What can Chauncey Billups bring to Portland?
MANILA, Philippines – There has been chatter regarding Portland’s decision to choose Chauncey Billups as head coach of the Trail Blazers over Becky Hammon, Jeff Van Gundy and Mike D’Antoni.
Terry Stotts and the Trail Blazers agreed to part ways after the former failed to get his team out of the first round in four of the last five NBA seasons (he did bring them to the conference finals once and the semifinals once).
Stotts posted the second most number of wins with the club (402-318 record) after nine seasons at the helm.
Well, I do understand the change. The front office wondered if Stotts is now the right coach to get them over the hump.
Furthermore, nine seasons is indeed a long time. Only Jack Ramsey coached longer in Portland with 10 years. Not even Rick Adelman, who led the Trail Blazers to two finals appearances, lasted that long (he was there for six seasons).
If Portland wants to make the most of star Damian Lillard’s his prime, is going with a rookie head coach the right thing to do? Being an NBA champion and a solid player throughout his career has nothing to do with coaching. It is entirely a different thing.
Assuming that Lillard will stay, it is contingent upon the Trail Blazers to add more talent to this team because clearly, they aren’t world beaters.
What does Billups bring to the table? What can he draw from his pro career into his coaching?
The underdog feeling and weight of expectations
A few years into his NBA career, many pro analysts looked at him as a draft bust notwithstanding his occasional moments where he lit up the scoreboard.
It was sitting injured and not playing for the Orlando Magic and then playing for the Minnesota Timberwolves where he changed as a player. The long hours of introspection with Orlando where he didn’t do anything at all and Minnesota proved to be the right situation for Chauncey.
He had the benefit of being mentored by an even-keeled Terrell Brandon and playing with a young team of Timberwolves that became a contender.
It helped that in his next team, the Detroit Pistons, they won as a team. And they were vast underdogs to the Los Angeles Lakers.
Furthermore, Billups knows what it is like to play with superstar teammates (Kevin Garnett, Carmelo Anthony and Chris Paul)
Surely, Billups has to draw on that success.
He understands being a two-way player
Billups is one of those rare two-guard players who not only could score — he wasn’t called “Mr. Big Shot” for nothing — and hit the big shot but also play defense. He was named to the All-Defensive Second Team twice in his career.
He was a leader and a winner
When Brandon went down with an injury, it was Billups who picked it up several notches, and the result was a 50-win season for Minnesota. Granted he played alongside Garnett, Wally Sczerbiak and Sam Mitchell, he made things go for the T-Wolves.
Billups was also a team captain on those very good Detroit teams and they won an NBA title.
Every team he joined after was better. Maybe they didn’t win the NBA title, but they were better. So Billups knows what it is like to help jumpstart teams.
Maybe his tenure as an assistant coach in the NBA for a season isn’t enough when he was on the bench of Tyronn Lue. What is key here is his selection of assistant coaches and the advice that he takes.
But Billups can draw upon all these to help bring Portland out of the doldrums. He cannot do it alone for sure. If the front office cannot bring in top reinforcements, I don’t think this team is capable of transforming itself.
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