Hoops

How far off the top 4 are the 36ers?

" Finals are a distraction. " Clarke told ABC TV News
just then, at Adelaide Airport.
" They're what you play for, but they're a distraction in terms of where we are at in our development."

Are you referring to Magden as the king? if so id be reasonably happy to lose Bruce and get Magden, both are similar level players and similar age, Magden is a SA boy and had the better season.

While Ninnis spoke to the new owners - 'Does this mean I have to sign Brad and Darren ?'
'No.' They told him. 'It's your call.'

Not sure I could handle Coach asking my son if he knows where the halfway line is, show me.

As a non-sixer fan i think you have to completely restart fresh, everybody should be considered to be left off the team, and throw away that terrible coach of yours.

Yeah, this is to confirm that only 3 players are signed for next year. Ballinger Johnson Creek.

Bruce/Balls/Big Red; that's the core team that can win games, since we did back in 2008 with that combo.

We've got Herbert and Carter who are great on defence, and personally I think they're great perimeter shooters for their value.

Bring Creek and Johnson off the bench and you have a core of 7 players with 3 spots to spare.

You can get a backup 4, and 6th man shooter and another young PG and you're laughing.

The past 3-4 years have told me that it's folly relying on imports anymore. Just go with Australian talent and leave it there.

Winitinaminute, we didn't sign Howard because Bogut recommended him as far as I know. I believe that was just a comment Bogut made in the media afterward.

EC, while I believe we have finally picked up some good young talent this season, they need time to develop. Right now, player for player, we are well behind most teams at nearly every position.

Considering we have useless imports as well, I think Clarke is doing quite well to have won eight games.

Lets just look at Sydney shall we? Compare it to ours:

Balls v Khaz
Holmes v Dann
Hill v Gilder
Howard v Madgen
Shannon v Martin

Khazzouh is the best centre in the league by a country mile. Balls is doing ok at centre, but he is a power forward.

Holmes v Dann is a wash, because both are extremely limited players who would not start for any other team.

Gilder had a poor start but is now clearly having a bigger impact on games than Hill does. Fair enough too, since he is an import!

Madgen is so far superior to Howard its just embarassing.

Shannon barely beats out Martin, but neither are worth keeping as starters. At least the Kings have an excuse because Martin is not an import!

So, the 'worst' team in the league has three starters who would smash our starters and the other two are basically a wash. That tells me we need significant changes to our personnel.

I wish I could be more positive, but look at that comparison above and what other conclusion can you reach?

I hope Marty is able to have the final say on every player on the team next season. Then we can see if he is getting improvement out of the team. If we haven't improved by the end of next season, I will be right with you about changing the coach, but he needs to be given two years to show what he can do.

Sounds like Ninnis is safe....
I know cutting and pasting isnt the way it should be done, but for those (and most of you will) that would ignore the link have a read.

Heal all set to Coach

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While remaining diplomatic, Heal admitted that Price had struggled to fit in with the culture of the Dragons and of the NBL.

"I don't think that Mark Price understood the commitment that it was going to take to be a head coach in the league and the time that it takes and the lack of resources you have in the NBL compared to the NBA," Heal said.

"The commitment to cutting up tape and doing all of those things is huge and I think that maybe he underestimated what it was going to take."

"He was very introverted like I said, wasn't big on a whole lot of discussion and handed a lot of the day-to-day activities of the coaching to (assistant coach) Scott Ninnes."

Heal though, said that he would instil in the team a hard-work philosophy and remained confident that the club could make a better go at the remaining 16 rounds of the 2006-07 season.

"The philosophy of the club that I want to place on this is about work ethic," he said.

"It's going to be a balance of me being a leader on the court and doing things as a point-guard and creating leaders off the court with Guy (Molloy, a new assistant coach) and Scott (Ninnis) as well."