct foot, positioning, attacking with strength, ability to use both hands equally, scoring from the baseline and behind the basket…will come naturally and as easy as breathing 

A coach has far less control over this than an individual player…he can only do so much with a missed-layup type of play.  Screaming about it tends not to help to much.  I feel when it comes to dumbass plays at the end of games, the only thing you can do is mention it, point it out, explain what should have happened, and then move on.  
My philosophy tends to center around the fact that games are not won or lost in the 4th quarter off one or two plays…be them tiny mistakes or true bonehead plays.  I think there’s an unnecessary fixation in basketball that hiccups in the 4th quarter are what causes the loss.  To me, it’s much more a conglomeration of many mistakes made throughout the game.  I also think this is what a coach has the most direct control of.  Hence, I think a coach is wasting his time when he gripes about a botched play or two…that type of stuff will happen.  

Where a coach should be SCREAMING about and pushing in the team’s face is the same types of errors that have been made numerous times throughout a game, especially if they are caused from a. lack of consistency  b. lack of enthusiasm  c. lack of flat out not knowing what to do/confusion  d. lack of fundamentals when executing.  

To me, in the Orlando game, this was defensive rotations.  In the first half, this was ATROCIOUS.  We need to be a top 5-7 defensive team in order for our parts to play at a quicker pace and overcome our shooting deficiencies.  This Orlando game, we did not do this.  This is the reason the Magic was so effective scoring against us, and a reason they hit long range shots against us.  

I don’t see how you can argue this wasn’t a huge cog having to do with this individual game…just because it represents a larger problem in many games of the season doesn’t mean it didn’t affect last night’s score.  It is exactly the recurring problems from one game to another that tangibly effects the outcome of each game more then any one timeout situation, one missed jumpshot or botched play.  

Also, just because the Magic are a good offensive team doesn’t excuse our inability to make defensive rotations.  I’d argue we should be putting forth MORE energy and mental toughness on this one aspect of defense when it comes to the big games against strong offensive teams.  So what if Dwight Howard is doubled teamed often?  I’m not arguing it will take longer to help or get out to the perimeter when that’s the case…I’m saying that we weren’t doing this at all, or far too late, and it had nothing to do with the fact we were helping in the interior sometimes.

Also, the specific 7-8 plays I’m referring to happened when we weren’t double teaming anyone, which makes the total look of team confusion when we take 10 seconds to rotate to the three point line, or step up to help when an opposing player drives, all the more embarrassing.  This stuff is just inexcusable, and what worries me is I have barely seen any improvement in this area in 15 games.

Lastly…I disagree with your defense of the box score with the Magic’s three point shooting.  I don’t think you can compare our defensive effort to their normal three point shooting as a team.  Who cares what their normal % is vs. what we held them to.  What matters is HOW we did it.  And the way we held them to a decent % was because we got friggin lucky, not because of skill.  Rashard Lewis, Hedo and Reddick can hit 3’s at a 40% clip or above.  Pietrus is at 35% or above.  We let these guys have FIVE blatently wide open threes where not one Sixer uniform was NEAR them.  This is shitty D, and from 40% long bomb shooters, total luck their shot was off.  

I know I sound like a broken record here, but defense should be, and needs to be, our strong point.  A team should look like they play defense together as one organism, that is shifting, helping, rotating and constantly moving and communicating based on what the other team is doing.  It requires not only the technical profficiency but will and desire to do so.  

We are showing neither of these two categories in the majority of our games.  The Magic scored many easy backups because we are not helping each other out on D when one man gets burned or is occupied helping someone else.  This is why we lost.  And if we show the same lack of defensive teamwork and cohesion against Boston, then the green machine is going to slaughter us.

Dave T, its’ funny I was thinking about you when Speights came in and played some excellent D! lol