Eddie Jordan: Worse than Kotite?
Posted by Johnny Goodtimes on December 17th, 2009
I got a message this morning from the Sandman: “Eddie Jordan is the worst coach in Philly since Kotite.” Ouch, them’s fightin words. But here’s what’s interesting about what a terrible coach Eddie Jordan is, and how overrated coaching experience is in the NBA: Tony DiLeo had never coached a basketball team in America in his life (he did, however coach a West German women’s team in the 1980s.). And yet, after he took over last year, he led the Sixers to a 32-27 record. The two players from that team that Jordan does not have to work with are Reggie Evans and Andre Miller. However, Jordan does get to work with Allen Iverson and Elton Brand (who was injured during most of DiLeo’s tenure). So Jordan has taken a team that might be a little bit worse than a team that was over .500 under DiLeo and turned them into a 5-19 monster. Why is he so terrible? Depressed fan grades him on a number of criteria, almost all of which he comes up a dismal failure:
Motivating/massaging egos. F. Calling out players in the press pretty much from the get-go. An unjustified arrogance when talking about his team to the press. Zero consistency when it comes to punishing/rewarding players and a nebulous, sometimes bizarre or dangerous, idea of what type of play earns reward and vice versa.
Implementing the correct system. F-minus. Not only has the PO (Princeton offense) been an abject disaster, his defensive system has completely undermined a roster with a track record of playing good defense and loaded to the gills with superb athletes who can pressure the ball and handle their men one-on-one in most situations.
Rotations. F+ …he’s jerked guys around including Jrue Holiday, Elton Brand and Andre Iguodala. Rodney Carney has been a non-factor and Jason Kapono has been on the floor for the wrong reason at the wrong time almost every game. Now you’ve got Allen Iverson monopolizing the ball (to a lesser extent than in the past, but still) and the lion’s share of the PG minutes on the roster. I haven’t even mentioned leaning on the flawed small lineup, but I don’t think I need to.
In-Game Strategy. F-minus. By every measure, statistical and anecdotal, Jordan is a world class narcissist, believing in his systems (on both ends of the floor) despite a mountain of evidence that things need to be change. It’s this obstinance that leads him refuse to make changes midstream. I guess you have to hand it to him, he set the faulty path and he sticks to his guns right to the bitter end.
Depressed fan throws up lots of great charts and numbers to defend all of his conclusions, though we think he was a little generous in his F+ grade for rotations. Jordan gets a bit more of the benefit of the doubt in this Sports Illustrated article about the Sixers woes, in which he is laughingly called a “proven winner”, a rather amusing term for a coach who has a career winning percentage of under 44%. Then again, in Little League, they told us we were all winners just for trying, so you gotta take that into account. But before we get you too depressed about Eddie Jordan, remember this: when you google image him, this comes up on the first page. There, doesn’t that feel better?
December 17th, 2009 at 4:24 pm
Worse than Doug Moe.
December 17th, 2009 at 7:50 pm
Eddie Jordan is worse than incessant haikus on a sports blog . . .
December 17th, 2009 at 10:19 pm
What we’ve got here is actually pretty close to an actual Catch-22. I can only speculate on why Ed Stefanski hired Eddie Jordan, but he did and now he’s stuck with him. Jordan is quite obviously incompetent, but for Ed to fire him now–a quarter of the way into his first season–would more or less be an admission of HIS OWN incompetence. He chose the guy, right? To make it worse, Eddie Jordan clearly hates Elton Brand and despite Brand’s recent good play, Jordan is keeping him chained to the bench. Besides hiring Jordan, signing Brand was Stefanski’s other big move, so now he’s watching his hand-picked coach lead the team into the toilet while his $75 million free agent languishes on the sidelines. How long can this go on?
December 17th, 2009 at 10:34 pm
Elton Brand cannot play anymore. He is a $75 million albatross. Just a big jump shooter.
December 18th, 2009 at 12:37 pm
Well, the funny part is, a big jump shooter is exactly what is needed in the Princeton offense. And Brand’s numbers are actually really good this year. Jordan just doesn’t give him minutes. Stefanski knew when he fired Mo Cheeks that he was going to have to hire a new coach the next year. And Eddie Jordan was the best he could come up with? He thought that a team of athletic studs would work well in the Princeton offense? Though he has been impressive with his draft picks, otherwise Stefanski has done an awful job.
December 18th, 2009 at 12:44 pm
Roy Hinson II.
December 20th, 2009 at 9:33 am
Stefanski has been impressive with draft picks? Speights and Holliday? Okay Speights looks like a nice player, especially at 16, but Lawson was available when Holliday was up. I think people mistakingly credit him for the Young pick, but that was actually BK.
For reference, Doug Moe had a better winning percentage (.339) for the Sixers when he got canned, than Jordan does now for them (.259) – and Moe went into the hiring with a far better winning percentage (.553 vs .444)