Well well, what a ride it was this season. A team who was 11th in the Eastern Conference made it within 2 wins of an NBA title. Unfortunately they ran into a ultra special talent in Steph Curry and this times version of a basketball dynasty. Let's give out some grades!
Ownership - given they didn't truly believe in this team and wanted to shed salary to avoid the tax. My grade for the ownership group is a solid C. Retiring KGs number gave them a fighting chance at a B, but given they traded away JRich who could have been key for them in the finals has me sticking with a C. Another feather in their cap was promoting Brad and hiring Ime.
Brad - what an incredible job by Brad overall given he had to work within a money conscious construct. Let's look at getting Al Horford back here for Kemba. That's an Auerbach type trade that paid off huge for this team. Getting JRich here was awesome and he was rounding into that huge bench scorer we needed. He also flipped JRich for DWhite which helped get us to the finals. He used DS to eventually get back Daniel Theis who had some finer moments for this team. IMO Brad gets an A, he did hire Ime, now for this season find those final few pieces so we can raise Banner 18.
Ime - talk about finding the perfect fit for this team. Ime was everything this group needed and more, once they finally listened and bought in. He brought a defensive first ball club that played hard on almost every possession. He also instilled in them to share the rock and trust in one another. Their belief in his coaching and his belief in them almost lead us to banner 18. What we need to see from Ime is a little better coaching with his sets. Other than that Ime gets an A from me especially being a rookie head coach.
The Team - early on this group looked like the sad team they were last year. Yet through their heart and effort they found themselves into being one of the best teams in the league. We saw a team that excelled on D and gelled on O. A T E A M that is what they truly were. The Jays found that their ceiling is infinite when they play their best. We saw Marcus and Rob dominate on D. Al did everything out there. GWill and PP grew into decent bench players. DWhite proved he could D up anyone. We still have some unanswered questions about Nesmith and Hauser both who can shoot the lights out. Talk about exercising some past failures, beating the Nets, Bucks and Heat on their way to the finals. This gets a grade of A minus from me because of their inconsistencies offensively and falling short of a ring. With that said go get that ring this year and A pluses will be flying around.
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